It’s May 2002. Teacher friend Bud Pollack and I are at the old Stadium in the Bronx for a Sox-Yankees game that evening. It begins to rain, so Bud picks up his cell and calls one of his former students, who was a producer at MSG at the time. He invites us to visit him, and we end up conversing with former major league stars turned baseball announcers, Jim Kaat and Bobby Murcer, in the spacious MSG broadcast booth as the rain continues pouring down onto the emerald field below.

Just as we departed, Bobby Murcer bellowed, “You know, fellas, Bob Sheppard loves to meet teachers who visit the press box! After all, he’s been one himself for decades.”

Jim Kaat then explained that Bob Sheppard had been teaching at Columbia since the 1960s. “Willie Mays might come into the booth, and Bob will be accommodating as always, but he feels most at home with his fellow teachers. I know that he would love to greet you both.”

For those of you who might not know about him, Bob Sheppard was the legendary public address announcer for the New York Yankees from 1951 to 2007. For 56 seasons, Mr. Sheppard ended up announcing more than 4,500 Yankees baseball games, 22 pennant-winning seasons, and 13 World Series championships. “He is the voice of God,” Mickey Mantle once explained. Boston’s Carl Yastrzemski stated famously, “You’re not in the big leagues until Bob Sheppard announces your name.”

As Bud and I entered his cramped booth at the old Stadium, we knew that Bob Sheppard had announced the revered names of Joe DiMaggio, Ted Williams, Mickey Mantle, Jackie Robinson, and Yogi Berra with such precision that Columbia eventually asked him to teach courses on elocution. “I found my true calling when I entered the classroom,” he stated matter-of-factly to us. “It changed my life.”

In the end, Mr. Sheppard couldn’t have been more gracious or accommodating, especially to two passionate Red Sox fans. We conversed about our classes, our passions, and why teaching continued to remain at the epicenter of our lives. The legendary PA announcer then asked me who my favorite Sox player was. When I informed him that it was the late Tony Conigliaro, he smiled and said, “A fine, fine choice, Shaun.” He then flipped on a switch in his booth, which was an interior sound check only, and bellowed: “Batting for Boston, Number 25, Tony Conigliaro, right field, Conigliaro.”

I thanked Mr. Sheppard profusely. “That does the old heart good,” I remarked. He threw me an appreciative smile.

Just as Bud Pollack and I were leaving the booth, he asked me what my number was I was a pitcher in college. “Number 14, Mr. Sheppard,” I answered. “Well, Shaun, I am going to do this for you because you are a fellow teacher!” He then switched on a speaker in his booth and clamored in his best Mount Olympus voice: “Now pitching for Boston, number 14, Shaun Kelly, pitcher, Boston.”

I told Mr. Sheppard that he had just given me my all-time favorite baseball highlight. He smiled and said to Bud and me, “Now go back to the classroom and continue to make a difference!”

While Bob Sheppard’s Zeus-like voice continued to echo the names of hundreds of baseball players at Yankee Stadium over the next five seasons, it was the humble words he imparted to us that have stayed with me ever since. Eight years later, three months short of his hundredth birthday, Bob Sheppard died. When I think back on the time we met in his cramped announcer’s booth seventeen years ago this month, I realize now, as a Sox fan, that I wasn’t in enemy territory then.

No, I was on hallowed ground.