| |
Pat DiNizio’s 7th Inning Stretch to Air July 12 - Smithereen's ESPN TV special combines baseball, rock ‘n’ roll
Since Smithereens leader Pat DiNizio is a singer/songwriter who hits one out of the park any time he picks up a guitar and a pen, you can bet we’ll be watching when Dinizio combines his love of music with his love of baseball on his own ESPN2 reality television special, 7th Inning Stretch, which debuts at 10 p.m. EST on Wednesday night, July 12 (check local listings for air times).
The show arose from pretty dire circumstances—DiNizio was sidelined a couple years ago with a serious illness, and he turned to his love for baseball as part of a long recovery process. Never one to merely sit around, he kept on swinging, in both the musical and the athletic senses. He has kept playing music all along with the Smithereens and on his own popular solo “living room concert” tours, and the whole baseball thing led to ESPN’s interest in what would become 7th Inning Stretch.
We wouldn’t want to give away all the details; suffice it to say that for the special, DiNizio enlisted the highly capable aid of Smithereens fans from the baseball world such as New York Yankee Don Mattingly, David Wells of the Boston Red Sox, Baltimore Oriole Cal Ripken Jr., San Diego Padre Tony Gwynn, and others, plus some of DiNizio’s music-biz pals, as noted below.
At home in stately DiNizio Manor in lovely Scotch Plains, N.J., in early July, the man himself deftly fielded a call from Fender News about the upcoming broadcast …
FN: How did 7th Inning Stretch come about?
PD: It was my idea. I had gotten very ill with a life-threatening and very debilitating nervous disorder, and baseball got me through it. I was watching games, and my imagination was running wild, and I’d heard about the men’s leagues in Jersey. And I just wanted to get in shape, and it became a goal in my mind to try to get off the Prednisone—the steroid that had ballooned my weight up and swelled up everything. That goal helped me to wean myself off the medication, and to start exercising and attempting to get back in shape.
Then, somehow, it evolved into a reality show for ESPN. I wasn’t even thinking of a TV show at first.
FN: When was it filmed?
PD: Over the course of the past year.
FN: And what will we see in the show?
PD: You’re going to see me getting advice and instruction from very famous future Hall of Fame baseball players. Don Mattingly gives me batting instruction in Yankee Stadium. David Wells is one of 17 pitchers in the history of the game to ever pitch a perfect game—he throws to me off the mound at Fenway Park. Cal Ripken Jr. gives me advice; Tony Gwynn, who won the National League batting title eight times, gives me advice.
Bob Euchre is in it—he and I are sitting in the dugout at Wrigley Field. There are a lot of ballplayers who are very important to the game giving me hands-on advice. Julio Franco, who is the world’s oldest professional baseball player, is telling me about longevity and the proper mental attitude toward the game—and the game of life; not just the game of baseball.
FN: Were you already acquainted with these guys?
PD: No. They were aware of my music and the career and music of the Smithereens. When I reached out to them, they were very gracious and generous to me.
FN: Some of your musical friends are in it, too …
PD: A lot of my friends and associates whom I’ve met and worked with in the music industry over the past 26 years make appearances in the show. It’s a very diverse group of people—Bruce Springsteen is in it, Joan Jett is in it; Todd Rundgren, George Thorogood, B.B. King and the Go-Go’s.
It’s baseball meets rock ‘n’ roll. There are similarities, as you well know if you’ve ever played in a band. There’s a distinct relationship between in a touring rock ‘n’ roll band and playing for a professional baseball team. You’re on the road all the time; you’re part of a team; you’re playing for an audience. The lifestyle is very similar in terms of what you do. And if you excel, everyone wins—you win; the band wins; the baseball team wins; and the fans win.
FN: Do you perform music in it?
PD: Oh yeah, there’s a lot of performance footage of the Smithereens. Oh, and featuring our all-Fender guitar lineup (laughs heartily)!
FN: (laughing) Ah, touché!
PD: It’s true! Jimmy (Smithereens guitarist Jim Babjak) is playing a ’52 Telecaster® reissue throughout the show; I’m playing my Sunburst Buddy Holly Stratocaster®, and the bass player is playing an orange Fender Precision®.
FN: So what did you get out of the whole project?
PD: I loved it. And I could probably coach a professional baseball team, after everything I learned about the game. Especially hitting. I got to the point where I could hit a 90 mph fastball.
In summation, based on my experience of going on this journey across America to try to find the heart of baseball, I found that—for me, at least—it’s easier to hit a 90 mph fastball than it is to write a hit song. It’s the truth. I taught myself how to hit; I got in the batting cage every day for a year, from 100 degrees down to 9 degrees outside in the snow, and took 300 swings a day.
Songs come from nowhere, and there’s no real game plan; no formula for writing a great song. But there is definitely some sort of blueprint for hitting a baseball, even though it’s the hardest thing to do in the whole sport. I mean, you have a bat and you have a ball that’s coming at you, so everything is there and you figure out a way to do it. It’s physical, it’s concrete and you know what you’re dealing with, whereas writing a memorable pop song or a song that might even stand a chance of becoming a hit is a much more elusive thing.
FN: But you’ve certainly done it before.
PD: Well, (laughs again) what man has done, men can do …
FN: And did your health improve?
PD: Absolutely. I lost about 80 pounds, and I learned a lot of new things that have benefited me. I challenged myself in ways I could never have imagined, in terms of trying to get in shape after a debilitating illness, and I think I did the best I could with it.
But I can’t reveal the ending of the show; you’ll have to see that for yourself.
Pat DiNizio's 7th Inning Stretch airs on ESPN2 at 10 p.m. EST on Wednesday, July 12. Check local listings for air times in your area.
Visit Pat DiNizio online at www.patdinizio.com; visit the Smithereens online at hawkfan.com/Smithereens.
This article is related to a Fender 60th Anniversary Random Act of Rock—click here to view. |
|
|
|
|
