By Jeremy Walsh
You’ve heard of “Casey at the Bat,” but what about canine at the bat?
One scrappy shepherd−mix got her turn on the diamond last week after construction workers spotted her running around the still−under−construction Citi Field.
Jackie, a year−old white−and−brown dog, proved to be quite the runner just like her namesake, Jackie Robinson, eluding shelter workers for a day before being captured and taken to Manhattan, where reports of her pre−season escapades drew a pack of eager adopters.
Michael Pastore, a coordinator with the New York Center for Animal Care and Control, drove out to the stadium in Flushing Jan. 6.
They did not see the dog, so they returned the next day.
“It was pouring out,” Pastore said. “We were soaked. We walked along the warning track first, and we spotted the dog, she was near the home plate area. She started to come up the first base line and took a detour into the stands. We went up into the stands to see if we could scoop her up with a rope, but she moved really quick.”
Workmen later trapped the dog in a fenced enclosure on the second−story loge.
When he got upstairs, Pastore found a rail−thin, 35−pound mutt eager to duck all the attention.
“She was skittish,” Pastore said. “You go two steps to her, and she’d take four steps back.”
Pastore took Jackie back to the nonprofit group’s Manhattan shelter, where she stayed for several days as news reports drummed up interest. By the time she was ready to be adopted, five or six families were ready, Pastore said.
“I think the story that went along [with] this animal definitely propelled it to a higher status than the other animals,” he said, noting the shelter typically has several hundred animals ready for adoption at any given time.
