Jeff Bagwell and Darren Rovell: Here Are Our Random Celebrity Encounters

Jeff Bagwell was inducted into the baseball hall of fame. Jeff Bagwell once made an appearance at ESPN reporter Darren Rovell’s bar mitzvah. To honor such a notable and newsworthy happening, here are some of our own random encounters with celebrities.

Duffy: I lived in New York for six years, three in Lower Manhattan and three in a leafy section of Brooklyn. So, I’ve had a fair number of celebrity sightings. It’s kind of hard to live there without running across Julia Styles, Chole Sevigny, or Sean Lennon on occasion. Some – Martha Stewart, Gwyneth Paltrow – were more noteworthy than others. I was once in a Shake Shack line on 4th of July with Scott Asdit from 30 Rock.

My one “encounter” came thanks to my small dog Rooie (see below). I carried her down from our fifth-floor walk up to use the facilities at the small park across 2nd Ave. What I took to be an overly made up crazy woman yelled out “POOOODLE,” ran in from behind me, and scooped her off the ground to pet her and give her kisses. After five seconds and a few blinks, I realized the crazy woman was Parker Posey.

Lisk: Well, I don’t live on the coasts in a big city like some of our other writers. I don’t generally see actors or actresses walking around. In Kansas City, we have plenty of athletes and former athletes that come through, but those aren’t random–I worked at a golf course owned by former Royals pitcher Larry Gura in high school, have had my kids play on sports teams with Dennis Leonard’s grandchildren, and saw Jim Eisenreich serving nachos as part of a fundraiser at the local high school game last year.

More random than local guys? Let’s see. I once saw Cherokee Parks at the Dillard’s at the Independence Center (local mall) walking around. This would have been in like 1993 when he was at Duke. His mom had moved to the area, and he was visiting.

I (and Mike Ryan) once had a 30-minute conversation with Lyle Mouton at Kelly’s Irish Pub in Westport in 1997, after the White Sox played a game in town. Some dude named Frank Thomas, along with Roberto Hernandez were there but were surrounded by women. Mouton, if you don’t remember, was an outfielder who played baseball and basketball at LSU, and won a College World Series there. So we chatted about his time in college, and I think he was amazed that some stalker knew so much about him.

Douglas: I briefly held a job as a greeter at a Verizon store one holiday season. It was extremely boring and I had to wear a tie for no good reason. That’s why I love blogging – total freedom to dress casually. Anyway, one day a very tall man walked in and I helped him sign in on the waiting list. He typed in “Craig F.” That’s right. I was assisting Craig Forth, the starting center from Syracuse’s 2002-2003 national championship basketball team. These days I hear he’s the principal at a local high school, but to tell you the truth, we’ve kind of lost touch.

A few years later I was waiting for my flight to London when I recognized a familiar face at John F. Kennedy International Airport. It was Jordan Peele. Since it was 6 am I did what anyone would do in 2015 – I went to social media and said he looked like a female character from his show. He responded in a similarly normal modern fashion by pulled up a picture of himself dressed as that woman and tweeted it at me. We’ve been inseparable ever since.

Then there was this one time when we were on a family vacation in Montreal or something and we saw Dante Bichette walk down the street. Oh, and I met John Legend at the Hard Rock in Las Vegas when they wouldn’t let him into Chrissy Teigen’s room. And I got a picture with Skylar Astin last year and was super nervous about it because I love Pitch Perfect so much. And those are all 5 times I have left my house in the last 25 years.

How about you?