Chilly home opener for Phillies with strong winds, wintry temperatures, and not much body heat

Gary “Sarge” Matthews works out three days a week and insists that at age 70, “I can still turn on a fastball.” He’s just glad he won’t have to try it Thursday afternoon at Citizens Bank Park, when the Phillies open their season in weather more seasonally appropriate to an Eagles playoff game.

Any rain will shut off in the morning, but during the game, which starts at 3:05 p.m., steady 17 mph winds will be blowing in from left field, the National Weather Service says, and with temperatures in the 40s it will feel colder when clouds cross the sun, and its power fades later in the day. It will be a few degrees chillier Friday, which thankfully will be a day off for the Phillies and their guests, the Atlanta Braves.

“No one likes to hit in the cold weather,” said Matthews, who finished his 16-year Major League Baseball career with more than 2,000 hits, collected in a variety of cities and weather conditions. “It’s awful, really.”

It’s not exactly a day in Martinique for the spectators either, and on Thursday body heat will be in short supply, given that the crowds will be limited to 8,800, or a quarter the stadium’s capacity. Fans would be wise to dress as if they’re going to that playoff game at the Linc, said Bonnie Clark, the team’s vice president for communications, and “come with a lot of energy.”

» READ MORE: Five things to know as the Phillies welcome fans back to Citizens Bank Park

As for the uniformed personnel on the field, especially the hitters, April indeed can be the “cruelest month,” to quote T.S. Eliot (never mind that Hemingway once said the poet “never hit a ball out of the infield in his life”).

The ball can take wing when it’s warm, gaining about 4 inches in flight for every degree of temperature increase, says Alan Nathan, an emeritus physics professor at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. All things being equal, a fly ball at 95 degrees could travel nearly 17 feet farther than one hit when it’s 45.

» READ MORE: The science behind baseball’s home run surge

That’s not the worst of it for batters, says Matthews, who still works for the Phillies as an “ambassador.” When it’s cold, hitting an inside fastball or a ball off the end of the bat can be an especially stinging experience for the hands.

Having also played for the Chicago Cubs, Matthews had countless encounters with baseball on ice, including a home opener during one of the all-time winter intrusions into April in Philadelphia.

Conditions on the field, and in the stands, will be eerily similar on Thursday to what they were for that home opener 39 years ago at the erstwhile Veterans Stadium.

Team executives visited the Vet at daybreak on Tuesday, April 6, 1982, recalled Larry Shenk, who for decades was the Phillies’ media-relations honcho. It was snowing, a record 3.5 inches for the date. It was windy. It was cold. It was ridiculous. The team decided to push the home opener against the New York Mets back a day.

It happened that the next day was the coldest April 7 in Philadelphia in records dating to 1874. In fact, low-temperatures records were set on the 6th, 7th, and 8th. The Phillies tried again Thursday afternoon.

Temperatures were in the 40s, winds were howling from left field up to 30 mph. In all, 26,000 ticket holders opted for sanity by staying away, leaving the Vet only about a quarter full. Sound familiar?

The absentees didn’t miss much, save for a Hall of Fame pitcher, Steve Carlton, giving up seven runs; a Gold Glove second baseman, Manny Trillo, making an error; and the Phillies offense literally gone stone cold.

For Matthews, who played left field, it was an altogether forgettable experience that began with a first-inning collision with perennial Gold Glove centerfielder Garry Maddox as they both chased a wind-disrupted fly ball.

It was a fitting prologue to a humbling, bumbling afternoon that ended with a 7-2 loss. The Phillies managed seven hits, only one of those with runners in scoring position, and grounded into two double plays.

Matthews said on days like that pitchers had the advantage. “They already know the hitters don’t want to swing at anything,” he said. “If you don’t hit it right on the nose, it hurts your hands.”

Wouldn’t it make more sense to have the Phillies playing the Braves on Thursday in Atlanta, where the azaleas are in bloom in Matthews’ yard?

Not necessarily. Conditions in Atlanta will be quite similar to Philly’s, with temperatures in the 40s and gusty winds.

April is lottery season in the atmosphere, and more than frequently Major League cities have drawn winter’s number.

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So why not confine April games to Florida, California, and the cities with domed stadiums?

For one thing, fewer than half the teams play in those places, and other factors are involved, say Major League Baseball officials.

It would be unfair to let some teams play all their games at home in the first weeks of the season, while forcing others to stay on the road. This gets into contract issues. Plus for drama’s sake, schedules tend to be front- and back-loaded with games between divisional rivals, crucial to postseason races.

For now, April baseball in Philly, New York, Boston, Chicago, Denver, Cleveland, and the like will remain a rite of spring. And climate change notwithstanding, April’s volatility almost certainly will persist.

Matthews says the best way for a player to stay warm is to get a couple of hits. The Mets’ Bob Bailor, a Blue Jay back when Toronto played in an open-air stadium, got three of them off Carlton in that 1982 opener.

Afterward, Bailor remarked: “This is a June day in Toronto.”