That’s how I remember one of Harry Caray’s many variations on the “Ballad of Davy Crockett” that he adapted for Chicago Cubs catcher Jody Davis.

With the Cubs, thanks to superstation WGN, becoming a national phenomenon in the 1980s, baseball fans during that decade grew accustomed to to that song.

Davis was a fixture on the 1984 team, which nearly brought the Cubs their first pennant since the 1940s.

I caught up with Davis by phone recently to share his memories of his career.

“It was undoubtedly the best eight years of my career,” he said of his years on the North Side.

Davis grew up near Gainesville, Georgia, in a town called Oakwood and attended North Hall High School. He said basketball was his first love, but “I wasn’t quick enough to play with the guards, and I wasn’t big enough to go inside.”

But he was always good at baseball, and in 1976 he was drafted by the Mets, who traded him in 1979 to the Cardinals for pitcher Ray Searage.

It was during his years in the minors that Davis learned the catching trade. He hadn’t caught a game until he was out of high school, when he was pressed into service to replace an injured player during an American Legion game.

He learned the fine points of the catching trade from his first manager in the Mets system, former White Sox catcher Tom Egan. Later, with the Cardinals, he was taught by former St. Louis backstop Dave Ricketts.

During spring training in 1980, Davis vomited blood and found he needed abdominal surgery for a ruptured vessel that had deteriorated. Davis came back, but the Cardinals did not protect him, and the Cubs chose him in the Rule 5 draft.

Davis made his major-league debut in 1981 and was soon the Cubs’ regular catcher.

During his early years, he said Cubs pitchers Rick Reuschel and Mike Krukow helped him and “talked to me about calling a game.” In the Mets organization, he said, he was used to hard throwers. Reuschel, he said, would throw 82-84 miles an hour with a big sinker.

The Cubs developed a winning culture under new general manager Dallas Green, who brought in leaders like Gary “Sarge” Matthews.

“Gary Matthews, to me, completely changed the clubhouse,” he said. “All of a sudden, if you didn’t do what the game situation called for, if you didn’t move the runners over, somebody’s in your face now.”

A major addition during the 1984 season was pitcher Rick Sutcliffe.

“We were brothers from another mother,” Davis said. “We did everything off the field together. We rode to the ballpark together. And Sut was the biggest jokester on the team.”

Davis remembered when Sutcliffe, one spring, had a group, including actor Mark Harmon, suit up and stand in the outfield, where Sutcliffe would hit them flyballs. “And he had the ground crew turn sprinklers on them.”

The two worked effectively as battery mates. “Obviously catching a guy in a Cy Young year was a lot of fun,” he said, although, Davis remembered, “We would go over the hitters about 20 minutes before he would go to the bullpen to warm up. And he would tell me how he wanted to pitch everybody. And then we would go right out there and I would call it and he would shake me off.”

There was a major addition off the field during 1982, when the Cubs hired Harry Caray as announcer, luring him away from the South Side. Caray took a shine to the young catcher and immortalized him in song with variations on the theme from a popular TV show starring Fess Parker.

“I don’t know what it was, but Harry liked me and it was definitely good for my career. Harry was just a fan with a microphone. I still go to Chicago and people start singing to me,” he said.

For Davis, the regular-season highlight of 1984 was a key Sept. 14 matchup against the NL East Division rival Mets at Wrigley.

The Cubs were leading 3-0 in the bottom of the sixth, and, Davis recalled: “The wind was blowing in about 15-18. It was blowing in pretty hard. blowing hard enough that I was not thinking about a home run. They brought in Brent Gaff, a guy I had caught in the minor leagues when I was with the Mets.

“I knew him, knew his stuff and what he was going to throw me. And they walked Ron Cey in front of me to load the bases. Two outs, bottom of the sixth. I was trying to hit a single up the middle. I said, ‘Man if I can give Sut a 5-run lead with nine outs to go, I’ll feel pretty good about this.’”

He wound out hitting it out for a grand slam.

“It was the biggest moment in my career. When I was running the bases, it just kept getting louder. It was like everybody in the stands realized that we were going to clinch the division and were going to the playoffs.”

Davis, who made the all-star team that year, had two homers, two doubles and a .389 batting average in the NLCS. But the Padres overcame a 2-0 deficit to overtake the Cubs and win the pennant.

“We didn’t think anybody could beat us three straight anywhere,” he said. And then, “When we got to San Diego, whoever was the home plate umpire, he would not say strike three.”

Still, Davis said San Diego “didn’t give up. They came back and won.”

After Davis’ playing days were over, he became a successful minor-league manager, winning a Florida State League title with the Cubs farm system in Daytona Beach. He also served as the Cubs’ minor-league catching coordinator, helping to convert Robinson Chirinos from an infielder to a catcher.

Today, he lives near Santa Claus, Indiana, and enjoys bow hunting.

Asked whether he feels he could manage in the major leagues, he said: “I have thought about it. But it seems that the analytics have run all of us old guys out.”