(#46)
Mississippi Gulf Coast always had a serious home field advantage in Perkinston.
In 1993, in a 3-3 tie, with nobody on base and two outs in the bottom of the seventh inning, the Bulldog’s lead-off hitter hit a line drive down the left field line.
Before it could roll into the corner for at least a double… it rolled down in a rabbit hole.
The runner sprinted around the bases for an unlikely game-winning in-the-park home run.
After a brief one-sided argument, the home plate umpire, with a lot of help by Hall-of-Famer coach Ken “Curly” Farris, ruled that “if a ball rolls down in a rabbit hole,” the outfielder should raise his hands and alert the umpires.
In this case, the fact that the outfielder reached down in “said” rabbit hole, meant that he was making a play of the ball and the ball was live.
Home run. In-the-park home run. In-a-rabbit-hole-in-the-park home run! Only at Perk!
From that point on, no matter where we played, we discussed what the ground rule was if a fair ball rolled down in a rabbit hole.
Always got some strange looks.
Their dugout was brutal. When we made an error, they would throw a boot tied to a rope out of the dugout and chanted “Boot, boot, boot!” as they pulled it back in. They screamed obscenities at our players. They did everything they could to distract the pitcher.
I had instructed Pat Rapp on our 1986 or 87 trip to Perk, to stay focused and no matter what they said or did, don’t look over in that dugout… no matter what they say or do. He was pitching a shutout through six innings that day. In the bottom of the seventh, he looked over there. Not sure what they said or did, but he heard it and we lost. I think the same thing happened to Chad Bradford years later. For some reason he could not throw a strike in the bottom of the seventh. And every ball he threw, the louder it got.
But we got our payback when they came to Raymond. Our guys recruited a left-field lounge of students and friends. The crowd was huge and they were brutal! The left fielder was distraught. He struck out four times and dropped two fly balls that day. They called him everything but a Christian. Even Coach Farris was crying to umpires. “They can’t do that!” I really enjoyed it. Payback. They deserved it. I coined a word for that day… karma-isa. 😁
A lot times the foul lines were chalked crooked. I was always told by Coach Farris that it would be okay because if was “fair for both teams.” That was a Perk oxymoron.
When you hear “fair for both teams” at Perkinston, get ready for trouble.
WE hit a ball that was fair and it was called foul because the foul line was crooked. And on more than one occasion, THEY would hit a ball that was foul and it was called fair because the foul line was crooked.
Lessons learned: Everything was crooked at Perk. It was all foul. Not much was fair.
Things happen, but things always happened at Perk.
Ken “Curly Farris, circa 1970s 
The Rabbit Hole
Rick Clarke's Diary of a Mad Baseball Coach 