When a bat boy changes the rules
Less than three months after Darren Baker – then the 3-year-old bat boy and son of San Francisco Giants manager Dusty Baker – finds himself narrowly missing being plowed over at home plate during the World Series, Major League Baseball 22 years ago today sets a minimum age of 14 for bat boys.
Darren Baker gains regional attention in Northern California before the World Series by running out to pick up bats during some of his father’s home games.
Young Darren, though, nearly becomes a national headline for all the wrong reasons during the seventh inning of Game 5 of the 2002 World Series against the Anaheim Angels.
That is when young Darren innocently, albeit mistakenly, runs from the dugout to home plate to retrieve a bat, but instead finds himself running into a middle of a live play as San Francisco’s J.T. Snow scores the first run of a two-run triple hit by Kenny Lofton.
J.T. Snow scores a run, saves a kid
The problem arrives when Darren Baker not only fails to see Snow rapidly approaching the plate to give the Giants a 9-4 lead, he also does not see the hard-charging David Bell right behind Snow with San Francisco’s 10th run.
Snow, who clearly inherits a great pair of hands from his father – former NFL Pro Bowl receiver Jack Snow – quickly grabs Baker by his extra small team jacket as he crosses the plate, lifts him into his arms and saves him from a potential collision with Bell and Angels catcher Bengie Molina.
Years later, Darren Baker says if not for Lofton being his favorite player, the near collision never would happen as fellow bat boy Nikolai Bonds – the 13-year-old son of Giants left fielder Barry Bonds – prepares to pick up the bat.
After the play is over, of course.
Like a bat boy should.
“Nikolai said he was going to get Kenny Lofton’s bat before me,” Darren Baker tells MLB.com in 2022, “and (Lofton) was my favorite player, so right when the bat dropped, I ran out there. Without the video, it’s like it never happened.”
Fast forward more than two decades later and Darren Baker today is an aspiring second baseman in the Washington Nationals’ system, a 10th-round pick out of the University of California in the 2021 amateur draft.
Now 25, Baker is coming off a 2024 season in which he rises through Washington’s system at Class AAA Rochester before making his major league debut on Sept. 1 with the Nationals.
He promptly goes 7-for-14 over nine games in his brief time in the majors.
Great moment, for sure, for Baker.
The bat boy eventually becomes a ballplayer
Despite that early success as a major league player, Baker knows, at least for now, he is best remembered nationally for his time as a 3-year-old batboy during the 2002 World Series.
And, Baker embraces that.
“It’s a funny moment. I talk about it at least once a day. It’s something that will stay forever.”
Especially with his father.
Dusty Baker not only needs to answer questions from the national media after his son’s near-collision during Game 5 of the 2002 World Series, he also needs to deal with a more imposing presence.
Namely, Grandma.
“I saw the play unfold,” Dusty Baker says, “and I was thinking about what my mom told me: ‘He shouldn’t be out there, he’s going to get hurt.’ I said, ‘Mom, I know what I’m doing.’
“First call I get in the clubhouse (after the game) was my mom to tell me, ‘I know you listen to me sometimes. Just listen to me this time.’ She told me to thank J.T., and I thanked him for saving him and the whole situation.”