Writer’s note: One Sixty-Two is a season-long series of blog posts connecting baseball’s major-league players to life’s universal themes. Just as there are 162 games in a season, so there will be 162 posts in this series. Let’s play some ball.
Day Eight: Daric Barton, Oakland Athletics
I couldn’t stand playing Wiffle Ball with Billy. The kid lived across the street from me, and he was often willing to join in on the summer games we played in my driveway. But the problem with Billy was that he always looked for a walk. In Wiffle Ball.
I mean, come on. You’re nine years old, you’re outside in the sun, and you need some exercise. Shouldn’t Wiffle Ball be all about hitting? Maybe it was that way for you and me, but not for Billy. He watched the looping curveball as it started over the plate, and rested the thin yellow bat on his shoulder while the white ball bounced off the rear bumper of our Pontiac Bonneville, just to the left of the lawn chair – hence, just outside the strike zone.
Ball four.
In the 1980s, when very few teams took note of a player’s on-base percentage, walks were not valued quite so much. Batting average was the key statistic for a hitter. In this here 21st century, however, hitters are now raised to approach hitting just like ol’ Billy did. The goal is simply to get on base, any way you can. A walk is, in some ways, even better than a hit, as it forces up the pitch count and gets you closer to a team’s often vulnerable bullpen.
No team has embodied this approach to hitting better than the Oakland A’s, who have used General Manager Billy Beane’s focus on computer-generated statistics to revolutionize the way teams prepare their ballclubs. A’s prospects are taught from the outset to be patient at the plate, and are rewarded for that patience – ultimately, with a trip to the big club.
This year, the most patient of the A’s has been a first baseman named Daric Barton, who has been up to the plate 97 times, yet has walked 20 of those times. So while Barton has earned a hit 30 percent of the time he’s been up to bat, he’s landed on base a whopping 44 percent of the time. More men on base equal more opportunities to score. So this 24-year-old, who hit only .226 in his only full season in the majors, is currently the poster boy for Oakland A’s baseball.
He’ll continue to be so for as long as he can wait, patiently, for the pitcher to throw him something inside that little strike zone. If it can’t hit the lawn chair, Daric, just leave it alone. Whether it’s my neighbor Billy telling you that, or your boss Billy, the advice is solid. Take your base.
Friday, April 30, 2010
Thursday, April 29, 2010
The Impossible Feat (One Sixty-Two: Day Seven)
Writer’s note: One Sixty-Two is a season-long series of blog posts connecting baseball’s major-league players to life’s universal themes. Just as there are 162 games in a season, so there will be 162 posts in this series. Let’s play some ball.
Day Seven: Ubaldo Jimenez, Colorado Rockies
While teaching a college reading-skills course one summer, I assigned my students David Ferrell’s Los Angeles Times feature story on the ultra-marathon known as “Badwater.” As we read and discussed the story, my students were amazed that there are human beings who run a 135-mile race from Death Valley to Mt. Whitney, Calif., often through temperatures well above 100 degrees. It doesn’t seem humanly possible, yet there are a select few who start and finish Badwater.
Achieving the near-impossible – it’s something that humans have been striving to do for as long as they’ve walked the earth. Climbing the tallest mountain, tightrope-walking between skyscrapers, swimming across channels – it’s part of what we do, part of our genetic makeup. And whenever we break another barrier, a name gets added to the list of trailblazers, stretching from Pheidippides the marathon runner to Phelps the swimmer.
It is time to add another name to that list. This young man has figured out something that no one has done before: He’s learned how to pitch dominant baseball in Denver, Colorado. For the past 17 years, Coors Field in downtown Denver has been known more as a launching pad than as the home to baseball’s Colorado Rockies. The thin, dry Rocky Mountain air helps baseballs soar farther at Coors than they would at lower elevations. Even though the Rockies have been storing their balls in an atmosphere-controlled room known as the “humidor” for eight years, the balls can still fly out of that park: Witness yesterday’s 12-11 Arizona win over Colorado in Denver.
But now, amid the long fly balls of 2010, a trailblazer has arrived. He is 26 years old, 6-foot-4, and born in the Dominican Republic. He has endured his share of tough games at Coors, but now things are different. As April comes to a close, the National League will surely name Ubaldo Jimenez its player of the month. He is 5-0 with a 0.79 earned-run average so far this year. Since May 1 of last year, Jimenez is 19-9, and not once have hitters hit better than .250 against him in a month. On April 17, Jimenez took things a step further and pitched a no-hitter – the first in Rockies’ history – against the Atlanta Braves.
Oh, and the kicker – he pitches no worse at home in Coors than he does away. Indeed, Ubaldo Jimenez has found a way to do what many thought to be impossible. This is a team that many pitchers have long avoided, for fear that the Denver air would wreck their careers, not to mention their statistics. This is a stadium known more for football-like scores than baseball ledgers. And yet, here he stands, 98-mile fastball in hand.
The Associated Press reported that on the day after his no-hitter, Jimenez awoke at 6:30 a.m. and ran six miles, slightly longer than his usual run on the day after he pitches.
Hey, it wasn’t Badwater. But for now, at least, one impossible feat is enough.
Day Seven: Ubaldo Jimenez, Colorado Rockies
While teaching a college reading-skills course one summer, I assigned my students David Ferrell’s Los Angeles Times feature story on the ultra-marathon known as “Badwater.” As we read and discussed the story, my students were amazed that there are human beings who run a 135-mile race from Death Valley to Mt. Whitney, Calif., often through temperatures well above 100 degrees. It doesn’t seem humanly possible, yet there are a select few who start and finish Badwater.
Achieving the near-impossible – it’s something that humans have been striving to do for as long as they’ve walked the earth. Climbing the tallest mountain, tightrope-walking between skyscrapers, swimming across channels – it’s part of what we do, part of our genetic makeup. And whenever we break another barrier, a name gets added to the list of trailblazers, stretching from Pheidippides the marathon runner to Phelps the swimmer.
It is time to add another name to that list. This young man has figured out something that no one has done before: He’s learned how to pitch dominant baseball in Denver, Colorado. For the past 17 years, Coors Field in downtown Denver has been known more as a launching pad than as the home to baseball’s Colorado Rockies. The thin, dry Rocky Mountain air helps baseballs soar farther at Coors than they would at lower elevations. Even though the Rockies have been storing their balls in an atmosphere-controlled room known as the “humidor” for eight years, the balls can still fly out of that park: Witness yesterday’s 12-11 Arizona win over Colorado in Denver.
But now, amid the long fly balls of 2010, a trailblazer has arrived. He is 26 years old, 6-foot-4, and born in the Dominican Republic. He has endured his share of tough games at Coors, but now things are different. As April comes to a close, the National League will surely name Ubaldo Jimenez its player of the month. He is 5-0 with a 0.79 earned-run average so far this year. Since May 1 of last year, Jimenez is 19-9, and not once have hitters hit better than .250 against him in a month. On April 17, Jimenez took things a step further and pitched a no-hitter – the first in Rockies’ history – against the Atlanta Braves.
Oh, and the kicker – he pitches no worse at home in Coors than he does away. Indeed, Ubaldo Jimenez has found a way to do what many thought to be impossible. This is a team that many pitchers have long avoided, for fear that the Denver air would wreck their careers, not to mention their statistics. This is a stadium known more for football-like scores than baseball ledgers. And yet, here he stands, 98-mile fastball in hand.
The Associated Press reported that on the day after his no-hitter, Jimenez awoke at 6:30 a.m. and ran six miles, slightly longer than his usual run on the day after he pitches.
Hey, it wasn’t Badwater. But for now, at least, one impossible feat is enough.
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Fearing Failure (One Sixty-Two: Day Six)
Writer’s note: One Sixty-Two is a season-long series of blog posts connecting baseball’s major-league players to life’s universal themes. Just as there are 162 games in a season, so there will be 162 posts in this series. Let’s play some ball.
Day Six: Alex Gordon, Kansas City Royals
I’ve been reading The Tender Bar, J.R. Moehringer’s warm and clear-eyed memoir on his search for a father figure and family in a Long Island bar. One of the dominant themes in Moehringer’s book is a theme we can find throughout modern American literature, from Death of a Salesman to Fences to Rabbit, Run: A man’s fear of failure.
So many of us feel this fear at times in our lives, as we compare the life we’re living now to the dreams of our adolescence. What if I never realize those dreams? What will I make of myself? Will the writer ever claim his Pulitzer, or get that job at The Times? Will the actor ever make it to Broadway, or at least out of regional theater? Will the lawyer finally – finally – get a shot at making partner? We compare ourselves to others, to the expectations we’ve had for ourselves, and to the prophesies that well-intentioned teachers or family members uttered on our behalf one shining graduation day.
As I reflect on The Tender Bar, I wonder what’s going through the mind of 26-year-old Alex Gordon. He was drafted five years ago with the second overall pick in the Major League Baseball amateur draft, and was quickly declared the face of a revitalized Kansas City Royals franchise. Gordon was compared to Hall of Famer George Brett, who, like Gordon, played third base for Kansas City. By March of 2007, Sports Illustrated had run a feature story on Gordon, the next can’t-miss kid.
This is now Alex Gordon’s fourth year in the big leagues. His highest average in a season was .260. He’s never hit more than 16 home runs in a year, never driven in more than 60 runs, never scored more than 72. To say that the young man has not lived up to expectations would be a gross understatement. There are rumblings that he might in fact be headed back to the minor leagues in the days ahead.
Which begs the question: What if Alex Gordon is not the next George Brett? What if he’s not even an All-Star? And, to take it a step further, what if he’s not even good enough to start for one of the least-successful teams in baseball?
What should he make of himself? What kind of man should he see when he looks in the mirror?
One can only hope that Gordon finds success in the truest of ways, and that he feels fulfillment from work, yet also from the deeper joys that life holds for him. But as he struggles on, he can take comfort in the knowledge that he’s not alone. Not by a long shot. They win Pulitzers writing about this stuff.
Day Six: Alex Gordon, Kansas City Royals
I’ve been reading The Tender Bar, J.R. Moehringer’s warm and clear-eyed memoir on his search for a father figure and family in a Long Island bar. One of the dominant themes in Moehringer’s book is a theme we can find throughout modern American literature, from Death of a Salesman to Fences to Rabbit, Run: A man’s fear of failure.
So many of us feel this fear at times in our lives, as we compare the life we’re living now to the dreams of our adolescence. What if I never realize those dreams? What will I make of myself? Will the writer ever claim his Pulitzer, or get that job at The Times? Will the actor ever make it to Broadway, or at least out of regional theater? Will the lawyer finally – finally – get a shot at making partner? We compare ourselves to others, to the expectations we’ve had for ourselves, and to the prophesies that well-intentioned teachers or family members uttered on our behalf one shining graduation day.
As I reflect on The Tender Bar, I wonder what’s going through the mind of 26-year-old Alex Gordon. He was drafted five years ago with the second overall pick in the Major League Baseball amateur draft, and was quickly declared the face of a revitalized Kansas City Royals franchise. Gordon was compared to Hall of Famer George Brett, who, like Gordon, played third base for Kansas City. By March of 2007, Sports Illustrated had run a feature story on Gordon, the next can’t-miss kid.
This is now Alex Gordon’s fourth year in the big leagues. His highest average in a season was .260. He’s never hit more than 16 home runs in a year, never driven in more than 60 runs, never scored more than 72. To say that the young man has not lived up to expectations would be a gross understatement. There are rumblings that he might in fact be headed back to the minor leagues in the days ahead.
Which begs the question: What if Alex Gordon is not the next George Brett? What if he’s not even an All-Star? And, to take it a step further, what if he’s not even good enough to start for one of the least-successful teams in baseball?
What should he make of himself? What kind of man should he see when he looks in the mirror?
One can only hope that Gordon finds success in the truest of ways, and that he feels fulfillment from work, yet also from the deeper joys that life holds for him. But as he struggles on, he can take comfort in the knowledge that he’s not alone. Not by a long shot. They win Pulitzers writing about this stuff.
Tuesday, April 27, 2010
The Doorknob Installer (One Sixty-Two: Day Five)
Writer’s note: One Sixty-Two is a season-long series of blog posts connecting baseball’s major-league players to life’s universal themes. Just as there are 162 games in a season, so there will be 162 posts in this series. Let’s play some ball.
Day Five: Phil Coke, Detroit Tigers
We live in a specialized world, or so we’re told. Don’t learn a little bit about a lot; instead, learn a lot about a little. Be it technology, finance, writing, science, medicine – everyone’s looking for that edge, and they often find it by carving a niche.
In baseball, a position has developed over the past decade and a half that is so specialized it occupies a tiny cubbyhole in the realm of baseball. It’s a job that often requires no more than 10 minutes on the pitcher’s mound, about 80 times a year.
It’s called the left-handed relief specialist. Minimum salary: 400 grand.
No one’s saying it’s easy: Your 10 minutes might involve a faceoff against Ryan Howard, Prince Fielder, Adam Dunn, or Justin Morneau. You may walk onto the field with runners on second and third, one out, and the cleanup hitter at the plate. You’ll have to go from warmup tosses to blistering pressure in no time flat.
But if you toss some nasty sliders at that cleanup hitter, and get him chasing a few, your night will be done as soon as he’s back in the dugout. You’ll get a pat on the back, a right-handed pitcher will come on to face the next righty hitter, and you’ll be off to the showers.
Not a bad day’s work. And man, is it ever in demand. Every team has at least one. Take Jesse Orosco, for instance. The former Mets closer stood on the mound to face lefties for 24 years, retiring at the age of 46. No pitcher has ever appeared in as many games as Orosco. His record, however, will surely be broken by another lefty reliever soon enough.
It’s like having a job installing only doorknobs. As the carpenters, plumbers and electricians do their thing, they call you whenever a door is installed and in need of a knob. You show up, screw it into place, and leave. Ten minutes.
Last year, Phil Coke did his left-handed doorknob installer job so well that it earned him a World Series ring with the New York Yankees. This year, Coke is with the Detroit Tigers, and he’s already won three games for Detroit in the bullpen. Monday night, however, Coke offered evidence of what can happen when we glide outside of our niche.
The Texas Rangers have loaded the bases in a game that Detroit leads, 6-4, and the left-handed slugger Josh Hamilton stands at the plate. In comes Coke. And before you can finish biting your nails, a sweeping curve sends Hamilton down. Strike three.
And then … Detroit manager Jim Leyland decides to leave Coke in to face Vladimir Guerrero, a legendary right-handed hitter profiled on Day Three of this series. Suddenly, the doorknob guy has been asked to wire the bathroom lights. And, before you can say “single up the middle,” sparks are flying. Guerrero trots to first, two men score, and the game is tied.
The night ended well for Phil Coke, as Detroit came back to win in the ninth, and he even got the win. But the specialist had climbed outside his cubbyhole, and he’d taken a few lumps.
We know the moral: Next time, Phil, stick with what you know. After all, you’re only 27. Ten minutes a day for another 20 years, and you’ll be passing ol’ Jesse’s record. The doors are ready for you, sir.
Day Five: Phil Coke, Detroit Tigers
We live in a specialized world, or so we’re told. Don’t learn a little bit about a lot; instead, learn a lot about a little. Be it technology, finance, writing, science, medicine – everyone’s looking for that edge, and they often find it by carving a niche.
In baseball, a position has developed over the past decade and a half that is so specialized it occupies a tiny cubbyhole in the realm of baseball. It’s a job that often requires no more than 10 minutes on the pitcher’s mound, about 80 times a year.
It’s called the left-handed relief specialist. Minimum salary: 400 grand.
No one’s saying it’s easy: Your 10 minutes might involve a faceoff against Ryan Howard, Prince Fielder, Adam Dunn, or Justin Morneau. You may walk onto the field with runners on second and third, one out, and the cleanup hitter at the plate. You’ll have to go from warmup tosses to blistering pressure in no time flat.
But if you toss some nasty sliders at that cleanup hitter, and get him chasing a few, your night will be done as soon as he’s back in the dugout. You’ll get a pat on the back, a right-handed pitcher will come on to face the next righty hitter, and you’ll be off to the showers.
Not a bad day’s work. And man, is it ever in demand. Every team has at least one. Take Jesse Orosco, for instance. The former Mets closer stood on the mound to face lefties for 24 years, retiring at the age of 46. No pitcher has ever appeared in as many games as Orosco. His record, however, will surely be broken by another lefty reliever soon enough.
It’s like having a job installing only doorknobs. As the carpenters, plumbers and electricians do their thing, they call you whenever a door is installed and in need of a knob. You show up, screw it into place, and leave. Ten minutes.
Last year, Phil Coke did his left-handed doorknob installer job so well that it earned him a World Series ring with the New York Yankees. This year, Coke is with the Detroit Tigers, and he’s already won three games for Detroit in the bullpen. Monday night, however, Coke offered evidence of what can happen when we glide outside of our niche.
The Texas Rangers have loaded the bases in a game that Detroit leads, 6-4, and the left-handed slugger Josh Hamilton stands at the plate. In comes Coke. And before you can finish biting your nails, a sweeping curve sends Hamilton down. Strike three.
And then … Detroit manager Jim Leyland decides to leave Coke in to face Vladimir Guerrero, a legendary right-handed hitter profiled on Day Three of this series. Suddenly, the doorknob guy has been asked to wire the bathroom lights. And, before you can say “single up the middle,” sparks are flying. Guerrero trots to first, two men score, and the game is tied.
The night ended well for Phil Coke, as Detroit came back to win in the ninth, and he even got the win. But the specialist had climbed outside his cubbyhole, and he’d taken a few lumps.
We know the moral: Next time, Phil, stick with what you know. After all, you’re only 27. Ten minutes a day for another 20 years, and you’ll be passing ol’ Jesse’s record. The doors are ready for you, sir.
Monday, April 26, 2010
The Out-of-Towner (One Sixty-Two: Day Four)
Writer’s note: One Sixty-Two is a season-long series of blog posts connecting baseball’s major-league players to life’s universal themes. Just as there are 162 games in a season, so there will be 162 posts in this series. Let’s play some ball.
Day Four: Javier Vazquez, New York Yankees
Every time a victorious third out is made in the top of the ninth inning at Yankee Stadium, more than 50,000 people stand up and begin a mass sing-a-long. As they slap high-fives and file out, the pinstriped faithful croon along with Frank Sinatra’s version of “New York, New York.” Some stand in place to sing, others sing while making a dash for the subway, and still others link arms and do a Rockettes kickline.
As they sing loud and clear, the Yankee fans come to a line they all know well:
If I can make it there / I’m gonna make it anywhere
As you walk out of the gates and onto River Avenue, another New York victory in the books and the buzz of humanity around you, it kind of feels as though you’ve made it in the big city, no matter where you’re headed after this game. It’s one of the heady, fleeting thrills of a ballgame in the city, and it emboldens Yankee fans to ask for more of their players the next time around.
Occasionally, however, a player will arrive in New York and have a tough go of it. If that player has succeeded on other teams, the news reporters will inevitably begin asking if this guy is choking under the pressure of playing for the Yankees. It’s such a pressure-packed situation, they write, and it appears that so-and-so just can’t hack it in New York.
The last time Javier Vazquez was pitching for the Yankees, he helped put an exclamation point on one of the lowest moments in New York history, when he served up a grand slam to Johnny Damon in the seventh and deciding game of the 2004 American League Championship Series. The Boston Red Sox went on to dominate that game en route to their historic comeback from three games down. Vazquez had pitched terribly for New York that season, and he was quickly shipped off the Arizona in a trade that brought Randy Johnson to the Yankees.
For every other team that he has played for, Vazquez has been a reliable pitcher – never the league’s best, but the kind of guy who will give you seven innings, give up no more than four runs, and strike out almost a batter an inning. Vazquez has been incredibly durable, and he’s got nearly 2,300 strikeouts. He’s pitched in Chicago, Phoenix, Montreal and Atlanta, and dominated many batters along the way.
When Vazquez left New York after the ’04 season, one wondered if he’d ever get a chance to pitch on the biggest stage again. This past December, the Yankees gave him that chance, trading for him and planting him directly in their rotation once more.
As April concludes, Vazquez’s 2010 numbers are very hard to look at: one win, three losses, and a run given up per inning. He’s having trouble even getting to the fifth inning. This is not the player who plowed through the National League last year with Atlanta. The New York papers are already pouring ink into the Vazquez story.
So, Mr. Sinatra, what do you think? Is this a man who can’t “make it” here? And if so, what should that mean to his reputation? Must every ballplayer prove himself on the biggest stage to be considered a success? Aren’t there people all over America who are more comfortable working in, say, Memphis or Little Rock or Fargo than they are in New York? What if you don’t really have little town blues, but actually enjoy a slightly slower pulse than that of the city that never sleeps?
It is OK, and always will be, to prefer something other than New York. For some, it’s a great place to visit, and that’s all. I’m not sure where Javier Vazquez stands on this. Maybe his struggles as a Yankee have more to do with arm mechanics, location, or the speed of his fastball. Maybe he’ll right his ship this spring and help the Yanks return to the “top of the heap.”
But if Vazquez is feeling too much pressure here in New York, I’m sure he’ll be sent elsewhere soon enough. He’ll hear the cascades of boos, and the papers will run him out of town. It’ll be a high-profile departure, but it won’t be the first of its kind. They won’t be cheering for Vazquez when they sing “New York, New York.” But that doesn’t make him a failure. Just an out-of-towner.
Day Four: Javier Vazquez, New York Yankees
Every time a victorious third out is made in the top of the ninth inning at Yankee Stadium, more than 50,000 people stand up and begin a mass sing-a-long. As they slap high-fives and file out, the pinstriped faithful croon along with Frank Sinatra’s version of “New York, New York.” Some stand in place to sing, others sing while making a dash for the subway, and still others link arms and do a Rockettes kickline.
As they sing loud and clear, the Yankee fans come to a line they all know well:
If I can make it there / I’m gonna make it anywhere
As you walk out of the gates and onto River Avenue, another New York victory in the books and the buzz of humanity around you, it kind of feels as though you’ve made it in the big city, no matter where you’re headed after this game. It’s one of the heady, fleeting thrills of a ballgame in the city, and it emboldens Yankee fans to ask for more of their players the next time around.
Occasionally, however, a player will arrive in New York and have a tough go of it. If that player has succeeded on other teams, the news reporters will inevitably begin asking if this guy is choking under the pressure of playing for the Yankees. It’s such a pressure-packed situation, they write, and it appears that so-and-so just can’t hack it in New York.
The last time Javier Vazquez was pitching for the Yankees, he helped put an exclamation point on one of the lowest moments in New York history, when he served up a grand slam to Johnny Damon in the seventh and deciding game of the 2004 American League Championship Series. The Boston Red Sox went on to dominate that game en route to their historic comeback from three games down. Vazquez had pitched terribly for New York that season, and he was quickly shipped off the Arizona in a trade that brought Randy Johnson to the Yankees.
For every other team that he has played for, Vazquez has been a reliable pitcher – never the league’s best, but the kind of guy who will give you seven innings, give up no more than four runs, and strike out almost a batter an inning. Vazquez has been incredibly durable, and he’s got nearly 2,300 strikeouts. He’s pitched in Chicago, Phoenix, Montreal and Atlanta, and dominated many batters along the way.
When Vazquez left New York after the ’04 season, one wondered if he’d ever get a chance to pitch on the biggest stage again. This past December, the Yankees gave him that chance, trading for him and planting him directly in their rotation once more.
As April concludes, Vazquez’s 2010 numbers are very hard to look at: one win, three losses, and a run given up per inning. He’s having trouble even getting to the fifth inning. This is not the player who plowed through the National League last year with Atlanta. The New York papers are already pouring ink into the Vazquez story.
So, Mr. Sinatra, what do you think? Is this a man who can’t “make it” here? And if so, what should that mean to his reputation? Must every ballplayer prove himself on the biggest stage to be considered a success? Aren’t there people all over America who are more comfortable working in, say, Memphis or Little Rock or Fargo than they are in New York? What if you don’t really have little town blues, but actually enjoy a slightly slower pulse than that of the city that never sleeps?
It is OK, and always will be, to prefer something other than New York. For some, it’s a great place to visit, and that’s all. I’m not sure where Javier Vazquez stands on this. Maybe his struggles as a Yankee have more to do with arm mechanics, location, or the speed of his fastball. Maybe he’ll right his ship this spring and help the Yanks return to the “top of the heap.”
But if Vazquez is feeling too much pressure here in New York, I’m sure he’ll be sent elsewhere soon enough. He’ll hear the cascades of boos, and the papers will run him out of town. It’ll be a high-profile departure, but it won’t be the first of its kind. They won’t be cheering for Vazquez when they sing “New York, New York.” But that doesn’t make him a failure. Just an out-of-towner.
Sunday, April 25, 2010
Breaking the Rules (One Sixty-Two: Day Three)
Writer’s note: This is the third in a season-long series of blog posts connecting baseball’s major-league players to life’s universal themes. Just as there are 162 games in a season, so there will be 162 posts in this series. Let’s play some ball.
Day Three: Vladimir Guerrero, Texas Rangers
Katie has a new art book, thanks to a generous Barnes & Noble gift card from her aunt and uncle. My 8-year-old has been reading the book almost every day for the past couple of weeks, and she keeps coming back to a two-page spread on Vincent van Gogh. She stares at the sunflowers and tells me how vivid the gold and yellow colors look to her. Together we read about Van Gogh’s use of texture, and how he’d apply his paints straight from the tube.
In Katie’s art classes, her teachers won’t be showing her how to paint directly from the tube anytime soon. They’ll hand her a paintbrush and show her how to do things the traditional way. She’ll follow the rules. In the same way, the boys and girls who learn to hit a baseball or softball are told to swing only at pitches that look like strikes. No need to try and hit something that’s outside your comfort zone.
But both painters and hitters are allowed to break the rules of their craft once they know what those rules are. If Van Gogh needed to use a paintbrush, he could do it in a heartbeat. He simply chose to think, and act, different. Over in Arlington, Texas, the Rangers’ designated hitter is a future Hall-of-Famer named Vladimir Guerrero. If you asked him to tell you whether a pitch is a strike or a ball, I’m sure Guerrero could tell you. But for the past 13 years, this right-handed slugger has made a living hitting baseballs that no one alive should be swinging at, much less hitting.
And my, does he hit them. Hits them hard, hits them far. Balls down at his shoe-tops. Balls up by his shoulders. Balls far outside. He lunges, he reaches, he hacks – and he hits. Guerrero has hit more than 400 home runs, more than 400 doubles, and nearly 2,300 total hits. So far. His lifetime batting average is .322. About the only thing Vlad doesn’t do much is walk. Of course, when you’re as busy as he is breaking the rules, there’s little reason to hold back that swing.
This winter, the word around baseball was that Guerrero was too old and out of shape to play well anymore. Going into today, he was hitting above .370. So the 35-year-old apparently has plenty left in that bat. To those who have watched him over the years, this was really no surprise.
One day eight years ago, I took a road trip to Montreal with my brother and some friends. Our goal was to catch a game at Olympic Stadium before the dome closed and the Expos left town. It was a bizarre old place, with enough eccentricities inside to have kept Van Gogh busy for years. Early in the game, Vladimir Guerrero stepped up to bat; at the time, he was Montreal’s best player. As a pitch arrived, Vlad took one of his legendary full-body hacks, and wood made violent contact with rawhide. The ball flew up – higher, higher, higher – until, finally, it bounced off the white roof of the dome.
In Olympic Stadium, the roof was fair play. The ball careened of the padding above us, then landed somewhere between shortstop and left field. Guerrero trotted into second base with a double. They were breaking rules all over the place, and the fans loved it.
There’s plenty of texture left on Vladimir Guerrero’s canvas. Just don’t force him to paint with a brush.
Day Three: Vladimir Guerrero, Texas Rangers
Katie has a new art book, thanks to a generous Barnes & Noble gift card from her aunt and uncle. My 8-year-old has been reading the book almost every day for the past couple of weeks, and she keeps coming back to a two-page spread on Vincent van Gogh. She stares at the sunflowers and tells me how vivid the gold and yellow colors look to her. Together we read about Van Gogh’s use of texture, and how he’d apply his paints straight from the tube.
In Katie’s art classes, her teachers won’t be showing her how to paint directly from the tube anytime soon. They’ll hand her a paintbrush and show her how to do things the traditional way. She’ll follow the rules. In the same way, the boys and girls who learn to hit a baseball or softball are told to swing only at pitches that look like strikes. No need to try and hit something that’s outside your comfort zone.
But both painters and hitters are allowed to break the rules of their craft once they know what those rules are. If Van Gogh needed to use a paintbrush, he could do it in a heartbeat. He simply chose to think, and act, different. Over in Arlington, Texas, the Rangers’ designated hitter is a future Hall-of-Famer named Vladimir Guerrero. If you asked him to tell you whether a pitch is a strike or a ball, I’m sure Guerrero could tell you. But for the past 13 years, this right-handed slugger has made a living hitting baseballs that no one alive should be swinging at, much less hitting.
And my, does he hit them. Hits them hard, hits them far. Balls down at his shoe-tops. Balls up by his shoulders. Balls far outside. He lunges, he reaches, he hacks – and he hits. Guerrero has hit more than 400 home runs, more than 400 doubles, and nearly 2,300 total hits. So far. His lifetime batting average is .322. About the only thing Vlad doesn’t do much is walk. Of course, when you’re as busy as he is breaking the rules, there’s little reason to hold back that swing.
This winter, the word around baseball was that Guerrero was too old and out of shape to play well anymore. Going into today, he was hitting above .370. So the 35-year-old apparently has plenty left in that bat. To those who have watched him over the years, this was really no surprise.
One day eight years ago, I took a road trip to Montreal with my brother and some friends. Our goal was to catch a game at Olympic Stadium before the dome closed and the Expos left town. It was a bizarre old place, with enough eccentricities inside to have kept Van Gogh busy for years. Early in the game, Vladimir Guerrero stepped up to bat; at the time, he was Montreal’s best player. As a pitch arrived, Vlad took one of his legendary full-body hacks, and wood made violent contact with rawhide. The ball flew up – higher, higher, higher – until, finally, it bounced off the white roof of the dome.
In Olympic Stadium, the roof was fair play. The ball careened of the padding above us, then landed somewhere between shortstop and left field. Guerrero trotted into second base with a double. They were breaking rules all over the place, and the fans loved it.
There’s plenty of texture left on Vladimir Guerrero’s canvas. Just don’t force him to paint with a brush.
Saturday, April 24, 2010
Citizen Twin: (One Sixty-Two: Day Two)
Writer’s note: This is the second in a season-long series of blog posts connecting baseball’s major-league players to life’s universal themes. Just as there are 162 games in a season, so there will be 162 posts in this series. Let’s play some ball.
Day Two: Francisco Liriano, Minnesota Twins
I’m showing my seniors Citizen Kane in class. We’re watching, discussing, taking notes, and gearing up for their first film-analysis essay. Whenever I watch the film, I am blown away by the attention to detail, the innovation, the depth of storytelling, and the acting in this 1941 masterpiece. In creating Kane, Orson Welles dominated the medium of film so thoroughly it can take your breath away. As a producer, director, co-writer and lead actor, Welles commanded both the camera and the screen in a way that no one, save Chaplin, has ever done.
And the tragedy, of course, is that he made so few films afterward. It’s a well-documented story, the life of Orson Welles, and no matter how many times it’s told we still have just a handful of his glorious films to watch. His career as a film director was brief, yet brilliant. Were he a ballplayer, he wouldn’t have had the number of games played that’s typically required for the Hall of Fame. But the few seasons he played would make it so difficult to exclude him from joining the great ones.
Over in Minnesota, there was this left-handed rookie pitcher a few years ago who took to the mound like Welles took to Kane. In that summer of 2006, then-22-year-old Francisco Liriano was called up from the minor leagues and proceeded to blow major-league hitters away, tornado-style. He started 16 games, won 12 of them, and struck out 144 batters in 121 innings. He gave up two runs for every nine he pitched. No one could touch the guy.
And then, late in the summer, Liriano hurt his arm. Badly. He was done for that year, and for the next one as well. He pitched a bit during ’08 and ’09, but the magic wasn’t there. His left arm seemed to have no follow-up to the Citizen Kane he’d delivered in ’06. Such a shame. It was a story Orson knew quite well.
But then … wait, what do we have here? Three games started in 2010, with two wins already. Seventeen strikeouts in 21 innings pitched. Just over one run yielded per nine innings. It’s just a few starts, but it’s the closest we’ve seen Liriano to that force of nature from 2006. Number 47 is whipping that left hand around and throwing darts once again.
We’ll take what we can get. Perhaps this is Liriano’s version of Welles’ A Touch of Evil, that brilliant thriller from 1958 in which Welles reminded viewers of just how unreal his career could have been, if he and the studios had just gotten along a bit better. Maybe Liriano is showing us one more time what that comet we saw on the mound in ’06 really looked like.
Or, perhaps, the lefty is embarking on a longer string of successes. Scorsese-like, perhaps. Over in Minnesota, they’ll take that kind of career every day of the week.
No offense to Orson, of course. But Welles knew the game. For as long as Liriano keeps winning, he’ll sell papers. That, my friends, would make Charles Foster Kane one happy man.
Day Two: Francisco Liriano, Minnesota Twins
I’m showing my seniors Citizen Kane in class. We’re watching, discussing, taking notes, and gearing up for their first film-analysis essay. Whenever I watch the film, I am blown away by the attention to detail, the innovation, the depth of storytelling, and the acting in this 1941 masterpiece. In creating Kane, Orson Welles dominated the medium of film so thoroughly it can take your breath away. As a producer, director, co-writer and lead actor, Welles commanded both the camera and the screen in a way that no one, save Chaplin, has ever done.
And the tragedy, of course, is that he made so few films afterward. It’s a well-documented story, the life of Orson Welles, and no matter how many times it’s told we still have just a handful of his glorious films to watch. His career as a film director was brief, yet brilliant. Were he a ballplayer, he wouldn’t have had the number of games played that’s typically required for the Hall of Fame. But the few seasons he played would make it so difficult to exclude him from joining the great ones.
Over in Minnesota, there was this left-handed rookie pitcher a few years ago who took to the mound like Welles took to Kane. In that summer of 2006, then-22-year-old Francisco Liriano was called up from the minor leagues and proceeded to blow major-league hitters away, tornado-style. He started 16 games, won 12 of them, and struck out 144 batters in 121 innings. He gave up two runs for every nine he pitched. No one could touch the guy.
And then, late in the summer, Liriano hurt his arm. Badly. He was done for that year, and for the next one as well. He pitched a bit during ’08 and ’09, but the magic wasn’t there. His left arm seemed to have no follow-up to the Citizen Kane he’d delivered in ’06. Such a shame. It was a story Orson knew quite well.
But then … wait, what do we have here? Three games started in 2010, with two wins already. Seventeen strikeouts in 21 innings pitched. Just over one run yielded per nine innings. It’s just a few starts, but it’s the closest we’ve seen Liriano to that force of nature from 2006. Number 47 is whipping that left hand around and throwing darts once again.
We’ll take what we can get. Perhaps this is Liriano’s version of Welles’ A Touch of Evil, that brilliant thriller from 1958 in which Welles reminded viewers of just how unreal his career could have been, if he and the studios had just gotten along a bit better. Maybe Liriano is showing us one more time what that comet we saw on the mound in ’06 really looked like.
Or, perhaps, the lefty is embarking on a longer string of successes. Scorsese-like, perhaps. Over in Minnesota, they’ll take that kind of career every day of the week.
No offense to Orson, of course. But Welles knew the game. For as long as Liriano keeps winning, he’ll sell papers. That, my friends, would make Charles Foster Kane one happy man.
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