On a recent trip to Cooperstown, I bought a sweatshirt for my mom. It had the words "Baseball Mom" handsomely embroidered on the front. The first impression of its meaning may be that the moniker refers to a mom who drives her kids to little league games and practices (ala a "soccer mom"), dutifully watches all of the games, and consoles her children after defeats.

In that sense, I suppose that my mom technically isn't a "Baseball Mom" (after all, I'm a good twenty-five years removed from my youth baseball days). Rather, she has earned the distinction in an equally meaningful way. She has always understood my fascination with the game of baseball and has never tried to discourage it. In fact, she has done many wonderful things over the years to enhance my enjoyment of the game simply because she knows how much the sport means to me.

When I was seven years old, my favorite player was San Francisco outfielder Bobby Bonds. While shopping in a local department store one day, my mom saw a Giants T-shirt with the number "25" on the back (Bobby's jersey number, of course). Not only did she buy it for me, but she also put my name on the back so that I "could look like all the rest of the Giants". I was ecstatic. I remember wearing that shirt religiously every time I went out to play ball that summer. And, truth be told, I also remember feeling like more of a ballplayer with my name and the number of my favorite player hanging on my back.

When I went away to college, my "care packages" from home included copies of the San Francisco Chronicle's "Sporting Green" (so I could follow the plight of my beloved Giants from a local angle) along with the requisite baked goods and clean socks.

In 1987 when the Giants ended a 16-year playoff drought by capturing the NL West Division title, my dad was able to get a pair of highly coveted tickets for Game Four of the NLCS between the St. Louis Cardinals and the Giants. Naturally, he invited my mom to go with him. However, she insisted that my dad and I go to the game together. In turn, I insisted that she go. Even as this sort of reverse tug-of-war (i.e., each side insisting that the other "win") ensued, I knew that my cause was hopeless. My mom may be the sweetest, most gentle person on the face of the Earth, but when she is determined to see something happen it is almost a certainty that it will. Eventually, I realized that she would be genuinely angry with me if I didn't take the ticket. So, I relented and accepted the ticket.

Of course, Mom's wisdom ruled the day. With the Giants trailing 2-1, Jeffrey Leonard hit a dramatic two-run homer in the bottom of the fifth and proceeded to round the bases in his now-famous "one flap down" home run trot. As the crowd rose to its collective feet and roared to a near-deafening pitch, I turned to my dad and instinctively went to give him a high five. To my surprise, he was ready for it and returned the favor. As we stood there with ridiculously giddy grins on our faces and screaming our heads off, I realized that it was one of those special father-son-bonding moments. And in hindsight, my mom likely offered me the ticket in the first place in hopes that such a moment might occur. To this day, it is the only post season game I have ever seen in person and because I was able to share that experience with my dad it remains one of my fondest baseball memories.

My mom has always inherently understood the place baseball has in my heart. She not only saved my old baseball cards but also stacked and sealed them neatly in boxes so that when I retrieved them years later they were basically in the same condition as the day I last rifled through them as a child.

Although she is a cursory fan of the game herself (pulls for the local team to do well, is familiar with names of the some of the bigger stars, etc), I think she enjoys the game because of the special connection it gives with her son.

Although baseball will always have a special place in my heart, it is not nearly as special a place as the one I have reserved for my mom and all of things she has done for me throughout my life.

I love you, Mom. Happy Mother's Day.