The Bullpen Gospels (10 page)

After two hours of sitting in silence, the sudden ring of my hotel room phone was deafening. I stood up and grabbed the receiver.

“Dirk?” the voice of one of the trainers asked.

“Yeah, buddy, how’s it going?”

“Hey, uh, Earp wanted me to call you and tell you not to pack for the Double-A van tomorrow.”

“What?”

“Yeah, he said not to bring your stuff to the field.”

“What do you mean
don’t bring my stuff to the field
? I’m on the Double-A roster, we leave tomorrow.”

“I don’t know what’s going on with that. He just asked me to call you and tell you this.”

I sat down. “Do I at least have a job?”

“I can’t answer that.”

“If you know, you should at least tell me for God’s sake!” I could feel my heart start racing. The volume of my voice was beginning to spike.

“I mean I don’t know, and I don’t. He said you can call. Well, he’s out now, but you can talk with him in the morning.”

“I have to wait till morning for this? You’ve got to be kidding me!”

“I’m just the messenger man. I’m sorry.”

I was teetering on the edge of screaming long, coarse barrages of expletives, but I knew it was not his fault. “Fine,” I gritted out. “Fine.”

He continued speaking but I did not hear him. I was no longer in the conversation. I was tumbling down from my own pedestal. I couldn’t catch my breath as I fell, like falling and suffocating at the same time. “Sorr—.”

I hung up. I was standing, holding the receiver and the set in my hand, though I don’t remember picking it up. I began a hectic search around the room. For what, I don’t know. Maybe I expected to find an answer, but there wasn’t any. A minute ago the room was serene, calm, a safe haven for me and my thoughts. Now it was a prison, and I was trapped with my racing mind scratching feverishly against the walls. I hurled the set at the wall, the corded receiver following after. Next, I grabbed the kitchenette table and flipped it over along with all its contents. An end table followed and then a lamp. Then I sat down, put my head in my hands, and tried to stop the spinning.

I called my parents first. I don’t know why. I don’t know what I expected to hear them say to me, but it was the first number I came to in my contacts list when I started searching for people I could vent to. They didn’t answer. The phone rang and rang, but no one picked up, not even the answering machine with my mother’s shrill voice declaring, “If you’re a telemarketer, you can hang up now!” That’s funny, because my mom is a telemarketer.

The next person on my hit list was my agent, and unlike my parents, he could actually influence the situation. A good agent is patient. He has to be. If he isn’t, he won’t stay an agent for very long, not with the amount of demanding phone calls he’ll get every time a player gets his feelings hurt.

I remember how many times I called my agent my first year. I thought he was my publicist, legal counsel, and mother all rolled into one. Anytime I got a bad write-up, I wanted him to sue the reporter, spin the bad number so it looked good, and tell me I was a big boy now. I expected a lot, and to my agent’s credit, he never once told me I was a demanding prima donna. So yes, all agents are liars.

Agents can specialize in different areas. Some are great lawyers, talkers, bargainers, arguers, or accountants, but the one thing they’ve in common is they’re all great babysitters. It’s not easy to deal with the massive and fragile egos of athletes who are simultaneously self-impressed to the point of narcissism and yet fearful to the point of paranoia. Receiving calls in the middle of the night from a player who’s convinced management hates him because he’s too good not to have been promoted by now is a specialty all to itself.

When I called my agent, it was about 11:00
P.M
. his time. He answered because right now was that odd season when he gets lots of calls to inform him certain players under his representation were looking for new jobs. In fact, Larry and Varner had already called him. When Adam picked up, he greeted me with what had become his standard hello, “Shizzle! What’s up man?”

He called me Shizzle because for a while we thought it would be fun to pretend I was a first rounder with a Snoop Dogg-type entourage. Alright, I thought it would be fun to pretend it. I forced him into it, and it stuck. So far from our natural personalities, it was funny for us to add izzles to the end of our dialogue. Now as I look upon the reasons for calling my breaking ball my curvebizzle, I feel extremely stupid.

“Hey Adam, we got a problem.”

“Alright, lay it on me,” he said. One quality I loved about the guy.

“I might not have a job come tomorrow.”

“You might not because you’re worried, or you might not because you’ve been told something.”

“The latter.”

“Give me the scoop.”

I recited how it all went down.

“That’s all he said?”

“Yeah, just like that. If I wanted to call in and ask for more information, I could, but I thought that might be a bad idea since I would probably start yelling at anyone who answered, so I’m calling you for advice.”

“Good decision on your part.”

“What do you think I should do?”

“I don’t think you should call.”

“Okay, but what else is there I can do?”

“Nothing.”

“I was afraid you would say that. Sitting here thinking about it is killing me.”

“Sure, I’ll bet it is.”

“What do you think it means?”

“It could mean a few things, but since they don’t want you to bring your bags in for Double-A, I don’t think they’ll send you there.”

“Damn it.” I moaned, and sat down. When I walked into camp today, I was okay with everything ending if it had to. But when I left, I did so with the belief I had earned my keep on the roster I set out to make. Now what had I earned?

“If I don’t go to Double-A, should I ask for my release? Do I get out of this organization and try to catch on with someone else? I pitched well against the Braves last year; maybe I could catch on there? Maybe they’d give me a better shake; I mean, I earned Double-A, right?”

Adam didn’t answer immediately, which meant he was trying to find a way to phrase something I wouldn’t enjoy hearing as positively as he could.

“Just tell me,” I said.

He took a breath. Cleared his throat. “Your chances of getting on another team right now aren’t that great. It’s not that you aren’t talented, but it’s just the time of year. Teams are setting their rosters. They’ve looked at a month’s worth of tryouts and let go of most of them just like the Padres have. Also, you’ve got to understand you’re an older guy with a mixed bag of results. You got experience at the higher levels, but the numbers aren’t impressive. The reality of it is, the Padres see something they like about you, which is why they’ve kept hold of you. You may have the benefit of the doubt with them you wouldn’t get someplace else. It may not be what you want to hear considering recent events, but they’re still your best chance for a future in this game. It just might not be Double-A, even if you’ve earned it.”

I held the cell phone to my ear in silence. I get quiet when I’m angry. Walking over to the hotel room window, I pulled the curtains and looked out. In the hotel’s hot tub were a group of players soaking. They were probably talking about the day’s cuts, where they were going, how they thought they would do on their respective teams. They probably didn’t just get a call telling them they might now be out of a job—those bastards.

Adam spoke up, trying his best to make sure I didn’t get defeated. “It’s baseball, brother. One of these days, when you’re in the bigs, you’ll look back at this and laugh.”

I hated when he talked to me like that, when he brought up being comfortable in the bigs, as if it was just a matter of time before I was there sipping from drinks with umbrellas in them while the good life washed over my toes. It was just a matter of time for guys who signed for millions to get there, not guys like me who’ve beat around the bush leagues and signed as seniors in college. I was a realist, and the big leagues were further away than ever.

Regardless of how inward focused and sure a player is, there’ll always be wavering moments of doubt. Sometimes, when the game’s going my way, when batters fall like autumn leaves and I can wring strikeouts out of my jersey like so much excess water, I permit myself to believe I can make it. Most of the time, however, when I’m in between excellence and catastrophe, I just hope I can. But in times like this, when I watch the window of opportunity slip shut and can feel the cold end of my career coming, I feel as if I’ll never make it and kick myself for ever thinking I could.

Not much was left to believe in now. The reality of the situation was the Padres probably liked me more than any other team, and their “liking” me may only mean they deliberated before releasing me on the final day of camp rather than pulling the plug when they axed everyone else. I probably wasn’t going to make the Double-A team, which meant I’d head back to High-A Lake Elsinore if I got to keep my job at all. It was now the best scenario. Adam was a good agent, but he wasn’t going to turn this turd of a situation into a first rounder for me.

“Do you think they’ll send me back to High-A?”

“They could.”

“Oh God…”

“If that’s where they stick you, Dirk, then that’s the best chance you’ll have.”

“I seriously need to quit.” But I couldn’t. I wasn’t a quitter—a curse of mine.

“Quit? Quit pouting maybe. It could be worse. You could be like Larry and Varner or that crazy dude with the tattoo.”

“You mean Lars.”

“Yep, you could be like him. You’ve still got a chance—I’ll bet they’d trade places with you in a heartbeat.”

“I’m not them, Adam. It’s not apples to apples here. I don’t know what they were playing for, but I can tell you what I’m not playing for. I don’t want to waste another year of my life kicking around the California League with no idea what the fuck I’m—Hold on a sec.”

My phone beeped at me, it was my mother on the other line. She was calling me back. I let it beep, deciding to call her back when I was done with Adam. I put the phone back to my ear.

“I want a better quality of life to come along at some point. Is that wrong? I’m not a quitter, and I think that may be just stupid of me. I think if I was smart, I’d get out of this now. I know this is a dream and there’s an argument to be made for walking away from it, but it’s not a fairy tale. I don’t open up the fucking wardrobe and frolic into Narnia every time the umpire says play ball.”

“I’ve never heard anyone put it that way.”

“You know what I mean.”

“I understand what you’re talking about, and I’m not going to tell you you’re wrong. There aren’t any guarantees, and there will always be some dumbass fan who freaks out about you pissing away the magical experience of baseball. I would never tell you it’s not a hard life, but this is part of it. You make the best with the chance you got. I know you aren’t a quitter, so, even though you’re angry, we both know you aren’t going to give up this chance.”

“I’m so tired of hearing that word! Chance, chance, chance!” I transferred ears. “It’s okay to chase it when you have some promise, but you can’t honestly tell me my chances just improved with this news?”

“No. No they didn’t, but you still, as much as you are sick of the word, have a chance, is what I’m saying.”

“Maybe.”

“You do.”

“Is it a chance I want?”

“You look at things differently than most players. I mean, you just used Narnia and fuck in the same sentence. I think you need to take some time and think about all this, and if you are as serious about walking away as you think, then I’ll support you. I’ll make some phone calls and see if I can get some more information. Just don’t do anything you’ll regret in the meantime.”

I looked around the hotel room. All the furniture was flipped over, strewn through the place with a lampshade speared by a table leg.

“Don’t worry. I won’t.”

When I got off the phone, a message popped up to inform me I had a voice mail from my mother. I dialed my voice mail box, and when the message began, my mom’s exasperated voice said, “Hey babe, if you want to get a hold of us, don’t call the house phone. Your brother came home drunk a few nights back and started doing his usual.” She said it as if he brought home another bad grade, as if she were accustomed to it now, more disappointed than angry. “He started in on your father, and your dad got so upset with him I thought he was going to have a heart attack. Dad threatened to call the cops on him, so your brother ripped the phone off the wall and smashed it.” I looked at the broken phone in my room. “I had to call the cops on my cell. We haven’t seen your brother in a few days—probably hiding over at your grandmother’s, who, by the way, has called us three times to tell us she doesn’t want you back because you eat her out of house and home and take her stuff. Anyway, the caller ID still works, but the handset is busted. I can’t get your dad out of the house to get a new one. I don’t know what you wanted, so if you need us, just call me on my cell, okay? Alright, pitch good. Bye.” Her voice was so casual, so everyday, it was as if she were describing her trip to the grocery store. The message played through. The robotic voice of my inbox informed me what to press to delete it. I closed my phone and set it down.

In the bathroom, I scooped up some water from the sink and splashed myself in the face. I let it trickle down my neck and soak into my shirt, not bothering to stop it. The hair on the side of my head matted to my face, and beads of water hung on my nose. I passed a hand over myself to flick off the excess. Then, flushed and broken, I stared at my disheveled reflection in the mirror. I looked in at Dirk, the baseball player. He stared back at me in his pristine uniform, hat on, glove at his side.

“You lied to me,” I accused.

“You lied to yourself,” came the calm response.

“Don’t give me that! I’ve done what it takes to get us here.”

“You’ve inculcated yourself.”

“Very funny, smart-ass.”

“You’re uptight because you’re afraid.”

“Afraid?” I laughed. “Afraid of what?”

“Afraid of the day you’d have to take this uniform off.”

“I’m not afraid. That’s ridiculous! I was ready to quit before I came here.”

“No,” he said gently, “you were ready for Dad to say you could quit, but he didn’t.”

“That’s not true. I can do it anytime I want,” I said like a defiant child. I knew the truth though, and my words weren’t convincing.

“I don’t blame you, really. You’ve been hiding behind that jersey for years now. It’s what you know.”

“Hiding! Who’s hiding? I’ve always been out in the open.”

“Out in the open that you play baseball, sure. But you’re afraid you won’t be important without it.”

“Fear has nothing to do with it! I’ve earned the right to be a respected athlete. I’ve paid my dues. There are only two kinds of people in this world: somebodies and nobodies. Baseball has made me somebody!”

“Really?” A skeptical look followed the question.

“Yes! I’m one of the special few who gets to do this!”

“Do you feel special right now?”

“…”

“You don’t know who you are, and you’re terrified of losing this.” He tugged the uniform.

“It’s my gift! Baseball is my gift, and I’m fighting to keep it.”

“Baseball is also your curse, and the fight to keep it is killing you.”

“Wrong—it’s the only thing that’s keeping me going. I have nothing else.”

“You have more than you think.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“That’s your biggest problem.”

The next day, I took the early van to the complex. I didn’t talk to anyone, not Frenchy, or Ox, or Brent. No one knew what was going on, except maybe the maids who would have a hell of a time cleaning up the mess I made of the place. I cut through the crowd on a direct line for the back office. I didn’t bother to look for Bruce; I went right to the source.

I came to the executioner’s office and walked in without knocking. Sitting at his desk, Earp turned away from stapled sheets full of stats and names and looked at me. The stark expression I wore did all the talking.

“I’m sorry. You had a good spring, and I fought for you. You’re not gonna like this, but it’s a numbers game.” He offered me a job in Lake Elsinore, Single-A ball—if I wanted it.