Tampa Bay Rays left-hander Shane McClanahan grew up with a lifesize Cal Ripken Jr. poster on his bedroom wall. Saturday, when he takes the mound at Camden Yards for the first time, he just might see his boyhood hero beyond the backstop.
McClanahan, 24, was born in Baltimore, and although his family moved to Florida when he was 5, he maintained a love for the Orioles — and for Ripken, a franchise icon who has seats behind home plate at Camden Yards and very well could take in McClanahan’s start from there Saturday.
“I’m gonna go out there and pitch regardless,” McClanahan said while standing in the visitor’s dugout at Oriole Park, “but it’d be definitely sick to have the guy that you worshipped growing up be at the game, even though he’s not rooting for you.