ATLANTA — One fateful day in the Major League Baseball season all the way back in 1980 still haunts former Atlanta Braves outfielder Gary Cooper.
Cooper was essentially an unknown rookie left fielder who was considered to be one of the fastest players in baseball, according to scouts. At just age 23, Cooper spent 42 days on the Braves' active roster as a pinch-runner and defensive maestro late in the game.
A native of Savannah, Georgia, Cooper was living out a dream of playing for the beloved hometown Atlanta Braves. But late in the season on Sept. 28, 1980, the Braves were rained out and Cooper never played in another MLB game again. He fell one game shy of receiving his MLB pension -- a requirement of 43 games.
Now, at 67 years old, Cooper is asking for just one more favor, making up for one more day that changed his life.
"It was just crazy man, I enjoyed it," Cooper said. "It's something that every kid wants to do, you know? Play professional baseball."
A Georgia boy himself and a graduate of Groves High School in Garden City, where he was a multi-sport athlete, Cooper relished in the chance he got to play for the Braves.
"I'm in front of 45,000 people, man, and it was crazy," he recalled.
Cooper was sent back to the minor leagues following the rainout and never reached The Show again.
Nowadays, Cooper has no car, no savings, no pension and works as a landscaper for a man named Robert Jonas, who is leading the fight for Cooper to get one more day added to his MLB service time. Along with hiring Cooper to work in his business, he created an online petition asking the Braves to help him achieve that goal to help support himself.
"He's gone through a life kind of harder than a lot of people and a lot of people with the same struggle," Jonas said. "But he never stopped putting his foot one in front of the other."
The petition reads in part:
"Please join us in urging the Atlanta Braves to add Gary Cooper to their coaching staff for just one game of the 2024 baseball season and help Mr. Cooper support himself in his golden years."
Cooper said he will do whatever it takes to help the team out in order to get one more day of MLB service time fulfilled for his pension.
"I do my best, whatever it takes, you know? Baserunning coach or, you know, bench coach or bullpen coach," Cooper said. "Something to just get that one more day. It's all I ask."
It's been done before by the Atlanta Braves
In 1968, legendary baseball player Satchel Paige -- who played in both the MLB and the Negro Leagues -- needed just 158 days on an active major-league roster to receive what was then a five-year minimum for a pension. Nineteen teams turned Paige down, but the Braves signed him as a team advisor at 62 years old.
Paige never played a game for the Braves but fulfilled his service time to receive the pension.