This was a day where the official address of Great American Ballpark would be changed to 100 Joe Nuxhall Way and a skyscraper sized banner of Ken Griffey Jr. would be placed on an adjacent building. Not to mention the first 10,000 fans to enter the stadium received a bronze statue of Joe Nuxhall (luckily we got two of them).

If the nostalgia surrounding the game itself wasn't enough, the right field seats were. Since Joe is originally from Hamilton, Ohio, one section of the right field bleachers was reserved for the West Side Little League teams along with friends and family. Getting there early enough allowed us to watch batting practice for both teams and enjoy homeruns by players like Albert Pujols, Jay Bruce, Rick Ankiel, Joey Votto, and many others.

Oh, then of course about fifteen minutes before the game was about to start we realized another historic event was about to happen. We were going to witness the major league debut of Mitchell Boggs. While the name may not be familiar to many, Mitchell is the son of Hall of Fame third baseman Wade Boggs who spent his career in Boston. Needless to say the younger Boggs would provide what the Cincinnati Reds couldn't; a pitcher.

On the mound for the Reds was overrated phenom Homer Bailey who proved to fans and coach Dusty Baker he just isn't ready for the majors. In fact, he may never be. He looked good, but only for the first two innings as the Cardinals opened it up with homeruns by Pujols and Ryan Ludwick. Once Bailey gave up a double to Ludwick in the fourth and giving St. Louis a five run lead Homer Bailey was off to the showers.

Boggs on the other hand had a lot of movement on his pitches giving up only two run on four hits over five innings. His only mistake was a homerun given up to Reds first baseman Joey Votto in the bottom of the fourth. After Boggs left the game relievers Villone, McClellan, Perez, and Russ Springer combined for five strikeouts and allowed only one hit the rest of the way out.

The final score ended up being a Cardinals win 7-2. While it definitely put a damper on the home crowd, it couldn't take away from all the history that surrounded this game. Pictures of Nuxhall flashed up on the big screen throughout the game as both a player and his long career as a Cincinnati Reds broadcaster. In between the tribute was a replay of Griffey Jr.'s 600th homerun just one night before against the Florida Marlins.

For those of you who don't know, Joe Nuxhall was the youngest player to play in a baseball game in the modern era of major league history. This was most in part to World War II which depleted rosters around the league. Although his father Orville Nuxhall was the Reds primary target, he wasn't interested. So the team signed the younger Nuxhall on February 18th, 1944 at the ripe age of 15.

Later on Nuxhall even commented on the fact that he was pitching against thirteen and fourteen year old boys at one point, then all of the sudden he was pitching against players like Hall of Famer Stan Musial. While his career pitching stats are no more than mediocre, his sixty plus years with the Cincinnati Reds organization billed him as one of the most memorable figures ever to dawn a uniform for their team.

It took nearly eight months for long time friend and radio announcer Marty Brennaman to put together a tribute on this day. A team that is well below their expectations with future Hall of Famer Ken Griffey Jr. on their team and a young supporting cast, no one really expected the Reds to compete. However, it's times like these that give youngsters and adults alike the excitement that revolves around our National Pastime. We're just glad we got to be there to experience it first hand.

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