Fishing-boat captain

Lure of nostalgia can't reel him in; there's only one sport for Yaz now

September 27, 2005|Stan Grossfeld, Globe Staff

SOMEWHERE NEAR PLUM ISLAND -- The striped bass are in a feeding frenzy, splashing about in shallow waters, gorging on bait fish. Carl Yastrzemski glides his boat upriver, grabs his fishing pole, and sends the lure screaming toward them. A line drive throw that approximates the distance from Fenway's Green Monster to second base. A throw Captain Carl perfected in a 23-year Hall of Fame career.

Yaz works the rod, making the lure zigzag like a minnow. One striper breaks loose and chases it, snaps and misses. Strike one. Yaz giggles, and slows down his reeling, ever so slightly. The striper bolts again and there's a big splash as it gulps the lure. Yaz laughs, pulls back, sets the hook, his fists wrapped tightly over the rod, his hands up high, as in his old batting stance. He reels in the striper, which is not a keeper. Then he pulls out the needle-nose pliers and releases the hook. He leans forward and asks the striper a direct question: ''Where is your father?" The fish disappears back into the river.

The great Yastrzemski, the last man to win the Triple Crown in 1967, is drifting downstream. It is a perfect September day. The weather is warm, the pennant race is hot. We will see more geese than people, and Yaz likes it that way.

''Just say we're fishing the Merrimack River," says Yaz, flashing that famous smile. ''Be vague."

He is now 66 years old and still can't go to a restaurant without being disturbed by autograph hounds. ''In Florida I can, but not here," he says. He doesn't fish in the ocean much anymore. ''I stopped ocean," he says. ''I got too beat up." But No. 8 is a master fisherman.

He once hooked a 500-pound blue marlin.

''It was off Cabo," he says. ''I saw him coming, the big fin. It hit me like a train. I wouldn't let the captain back up. That's a no-no with me. It's cheating. He did 10 jumps, he was absolutely beautiful. Then he went down, down, and got off. I never got him in. I was glad. I fought him for two hours. Now I like to just cut the engine and drift."

Drifting with Yaz near the Merrimack River is fun. He never anchors, just floats with the tide. He doesn't have a fishfinder on board his 19-foot skiff because he is a fishfinder. ''Those things don't work anyway," he says. ''They only spot the baitfish."

He is a hard-core fisherman, out there rain or shine, and he never seems to get skunked.

For the first American Leaguer to garner 3,000 hits and 400 home runs, this is heaven. In eight years rolling on the river, he has never had to sign an autograph. Yaz shuns the limelight. He's not looking to be a broadcaster or do a book. He has nothing he wants to promote. He only goes to the ballpark five times a year, preferring to watch the games on TV. ''I need to see the pitch location," he says. And he never looks back.