Todd Zeile on New 9/11 Film and the Healing Power of Baseball

Craig Carton (0:00)

Joining us now on the hotline is the executive producer of a new documentary called When America Took The Field, and it's our old pal Todd Zeile, who's the executive producer of it. Todd, it's Craig and Big Mac here on The Fan. How you been, buddy?

Todd Zeile (0:16)

What's happening, guys? That sounds very fancy, executive producer. Yeah, look, I didn't know you could read.

Craig Carton (0:22)

You're a very fancy guy, to be honest.

Todd Zeile (0:25)

You know what? I've dabbled, as you probably know from back in the day, but this was a little bit more personal, certainly a labor of love and passion project, if you will. And I was lucky enough to get partnered with Major League Baseball, the MLB network. And that was really what kind of took it to the next level and gave us an opportunity to kind of complete this and put it out.

Chris McMonigle (0:49)

When did the process start on? When was the beginnings of this documentary?

Todd Zeile (0:53)

I mean, that's a great question. About two years ago, a guy who's a good friend and also a fellow executive producer on this, named Mark Lineweaver and I were in the shadows of One World, kind of having a conversation. He was asking me about the time during that post-911. And he's like, has the story been told? I said, yeah, the story's been told. But he could tell that there was things that I knew, that I spoke about that involved baseball, that were not what everybody knows. And he's like, hey, I think we ought to consider trying to do something for the 25th anniversary.

And that was the genesis of it. He brought a good buddy, Chris Wax, who's an executive producer, in to write some creative thoughts about how we do it. And then it really started from there, even though, as you well know, Craig, this started 25 years ago. It's been a story that we've known, that's continued to evolve, that we've continued to tell. And I've been fortunate enough to remain sort of involved with the Mets, involved with first responders, with the FDNY, with Tuesday's Children, which is now Tuesday's Promise, or Tunnel to the Towers, those kinds of things that just have continued to perpetuate the story. And so all of those things kind of converged. To be able to tell what really is a love letter to baseball, this isn't a political statement. This isn't what you're gonna see a lot of in this 25th anniversary. This is really a love letter to baseball all across the country, not just in New York.

Craig Carton (2:34)

Talking to Todd Zeile, Todd, of course, was the starting first baseman for the Mets on September 21st, 2011, 10 days after the attacks. And of course, everybody remembers Mike Piazza, Sir Morano, what that meant to us as New Yorkers, regardless of fandom and what it meant to America, that special night and the great play-by-play calls of it.

Walk me through as best you can remember, because I know it's 25 years, it's still 25 years. What was it like for you as an active player? You're going to start that game. You did start that game at first base. Do you remember specific aspects of things that you paid no attention to over the course of your career, like the drive to the ballpark that day? Like the little things that the minutiae of life that we all take for granted. What are your memories of that day waking up in the morning when Bobby said, hey, guess what? We're playing a baseball game tonight. MLB approved it. It's all on.

What was your day like getting to the ballpark?

Todd Zeile (3:35)

Look, that's a really interesting perspective because I was living out at Greenwich by that point, and I was making that drive into Shea just about every day after 9-11. We made some trips down to Ground Zero, down to the Armory and Javits Center and so on. But that drive where I get to the Whitestone Bridge, it would be like almost every day going in there, I'd look from that vantage point at the Whitestone where you're used to seeing the towers at the bottom of Manhattan and it was nothing there. There was still smoke at times. It was just surreal to kind of make that drive every day. So that day was similar in the sense that I was coming in from that route, but leading up to that day, I think there was a lot of discussion as to whether or not we should be playing in New York. Is this the right time?