The Bullpen Gospels (22 page)

Before the bus took us to the field, it shuttled us to the local mall. The hotel was so far away from food sources that if we wanted to eat breakfast, we had to get up and take the bus to the mall food court. I had Chinese for breakfast and Cinnabon for dessert.

At the park, Pops came out to rag on the pitchers while we stretched. Most hitting coaches pick on pitchers and vice versa. It’s part of an age-old rivalry that one job is harder than the other. Hitters will say swinging the bat is harder than throwing a ball, whereas pitchers contest the superior challenge is locating a ball while someone tries to strike it. Both sides are biased, of course, which means the fire will burn as long as the game is played.

Pops stood by us swinging his slender fungo bat like a golf club, trading insults with Handsome Rob about how pitchers got it easy.

“Yeah, you face the Yankees lineup and tell me it’s easy,” Handsome Rob countered.

“You ain’t never faced the Yankees lineup. For all you know, you may go right through ’em.”

“Right, I’m sure I’d still be here in the Texas League if I could go right through the Yankees. Great point, Pops.”

“I’m just saying you could get lucky and get them out. There’s so much room for error with pitching. You can make bad pitches and get guys out.”

“And hitters can’t take bad cuts and bloop balls in?”

“Sure, but that don’t happen as much as bad pitches gettin’ guys out.”

“But if it happens three out of ten times and the bases are loaded those three out of ten, it hurts just as bad,” Rob countered, in his high-society voice.

“You can argue all you want, but handling the stick is way harder.”

Rob paused the tit-for-tat volley. He was pulling his arm across his chest, stretching it for warm-up catch, when an idea hit him. He stopped his stretch and walked over to Pops, a smile painted across his face.

“I suppose you would know Pops. Speaking of handling the stick, I heard you got a visit by the cops back in San Antonio?”

Guys slowed their stretching and began to watch Pops.

“You don’t need to worry about that,” Pops said, shifting from the confident arguer to an anxious worrier on the spot. We traded curious glances among each other. Pops’ body language showed something was up.

“Oh, I heard the story,” Rob pressed, “and I think you should tell it before you force me to.”

Stretching came to a stop. Everyone eyed Pops with anticipation. A coach having a run-in with the cops was just too juicy not to hear. Pops looked around at all of us staring back at him. “Fffuck, alright,” he consented. We crowded in. “First, it’s not that big of a deal. It’s gonna sound bad, but it ain’t.”

“What happened?” Blade asked, practically drooling.

“I’m sitting in my living room back in San Antonio, in those shithole apartments they put us in, talking on the phone. There comes a knock on my door. It’s the fucking cops, right? I hang up, go to the door, and answer. I’m like, ‘Hello officers, how can I help you?’”

“So they say,”—he shakes his head at the thought of it, while we’re hanging on his words—“‘We had a report that you were masturbating with your windows open.’ I’m like, what the ffffffffuck” His face looked genuinely shocked. The team started roaring, all of us, falling on each other.

“Yeah, you go right ahead and laugh. It was probably one of you that called ’em, you sons of bitches,” Pops said, leaning on his fungo.

“Well, were you?” Rob pressed.

“Fffffuck no! Are you kidding me? I’m a grown man!”

“Grown men get urges,” Blade countered.

“I don’t give a shit what grown men get. I wasn’t. I was totally shocked by it all. Oh, oh, get this, then the cop says, ‘Sir, it’s okay if you were, but next time, please be more discreet about it.’ What’s that supposed to mean? It’s okay if you were, just be more discreet? They didn’t fucking believe me, which pissed me off even worse. They didn’t believe me, I’m some kinda perv.”

“Did you tell them you weren’t jerking it?” This was Rob again.

“Yeah, like a dozen times I says.” Pops was arguing as if we were the cops in question. “But the more I talk, the more they don’t believe me. So they says, ‘How many times have you been arrested, sir?’” The team’s laughter began again. We could feel Pops’ frustration both now and then.

“I almost lost it right there. I ain’t never been arrested. First you come accusing me of being some pervert; then you tell me to be a more discreet pervert; then you ask me what kind of criminal I am…” He was so worked up, he looked as if he might come to a boil.

“It’s the mustache Pops. You can’t trust a guy with a mustache.”

“Those fucking cops had mustaches!”

“What did you tell them then?” Rob continued.

“I told them to get the hell out of my house. And as they was leaving, they told me they was sorry they upset me, but I should be more discreet! I could have—” He took his fungo and swung it through the air as if he were beating someone with it.

“But seriously, if it was one a you, I wanna know. I ain’t mad.” No one believed him. “I just wanna know so I don’t have to worry about shifty characters peeking in my window.”

“What if I peek in your window?” Blade asked.

“I don’t doubt you would do something like that. People need to be calling the cops on guys like you.”

“I peeked in your window, but I didn’t call the cops,” Dalton said, kidding him.

“That’s fine. You keep on peeking. You ain’t gonna see nothing, but if I catch your ass—” Pops took another cut with his fungo.

“If I’m not going to see anything, I don’t think I’ll bother to peek anymore.”

Pops waved a hand at the smartass comments. “Seriously, if one of you did it, speak up. There’s some weird-ass people livin’ in that place.” Nobody raised his hand. Pops scowled. “I don’t believe it. One of you motherfuckers did it.” He waggled his finger at the group while we laughed.

“Couldn’t have happened to a better guy, Pops,” Blade said, needling him some more.

“Ff-uck you.”

The relief crew spent a spider-free night in the pen. Having pitched an inning for the team, I officially felt as if I was one of the boys, As part of the family, I was privy to all manner of new information. Handsome Rob, for example, was dating a stripper he met at a place called The Palace.

“We aren’t dating, okay.”

“You’re dating; you totally love her.” Blade was at work again.

“You know, that’s so immature, I’m not even going to respond.”

“That’s how I can tell you love her, because you get so bent out of shape.”

“I am not bent out of shape. It’s just an immature argument. I prefer to call it a working relationship.”

“
Working relationship?
She dances and you insert dollar bills? What? Does she give you a discount for being with her? Define working relationship?”

“It’s like Ox and the Puffy Taco.”

“Whoa now, we don’t need to bring me into this,” coughed up Ox.

“Wait! What’s the Puffy Taco?” I asked.

“It’s one of our mascots back in San Antonio.”

“Our mascot is called the Puffy Taco?”

“Our real mascot is Ballopeño, the Puffy Taco is like a sidekick.”

“What the hell is a Ballopeño?”

“It’s like a half baseball, half jalapeño.”

“What the fuck?” I mumbled.

“Exactly.”

“How does that have anything to do with the Missions?”

“No idea.”

“So what’s your connection to the Puffy Taco?”

Ox grumbled, but Rob happily filled me in. “The Puffy Taco is in love with Ox. It’s a working relationship.”

“What the hell does that mean?” Dalton demanded.

“It means, it’s a summer fling and both parties know.”

“Is that your
discreet
way of saying you’re boning her?”

“Bingo.”

“So you’re boning a stripper.” I nodded to Rob. “And you’re, uh, boning a taco mascot?” I asked Ox.

“The chick that works the taco suit is a total cleat chaser. I’m not the first player; I won’t be the last.”

“So she’s just your working relationship.”

“Sounds like you’re her working relationship,” Rob said.

“She’s not holding me down, that’s for sure,” Ox said.

“Yeah, Ox’s not holding her down either. She and a few other guys went at it in the mascot dressing room,” Dalton said.

“Could you imagine doing that,” I asked, “with all those weird mascot heads watching you?”

Everyone looked at me funny.

“What?”

Ward opened the gate of the bullpen and walked in with a cup of coffee, as if he needed it. “What’s so funny? What I miss?”

“Ox has a working relationship with the Puffy Taco.”

“Sweet life, Ox.”

“Save it, smiley.”

“Hey! Heeeey!” interrupted a fan yelling down at us. We looked up to face a man holding a plastic beer cup. “Y’all suck!” He was standing on the brim above the fencing, surrounded by his buddies, all of them giggling like chimps.

“Beat it,” Ox said, who turned back to the game.

“What’s the score out there? Oh! Look, y’all are losin’. Y’all are a bunch a losers.”

“Game’s not over yet, pal.”

“Y’all must be the bad players. That’s why they stick you out here, huh? They keep the bad eggs away from the good ones.”

The guy doing the talking looked as if he lived in his parents’ garage. A thirty-something guy who probably raced demolition derby cars for a living and divorced his wife when he found her listening to Justin Timberlake music. He had a grease-stained hat; a pointy, ratlike face; and a hunting-themed T-shirt that said Shooting Deers and Drinking Beers, That’s How I Roll. The guy had to have been several beers deep at this point, and making the most of it.

“Hey look,” Ward started, “it’s the Blue Collar Comedy tour. Tell me a redneck joke!”

“Hey, y’all do anything except sit the bench?” came the retort.

“Haven’t I seen your face on television? Weren’t you on
Cops
? Taking a break from beatin’ your wife so you can come catch a game?”

“I ain’t married,” the man said proudly.

“No kiddin’?” Ward pretended to be shocked. “A classy fella like you?”

“Yeah, well, y’all are losin’.”

“Yeah, I heard that one already. Get some new material. Hey, which one of you guys is the girl in this relationship. I hear most convicts take turns being the girl, so who’s it gonna be tonight?”

“Fuck you, pal. I ain’t queer.”

“Fuck me? Oh, so you must be the guy tonight?”

The speaker was getting rattled, so one of the other chimps stepped in. His face was pocked up, and he had a Dale Earnheart hat on.

“You must be pretty bad to be down here in the minors,” he started. “How far are you away from making it to the big leagues?”

“About as far away as you are from graduating high school.”

“Shit, I’m smarter than you are.”

“Yeah, you look it. What, you try to shave with a broken bottle? That’s not a smart thing to do, bro.”

“I’m better looking than you, and I got a better job too,” the Dale Earnheart fan protested.

“Seriously bro, you look like your face caught fire and someone put it out with an ice pick, and being the greeter at Walmart is hardly a better job than this.”

“Fuck you, pal,”

The third one stepped in. He was the largest of the three, a beer belly stretching the fabric of his collared shirt. At least it was collared, a feature that gave him an air of sophistication considering his company. “Talk it up buddy. It won’t be funny when you get sent down.”

“What, is it diabetes day at the ballpark?” Ward replied, pretending he had a big gut.

“Ha-ha. Maybe if you spent more time working on your game instead of your insults, you wouldn’t be here.”

“Oh thanks, coach. Hey, I don’t go to McDonald’s and tell you how to flip burgers, so you don’t need to come here and tell me how to do my job. But since we’re giving out advice, maybe you should spend less time eating the product and that shirt wouldn’t be strainin’ to hold your gut back.”

“I might be fat, but at least I ain’t stuck in the minors, losing.”

“Yeah, we might lose tonight. We might win tomorrow. But at least we wake up with a chance to be something, which is more than I can say for you, pal.”

“Shit, I can be anything I want to.”

“Oh, so you
want
to be like that? Sorry, I didn’t know you were living your dream.”

The trio was not as well prepared as Ward was. They probably thought we would sit there and take it as most players do. Surprise! They took a moment to conference on how to reply. Putting them on the run, Ward wasted no time.

“Hey tubby, did your wife make it home alright last night? We didn’t talk much when we were together, but tell her I had a good time. I never drank champagne from some of those spots before.” Ward could have gone on all day, but before the trio had a chance to come up with something, a stadium usher came by and asked them to back off the railing and take their seats. Defeated, they took this as a sign to call it a day.

“Y’all still suck, stupid Yankees,” they said, a final parting shot as they disbanded.

Ward looked at us and started laughing. “Did he just call us Yankees? Hey! Heeeeey,” he called back, “don’t drink too much, since I wouldn’t want you to be too drunk for your Klan meeting.” The group continued walking.

“Yankees? Really?” Blade shook his head. “This is the only state I know where people will make fun of you because you aren’t from it. Like people here think they are hands down better than you because they are from Texas.”

“Those were some fine examples, let me tell you.”

“Consider where we are. It’s Midland, Texas, where the hottest thing to do is take your sister on a date to the mall food court,” Rob said.

“Well I hate this place,” Ward said with a smile. “Manrique’s family steals my PSP, Eddie makes fun of my teeth, and the guys from
Deliverance
tell me I’m a loser. I just don’t know how much more I can take, bro.”

We didn’t find any spiders that night, but we did rack up another loss. Including the game I pitched in, that made three in a row since my arrival. Sometimes players correlate new faces with losses, but the team didn’t connect my arrival to its bad luck. In fact, it didn’t seem as if the boys cared too much about the results, content to enjoy each other’s company and have a good time at the park. After the third loss, Randy pulled the team together for a meeting before the next game’s stretch, to make a preemptive strike.

He walked out of his office and stood in the middle of the locker room, his uniform pants on, tailored to stop at his shins, and an old T-shirt that looked like it dated from his playing days. He pulled a piece of paper from his back pocket and cleared his throat.

“At this level, I’m a teacher, but I’m also an evaluator,” he said, prefacing his remarks while unfolding the paper to reveal some notes written in shorthand. “So, I’m going to take my experience in the game and address some things I’m seeing.

“I’m not saying we are a bad club, fellas, but right now I think we are a little snakebit. I don’t like the smell of things, or where they’re going. We had a good April, with fifteen wins and nine losses, and here we are in May at 3–6.” He glanced over the notes, letting the room fill with silence again, then looked back up at us.

“Look, I think we need to have a certain amount of discipline in order to play consistent baseball. We’re gonna lose some games, but how we go about it is what I’m smelling. I’m sniffin’ around here and I’m starting to see, come game time, we aren’t ready to play. Guys aren’t taking preparation seriously, and that’s a reflection on me. I pride myself on getting you guys as much information for the game as I can, so I expect you to put in your work and be prepared. Take your ground balls, get your cuts in, get your mind right, and be ready to go all nine, from the first pitch to the last. I don’t think we are getting our priorities in order, so…”

Randy laid down a few new rules curtailing time allowed for shenanigans like Xboxes and scooter racing. Then he placed a limit on card playing and television watching before game time.

“Look, the partying, the nightlife, I don’t care if you’re doing that stuff as long as you are doing your job. I know it’s gonna happen, some guys can operate while doing it. However, I will say this: no matter how good you are, you will not be as consistent a professional baseball player if you are a consistent partier, especially not if you are in here loud talking about it while I’m sniffin’ around.” He let the last part hang for a while, looking around the room. Some guys shifted uneasily. I hadn’t been around long enough to know the scoop, but Midland didn’t exactly seem like an after-hours hot spot.

“Our body language really sucks right now,” Randy continued, again with the piercing stare. “We’ve only played thirty-seven games. It’s May tenth, yet I see bodies telegraphing that the season’s over.

“Here’s how it works. A couple of guys start showcasing negative body language when things are down, soon other guys start gravitating to them when they take their lumps. It spreads. Guys start feeling sorry for themselves, and there’s no room for that. This is Double-A baseball, men—it’s a separator. You got scouts coming in and out of here all the time, looking for guys who can rise to the occasion. Every day’s a clean slate with me, and it’s gotta be that way with you…”

Another glance to the notes. “I’ve already heard guys whining about this today, so I’m going to address it. The
I’m tired, the travel’s hard in this league
stuff…fucking get over it. Grind it out for the five months. You know the forecast, you have to have the mind-set for it. Didn’t get enough sleep? Didn’t get a chance to get up and eat? Bad accommodations? Sorry. That’s the way this game goes sometimes. Still gotta compete. Still gotta play the game hard. I’ll tell you this, men: if you’re a pussy, this game will call you out on it real fast. It will cut you down.”

He folded up the paper and put it back into his pocket. “My suggestion: back to the basics. Be ready to pitch, be ready to hit, be ready to make the play. Be ready to compete. If you got things getting in the way of your commitment to the game, get ’em out of the way. Baseball has got to be the priority right now. We have got to play with a purpose to have success, individually and collectively. All the little things we were doing early on to be successful, I don’t see us doing them right now. To me, that’s lack of focus. We have got to get our focus back.

“It’s a grind, it’s a motherfucker, but come six thirty, you gotta be locked in, men. We won’t always bring our best to the park every day, but we gotta compete with one hundred percent of what we got.”

He looked around the room, serious faces staring back at him. “Hey, prepare, compete first pitch to last pitch, lay it all out there, and at the end you can say you did the best you could—that’s the only way to go about it. Play to win, that’s the only way I know.”

“Questions or concerns anybody?” Randy asked.

No hands went up. Message received.

“Alright. Stretch in fifteen.” He walked back into his office. The room sat silent for a second and then Tourney stepped in.

“Hitters, I’ll have the film of your at bats ready to watch by tonight. If you wanna see it, stop by my hotel room and we’ll review it.”

“Hey Tourney, make sure you put the Do Not Disturb sign on your door if you’re gonna be doing something you don’t want us to walk in on.”

“Yeah, and shut the blinds for God’s sake!”

“Very funny, very fucking funny.” Pops tromped back into the coach’s office.

Everyone would take Randy’s words differently. I’m sure I was no exception. While the other guys suited up to hit the field and made resolutions to cut back on their nightlife, I remained at my locker, thinking about his message and the experiences that got me to his team.

He was right. This level is a separator, not only of physical talent, but of priorities too. People play the game for different reasons. Looking back, I knew I played for a chance at something better, for the glory, for a fix, for an ego stroke, and for validation. But the first and main reason, the one that hooks us all: I wanted to make it to the big leagues.

The nice thing about pitching, I decided, was while I was doing it, I always knew what the goal was. Get an out; get a couple of outs. Life, on the other hand, wasn’t so clear. The trouble was baseball was my life. The two were connected somehow, that much I knew. Yet I didn’t know the proper formula and was tired of the explosive result they yielded when mixed. I wanted to separate them, keep them safe from each other. I decided to take the lessons I had learned—forget the loose ends—and disappear under the waves of baseball.

When I started this game, I had a dream of playing in the big leagues. Everyone who signed a contract did. It’s the basic player motivator, and like Randy said, maybe it was time I got back to the basics.