ALL-STAR GAME : You Can Be Sure They’ll Have One Good Old Time Tonight

They’re both way too old to do what they do, but there they were Monday afternoon, in center field at Anaheim Stadium. It was the American League All-Star workout, under a scorching sun, and they were playing a game with a bat and a ball.

Nolan Ryan, age 42, baseball’s power pitcher laureate, was darting around a small area in deep center field, shagging sharply hit baseballs.

Jimmie Reese, age 83, baseball’s all-time fungo king, was 10 paces in front of Ryan, swinging his skinny bat like a weapon, working Ryan back and forth across the grass like Boris Becker working Stefan Edberg.

It was like old times, when they were on the same team and when they became lifetime friends. They both came to the Angels in 1972, Ryan from the Mets and Reese from a minor league coaching job.

The first day of spring training, someone instructed Ryan to go shag in the outfield. Reese was waiting with his trusty toothpick of a bat, and he fungoed Ryan around the outfield for a solid half hour without so much as a 10-second break.

“I was hitting ‘em all over the park,” Reese said Monday, smiling. “We finished and Nolan asked someone, ‘Who the hell is that fella? He’s going to kill me the first day.’ ”

By the time the season started, the two were in the habit of grabbing a cab together to get to the ballpark early, before the rest of the team, to have time for extra outfield work. Even on days Ryan was to pitch, Reese would run him for five or 10 minutes in the outfield, to help him loosen up.

They ate a lot of meals together, caught a lot of movies, talked a lot, developed a solid friendship.

Ryan called Reese “Dunk,” which is an offshoot of Donk, short for Donkey, and pretty soon that was Reese’s only name in the clubhouse.

What did the two men have in common?

“I have no idea,” Reese said. “I can’t imagine why we became friends. I’m about 100 years older than Nolan.”

Simple, says Ryan, a man with a reputation as one of the game’s true gentlemen. “Dunk’s just a good person. I just gravitated to him.”

In ‘77, Ryan and his wife, Ruth, had their second son and they named him Reese.

Two years later, the Angels let Ryan slip away. Dunk stayed on and is still an Angel coach.

They remained friends. Ryan still phones Reese frequently, and they get together for lunch when they’re both in Los Angeles. When Ryan pitched his fifth no-hitter, he shipped the game ball to Dunk.

Ryan rejoined the American League this season, and when his Texas Rangers came to Anaheim last week, he worked for 20 minutes in the outfield, chasing Dunk’s fungoes. Joining Ryan in the workout was his 12-year-old son, Reese.

Monday and today, Dunk and Nolan are teammates again, their dressing cubicles side-by-side in the American League All-Star team’s locker room.

Ryan is having a remarkable season for the Rangers and was edged out for the All-Star starting nod by Oakland’s Dave Stewart.

Reese is having another remarkable season, too, running Angel pitchers and outfielders nearly to death with his bat. His pet project--”My new bobo”--is a quiet, young, bullet-throwing pitcher named Jim Abbott.

In honor of Reese’s seven decades in a baseball uniform, he was asked to throw out the ceremonial first ball at tonight’s All-Star game.

The request took him by surprise.

“Mr. Giamatti (Commissioner Bart Giamatti) phoned me and asked me if I would do him a favor, if I would throw out the first ball,” Reese said. “I thought it was a joke.”

The Angels’ clubhouse this season, remember, is hotfoot heaven, prankster paradise. So Reese said to the caller, “What’s the gag?”

And Giamatti said, “No, this is serious.”

Reese hung up and phoned an Angel official, who assured Jimmie that the invitation was legit. Who better for the first-ball honors? Reese broke into baseball in 1917 as a batboy for the L.A. Angels of the triple-A Pacific Coast League, a team managed by Frank (Tinkers-to-Evers-to-) Chance. Seventy-two years later, Reese is still an Angel, still playing a kid’s game, making friends, epitomizing the spirit of the sport.

He wasn’t a bad player in his day, either. Reese was a fine infielder, working his way to the major leagues, playing for the Yankees in 1930 and ’31 and for the Cardinals in ’32.

He also played 13 seasons in the Pacific Coast League. When the all-time PCL All-Star team was selected, Reese was the second baseman.

At New York, Jimmie was Babe Ruth’s roommate and occasional running mate, and he was also befriended by Lou Gehrig. Those were two vastly different personalities, Ruth and Gehrig, but Reese hasn’t run into anybody in 72 years that he doesn’t get along with.

Ryan, though, holds a special place.

“He’s probably my best friend in the game,” Reese said.

Reese was sad when Ryan left the Angels in a dispute over money, and even sadder when Buzzie Bavasi, then the general manager, dismissed Ryan as a common .500 pitcher. Reese is very proud that Ryan has proven otherwise, that he has become one of the marvels of sport.

“He’s done baseball proud, that man,” Reese says.

For 17 years, Reese has been applauding the accomplishments of his great friend. Tonight, for a moment before the game, it will be Jimmie Reese taking the bow, and his proud friend applauding from the dugout steps.