On the street across from the little stadium in Dunedin, Fla., there used to be a cozy greasy spoon that made terrific breakfasts.

The waitress wore a faded yellow dress with white trim and wrote my order on a similarly coloured notepad — until I appeared three consecutive mornings, after which she'd say, "Same?" Soon my poached eggs, crisp bacon, brown toast and freshly squeezed orange juice appeared at my table as I browsed the morning paper.

I used to attend baseball's spring training as a sports world interloper. I've never been a sportswriter in the sense of covering a "beat" such as baseball, hockey or football. But for several years, the Globe and Mail asked me to write about baseball during spring training, which allowed me to stay with the sports guys in the newspaper's condo.

One March, it was that high-rise condo with a balcony overlooking the Gulf of Mexico watching the fat pelicans, another March it was a gated-townhouse with the screened-in veranda on the outskirts of Dunedin.

Baseball's spring training began some 100 years ago when the Chicago Cubs set out for Hot Springs, Ariz., in March to get a jump on the summer. Next, John McGraw took his New York Giants to southern California, then Branch Rickey discovered Florida and the giddy prospect of wealthy retired folks anxious to bask in the sun and actually pay to watch meaningless exhibition games.

What I enjoyed most about spring training was the access to the players. One actually gets a chance to schmooze with the players, even some of the stars, who haven't yet mastered their summertime game faces, and mid-season arrogance. I made friends with the likes of players such as Rick Bosetti, Ron Taylor, Jim Gott, Larry Hisle and a lovely ol' pitching coach named Al Widmar.

There's a loosey-goosey camaraderie under the sun of Florida in March, which across most of Canada is one of the most vile months of the year. In 1993 — the year the Blue Jays won their second consecutive World Series — my son, Sean, joined me as we set out to do a book on the team.

Before one afternoon game at Grant Field, Joe Carter of the Jays and National League umpire Frank Pulli swapped stories and wisecracks on the soft grass by the left-field sidelines.

"I can't wait to go north," Carter mused.

"I don't blame you," Pulli said.

"Why's that?"

"Because you can't hit for shit down here."

Blue Jays slugger Joe Carter, right, was part of two World Series teams in Toronto. (Frank Gunn/Canadian Press)I never made friends with Carter, not that he isn't a thoroughly decent human. And I didn't meet Ron Taylor in Florida. He's the reliever from Toronto's Leaside neighbourhood who helped the 1969 New York Mets to an improbable World Series win. I met him far away in Alberta, when he was coaching the Lethbridge Lakers in the mid-1970s. He's my family doctor now, and we've bumped into one another often in Florida.

One October in the early 1980s, I brought a friend to Ron's house to watch the start of a World Series. "You must miss baseball terribly this time of year," she said to Ron.

"Not at all," Ron replied. "I'm a doctor now and baseball is far behind me. I don't even think about baseball anymore. What would you like to drink?"

Minutes later, he appeared with our drinks, dressed from cap to Astro-turf cleats in his 1969 Mets uniform.

Early days with the Jays

Rick Bosetti was a peppy young outfielder who toiled for the Jays in the early 1980s. He was born in Redding, a pretty mid-sized city in northern California. I met Bosetti in Florida and when the team moved to Toronto I visited him at his house in Mississauga, Ont. He retired when he was 28, saying, "I'm at the twilight of a mediocre career." He took pride in the achievement of peeing in every outfield in the major leagues. Last I heard, he was mayor of Redding.

Jim Gott was a starting pitcher, born in Hollywood —yes, that Hollywood, the one in California with the movie stars. He had shown much potential the year before and he was having a splendid spring, then suddenly he couldn't pitch. Nothing worked. Turned out he had a severe case of blisters on his pitching hand, between his index and middle fingers — blisters as hard as lobster shells.

Fans sent him old home remedies, such as ample doses of pickle juice, but nothing worked. I happened to find if not the cure, then at least the cause of Gott's malady. I was as addicted as he was to playing Ms. Pac-Man, a wildly popular arcade video game at the time. I, too, developed blisters between my index and middle fingers. When I showed Gott my blisters and explained how I got them, he looked crestfallen, and a bit scared.

"Hope you're not writing about this," he told me.

I never did, until now, when Gott is safely away from baseball and back in Hollywood, this time working in the movie business. For the 2002 movie The Rookie, about a high school teacher named Jim Morris who makes it to the Bigs as a rookie in his 30s, Gott worked as a pitching instructor for the character played by Dennis Quaid.

Baseball sun can be torrid

I sometimes sat in the press box with Al Widmar, the Blue Jays pitching coach. Between 1945 and 1952, he played for the Boston Red Sox, St. Louis Browns and Chicago White Sox. As a coach, Widmar worked with the Phillies, Brewers and Blue Jays. For some reason, he liked what Sean and I were trying to do as a father-son writing team

One hot afternoon in an open SkyDome in Toronto, Widmar and I were watching from the press box when we both were recovering from skin cancer. My nose was bandaged, one of Widmar's ears was bandaged. Baseball players often come down with skin cancer on their ears because their ears aren't protected and the baseball sun can be torrid.

Two things I remember from that afternoon chat in the press box. I asked Widmar what a pitcher thinks when a hitter, in a bunting situation, has two strikes and tries to lay down a bunt. The rules are that if the hitter fails to bunt the ball fair when he has two strikes, he is out. Widmar said what I hoped he would say, that it's often effective for a hitter with two strikes to lay down a bunt with the infield faded back.

"There's the surprise factor," Widmar said.

A noisy wave erupted in the packed stadium as fans jumped up and waved their arms to the sky.

"What do you think of the wave, Al?" I asked, thinking of the many so-called sophisticated baseball fans who considered the wave corny and bush.

"Aw, they're having fun," Widmar said, which was another thing I had hoped he would say.

At least one generation of Canadians knows the line, "The state has no business in the bedrooms of the nation." Pierre Elliott Trudeau made it famous, but the line belongs to Martin O'Malley, who wrote it when he was with the Globe and Mail. He has written eight books, including one on the Toronto Blue Jays.