Trailer "The Bird: The Spirit of '76"

The summer of 1976.

Peter Frampton dominated the billboard charts.

Jimmy Carter is on the campaign trail.

And a baby-faced 21-year-old pitcher for the Detroit Tigers bursts into the spotlight.

He's won seven in a row.

He is some kind of unbelievable young Mark Fidrich.

Mark Fidrich was central to the soul of the summer of 1976.

He was unlike anything baseball had ever seen.

He became perhaps the most famous man in America during its bicentennial

summer.

To this day, he remains the only pro baseball player to appear on the cover of Rolling Stone.

He was Runaway Rookie of the Year and was America's Hero of the Moment.

It was after one of Mark's games, and he won, and the crowd was going crazy.

And all these people are banging on the car, yelling, it was a happy feeling for us.

One brilliant season, followed by four injury-plagued years, his major league career over at 26.

But the story of Mark the Bird Fidrich doesn't end there.

Fifty summers later, with unprecedented access to his family and teammates, we explore the crossover cultural phenomenon that was marked the bird Fittrich.

This is the bird, the spirit of 76.