Off-Season

Alright folks the off-season is almost over. I have taken a breather but my legs and arms are fresh again and I'm feeling good about this year. Once school starts back in two weeks, the Bush League will start up again. We made some good acquisitions during the off-season and I think we can compete for a playoff spot. I have many stories to tell, so go grab your peanuts and hot dogs and get ready for an exciting season. We'll see ya.

"Picking Up Chicks From The Dugout"

My summer baseball team last year had the least attendance of any team in the league for one reason. It wasn't because we were a bad team. We finished second in the league. It also wasn't because we were in a bad location, because we were in one of the nicest suburbs of Dallas. And no one could use the "it's too hot to watch a baseball game" excuse because every other team had packed stands. The reason we did not have many (if any) fans was due to the fact that we could not serve alcohol at our games. If our team could have sold booze, we would have. It just so happens that we played on a high school field, which made it illegal to serve booze.

If a baseball player tells you that he doesn't take a glance into the stands every now and then to check out the fans, he is lying to you. We all do it. We would always find the hottest girls in the stands within the first three innings or so. Of course we could only do that at the away games, because no chick in their right minds would come watch a baseball game in 102 degree heat without being able to sip on a cold beer or a frozen margarita.

I guess this situation would be like being in jail for a while. You never have any contact with girls. By the time you get out of jail, I'm sure your standards hit rock bottom. Helga the clerk at the local Mapco probably looks like Pamela Anderson to those guys when they get out of the slammer. That is how I would compare it to when a girl showed up at one of our home games.

If a girl that looked like she was anywhere near the age of 18 walked into our ballpark, all eyes were on her. I'm sure she was creeped the hell out for like the first ten minutes. We would pretty much just stare and point at her, completely not caring how stupid we looked. Then the dugout chatter would start: "Dude, who's girlfriend is that?" "Bosa did you invite some of your girl friends to the game?" "Dude, I can't tell if she is in high school or not." "Oh man I would definately hook up with her." "Guys, she looks like she might barely be 16 years old." "Is she with her Mom?" "Cotton, is that Mandy from the strip club(please see stripper story from last week)?" Then you would here the magical words: OK SOMEONE GO GRAB A BASEBALL AND A PEN

If we determined that this girl was of legal age(or close), we would immediately devise a plot to get her number and invite her to come out with us that night. I have to give props to my host-brother at this point, because none of this would have gone down if he and his little friends had not been there. They were always in our dugout being bat boys, and they would pretty much do anything for the guys on the team. The only form of communication that we could have with these "female prospects" in the stands was through a baseball. We would write our messages on the ball and get our little bat boys to run back and fourth for hours while we tried to convince these girls to come out with us.

The best part was watching the reactions that each girl had when the little kid ran up to her with a baseball and a pen in his hand. Forget the game. We wanted to see how these chicks would react to our lame attempt of picking her up. We always knew what the first question was going to be. The girl would ask the batboy "Who told you to give this to me?" Then he would point her to our dugout and there we would all be. Staring. Sometimes waving. Some would even just peek out of the corner of their eye to see her reaction, not wanting her to think that the ball was sent from him. Either way, we knew the games had begun. For the next couple of hours, we would have an ongoing conversation with some girl/girls while trying to win the baseball game.

SITUATION 1: Two girls are sitting in the stands. We ask bat boy to take the ball to the blonde on the left.There is a brunette on the right. Bat boy runs back and forth from dugout to stands.

Dugout: "Hey cutie how old are you?"
Blonde: "16"
(shit) We then tell the bat boy to run back over and give the same ball to the other girl.
Brunette: "We are both juniors in high school :) :)"
We would go ahead and cut our losses at that point and come to grips with the fact that it wasn't going to happen that day. We were not trying to go to jail.

SITUATION 2: Two girls are sitting in the stands. One guy is sitting next to them. We tell the bat boy to give the ball to the girl that is sitting next to the guy.

Dugout: " Are you in College? Circle Yes or No"
(The girl gets the ball and laughs. The guy next to her looks into the dugout like he is going to kill someone.The girl responds anyway)
Girl: The "Yes" has been circled
(excitement in the dugout)
Dugout: "U and ur girlfriend going out 2night?"
(both girls giggle)
Girl: "Maybe :)"
Dugout(knowing the guy is reading): "Who is that homo sitting next 2 U?"
(the guy proceeds to grab the ball and throw it completely out of the stadium)
We struck out this time around but it was fun as hell screwing with that girl with her boyfriend sitting next to her.

SITUATION 3: Two girls together. For sure in college. Look like they might be down to do something they were going to regret. We decided to go straight in for the kill on this one. Tell the boy to take the ball to the blonde girl who has been staring into our dugout the whole time with the "I'm a bad girl" look.

Dugout: "Staying in town 2night?"
Blonde: "Yes :)"
(tension is building in the dugout)
Dugout: "Names/Age"
Blonde: "Linda and Maddie. Both 22"
(bingo)
Dugout: "R yall single?"
Blonde: "We R 2 night"
(Immediate confusion trying to come up with a plan really quick)
Dugout: "Whats ur #?"
Blonde: "7152376543"
(High fives being exchanged in the dugout. Everyone reaching for thier phones)
Dugout: "C U 2night"
That is the point that the girls would leave together, giving us looks the entire way out of the stadium. We had it in the bag, and at that point we tried to get the game over as soon as humanly possible. I think Tucker Max has a blog that might be more appropirate to write the rest of the story on. Use your imagination.

I don't have enough time or finger strength to tell you every conversation we had. There were many. This is my official "Thank You" to all of our bat boys and my host-brother for allowing us to try and run game from the dugout. It would not have been possible without you. We finally had the chance to use our AIM and text language in the real world, for a good cause. Bottom line is that we made the most of the situation that we were in. We rolled with the punches, and we faced the adversity of empty stands and sober high school girls. After all, this was just practice for when we went on road trips where their were loads of liquored-up coeds in the stands checking out the new team that was in town for the weekend...

Be Safe..

Tonight's Preview

"Picking Up Chicks From The Dugout"

Summer ball was laid back. It wasn't every day that we actually had fans at our games, much less girls. We had to take advantage of every opportunity that we got. Poor girls. There is no way they imagined the harassment that they were going to receive from us when they strolled into The Snake Pit for a game.

"Taking A Beating From My Roommates"

I've never been in a fight, but I sure know how it feels to be knocked the hell out.

The first time I ever hung out with "Mitty," he tried to kick my ass. One has to realize that Mitty and I come from two completely different backgrounds. I am from a big city, and attended an all guys private school. On the other hand, Mitty is from a very small town, and no one goes to private schools around there. Mitty was about 6 foot 2 and let's say 185 of pure muscle at this time. Me? Well I was about 5 foot 10 and looked like I had been eating Big Macs instead of lifting weights. Not to mention I looked like I was about 13 years old as a freshman in college. We had absolutely nothing in common except for baseball, which helped build the strong bond that Mitty and I have today.

The first night we ever hung out was at a Huddle House at about 3 a.m. If I was Mitty, I probably would have wanted to beat the hell out of the "big city frat kid with hair that looked like a large mop" that I was at that time. I guess I made some smart ass comment(not me?), and Mitty announced that he was going to kick my ass. Thank god the driver of our car broke it up before he could kill me (the driver was a freshman girl..yes a girl saved my ass).

Fast forward a few years and Mitty and I are best friends living with each other. Who would have thunk it? After moving to a new house midway through the year (an entire story by itself), The Big Red Dog took me in off the streets and let me live with Mitty and him. I wish I could say that Big Red and I hated each other at the beginning (better story), but we got along with each other from square one.

Spring scrimmage. Mitty is up to bat, and I am catching behind the plate. I'm pretty sure the count is 2 balls and 0 strikes. In Mitty's mind there is no way that I am going to call on off-speed pitch. So what do I do? I call a change-up. Mitty swings like it is a fastball right down the middle, and he misses the ball by a foot. He looks back at me with a "you are supposed to be my roommate look" and says "Man, I hope you get on base and get picked off so I can tag you as hard as I can." Mitty probably hit a double later in that at bat, and I completely forgot about what he said.

I come up to bat the next inning and hit a single up the middle. There I am on first base. It's just me and Mitty over there. I take my lead. The pitch is delivered and I shuffle off the bag. Just my luck, Hitizzle(now catching) drops to his knees and picks my ass off by about a foot. I turn to dive back into the bag, and the only thing I remember was something hitting me in the eye that felt like a bowling ball.

I "wake" up and I am lying on my face, almost using first base as a pillow. Mitty is standing over me asking if I'm okay (even thought he told me he was going to tag me hard, he didn't actually mean for it to happen)and I hear our head coach yell from the dugout, "Great tag Mitty!" I'm thinking well shit coach I'm knocked out cold on first base and the first thing I hear is how much you loved seeing me get knocked the hell out. I remember snapping back to reality and asking Mitty if in fact, I was out. He informed me that Hitizzle had just picked me off from his knees and I started trying to jog back to the dugout.

I was so dizzy that I'm sure I looked like I was hammered drunk, and I swear that I heard someone in the dugout say, "Oh my god his eye got knocked out." I was thinking great, I lost an eye. The eye sure was bleeding like hell, but of course my eye wasn't knocked out. After the game, Coach saw the aftermath off Mitty's beating and confessed that he had no idea I actually got hit that hard. I guess that made it feel a little bit better. Mitty 1. Me 0.

So I decide to suck it up and go out for a night at our favorite bar, even though I have a freakishly nasty black eye that I can barely see out of. It was just a black eye. Wasn't too embarrassing. So I'm having a good time, making as many girls feel sorry for me as humanly possible. I'm sure I told some bullshit stories to some ladies, making sure to play "the sympathy card" to it's fullest capability.

I see The Big Red Dog over by the bar and decide to go grab a cold one with him. I can't recall what the sporting event was that Big Red was watching, but he was really getting into it. Just as I put the ice cold beer bottle up to my lips, something crazy happens on the TV. Screaming at the top of his lungs, Big Red throws his arms up in the air and absolutely smokes my beer bottle that is sitting nicely on my lips. I hold my hand up to my mouth, as I am sure he has just knocked my tooth out. Some dude standing near us yells "Oh shit, this kid just got his tooth knocked out!" People start frantically looking for my tooth on the ground as if they are going to be able to find it and super glue it back together?

Ok so I can handle having a black eye at the bar, but the whole "chipped tooth" thing was too much for me to handle. I looked like Lloyd from "Dumb and Dumber" and walked home with my tail between my legs. So much for a fun night at the bar. Big Red 1. Me 0.



I almost forgot about the second round of physical abuse I received from Mitty. So I come home from one of our workouts, and I'm complaining about my sore back. Mitty, being the friend that he is, tells me to lay down on the floor and says he will try and rub the knot out. So he's really doing a good job of working the knot out, and then he gets the genius idea to use his version of "heat therapy." He gets a wet rag and sticks it in the microwave, assuring me that he has done this a million times.

He takes the rag out of the microwave and sticks it straight on my bare skin. I immediately begin screaming like a little baby at the top of my lungs. I am screaming "Mitty get off of me my skin is melting off!" Mitty proceeds to press down harder, while telling me to stop being a little bitch. Finally after squirming around like a crazy person, Mitty decides to get off of me and we see the damage. There was a piece of skin about the size of a sand dollar that had been completely melted off of my back. The funny thing about Mitty is that if he does actually hurt you on accident, he feels like hell about it for at least a week. After many nights of sticking to my sheets, I forgave Mitty and now all is good. Mitty 2. Me 0.

So the final score is Mitty/Big Red Dog = 3. Me = 0. Looking back, a black eye, a chipped tooth, and I permanent scar on my back is well worth the bond that I have with these two fools. I would never have it any other way. See you guys soon.

Rain Delay

Sorry folks but tonight's blog has been rained out. My softball duties are calling for tonight. We will pick up tomorrow with the story about me getting beat up by both my roommates, and then it will be smooth sailing for the rest of the week. Four stories for this week. Have a good one.

P.S. When I think of rain-outs and the softball league that I'm playing in, I think of beer. So what is your favorite beer? Comment away..

Today's Preview

"Taking A Beating From My Roommates"

Mitty and Big Red Dog decide it's a good idea to beat the hell out of me during this week...

Player Profile: "G Man" (and his dad)

The picture above is "G Man" speaking to future collegiate athletes. No he is not talking to these future studs about making good grades. The title of his speech on this day was "How to be the Life of Any Sports Team."

Every time I walked into the locker room I could tell within about 30 seconds if "G Man" had taken his medicine that day or not. G Man would either be sitting in his locker keeping to himself, or he was running around the locker room but ass naked bouncing off the walls. Who am I kidding here? G Man was always bouncing off the walls like he had just been forced to drink a dozen 5 Hour Energy drinks.

G is one of those guys that automatically puts you in a good mood, even if you are having a really shitty day. Its impossible to be in a bad mood when G comes up to you and says "Hello Friend!" and then proceeds to slap you on the back of the neck about 50 times. That was G's signature move. He does not believe in the hand shake. G believes in the neck slap.


If G could have his way, I don't think he would ever wear clothes. G is the guy that would come up to you in the locker room and try to have a normal conversation with you, but it was impossible. It was impossible because he probably has you laughing too hard at that point, and because he is standing 3 inches from you completely naked.

I remember back in the little league days when I would see G play. He was always on the team older than me, but I remember him very clearly. G was the guy that was always having the most fun on the field. No matter what he did during the games, he was always smiling and having a great time, and that obviously carried over to his college baseball. Our team would not have been our team without G.

Besides his hose from the outfield, and his power at the plate, I will never forget one aspect of G: his pre-game/practice stretching. The best way to describe this move is doing a groin stretch. You would almost get in the position that a frog looked like, with you feet together, using your arms to push your knees out. That is what everyone on the team would do, except G. We would look over at G and he would be "dry humping" the the ground. I guess it was the sexy version of the groin stretch. I swear there is no way to describe it. We could not even stretch before games because G would be practicing his moves for the bar that night, and our whole team would be hyperventilating laughing. If only I had a video.

I mentioned G's dad in the title because they are the ultimate tag team. G's dad used to be a baseball player back in his day as well. I think if G and his dad went to a bar together, they could walk away with any girl in the house. It is crazy. I would be sitting at dinner (made up situation) and G and his dad would walk by the table. The girl I was eating with would mutter something under her breath to her friend about how "good looking" G was. Then the mothers at the table would get all bashful and start talking about G's dad. I swear they could both be movie stars.

Besides being the most fun guy I have ever played with, G is responsible for one of my all time favorite baseball moments. We were playing in the SEC Tournament and we were losing to a team that we all hated very badly, Kentucky. It was the last inning and we were losing. G was the winning run, and he was batting against one of the most physically intimidating pitchers in the league. This pitcher was insane. He looked like he could be a tall middle linebacker in the NFL. He obviously ate his full dose of steroids every morning for breakfast. The pitcher throws a 93 mph fastball on the inside corner and G takes a massive hack. We watch the ball sneak inside the left field foul pole and we win the game. I will never forget crowding around home plate, watching G round the bases. Right before he hit home plate, he threw his helmet in the air, and the whole team tackled him. That was one of the best feelings in the world. Our coaches were hugging each other like little kids, and I had never seen that much emotion out of any group of coaches I have been around. I had trouble sleeping that night because I was so pumped up.

These days, G is playing pro ball and I'm sure he is doing great. And I know for a fact that he is reading this. So, G I want to tell you thanks for all the great memories, and your teammates miss you very badly. And I feel very sorry for all the girls that live in whatever town you are playing in...

Tonight's Preview

Player Profile: "G Man"(and his dad)

Crazy dude who is responsible for one of my favorite baseball memories.

Player Profile: "It's Ferg"

Ferg is one of those guys that you just don't forget. It doesn't matter how many times you have met him, you are always going to remember him. Ferg is filled with Texas pride just like the rest of the people from that country. He has a giant smile and can do a really good impression of my room mate, but we will get to that later. No matter how many times you have had a conversation with him, I guarantee you have heard these words come out of his mouth: "It's Ferg."

Yes Ferg loves to refer to himself in the third person. I guess its okay to refer to yourself in the third person if you have the balls to make "Fergalicious" your walk-out song every time you come up to the plate. You've got to be a pretty confident guy to have a borderline walk-out song like that. And if you know Ferg, you know he's not lacking in the confidence department.

You have all heard of the "Parkman Shimmy" from the great movie "Major League." Well Ferg has his own shimmy. If you have been to one of our games you have seen the Ferg rituals. He does the same damn thing before every pitch, and I swear he has to sit and home and practice this crap. It consists of some leg stretchin', some batting glove spittin', and a little shake of the ass. Drives the ladies wild. I've seen diamond girls trip over bats on balls over the Ferg. If you asked him what the hell he was doing with his rituals before every pitch you would get a very simple response: "It's Ferg."

Not only does Ferg possess gifted athletic skills,but his skills carry over into another arena: The Beerpong Arena. Ferg and Trace( more to come from Trace) will team up and take some fools down whenever they please. Every time Ferg makes a cup, you are guaranteed to see Ferg shrug and tell you that "It's Ferg."

I'll ask Ferg why he hooked up with a girl in the grass and he would tell me "It's Ferg."

After hearing about the massive parties that Ferg throws back in his hometown, I know the end of every story is going to be capped off with "It's Ferg." Maybe even a "It's Ferg Baby!"

Ladies and Gentleman, if you decide to come watch Ferg play some ball, I will guarantee you some fancy bare-handed double plays (even though Ferg has time to catch the ball, do a 360 and still throw him out). It just wouldn't be Ferg ball without some unneccessary Web Gem efforts. But hey, "It's Ferg" right?

So Ferg wherever you are, I'm sure you are dominating some Pong and I'm sure you have already completely taken over the nightlife planning scene. So to Ferg's new friends this summer, just listen to Ferg. You might learn something. And if you ever look at Ferg and wonder what the hell he's thinking or why he's doing something, just remind yourself that "It's Ferg," and you will never understand.

And ladies, come to our games to watch the team play. Don't just come to the games and text the whole time, only looking up when it's time for the Ferg Shimmy. Thank you.

"My First PT At An Away Game:Field Goal"

So I ended up getting some playing time last year, by the grace of god. I got a few innings at home, and then we headed to play a weekend at TCU. I should have known this was going to be a messed up road trip, because our planes were all kinds of delayed. Nothing went smoothly at the airports or on the playing field.

So the game was dragging on very slowly. We were not playing well at all, and the umpires were really screwing us over. Nothing was going our way. I just had a pretty bad feeling about this road trip the whole time we were there. Earlier in the game, EB had almost gotten thrown out of the game for starting a fight with the other team's third baseman. Anyway.

So I'm chilling in the dugout trying to pay attention to the game. I'm sure I'm shooting the shit with one of my boys and then all of a sudden I hear the umpire yell, "Your out of here!" I looked up, and our starting catcher has the "what the hell did I say" look on his face. Our starting catcher had just gotten tossed from the game. Supposedly he told the umpire that he was squeezing the hell out of our pitcher, among other things.

Then I heard it: "Rut your in!" I'm thinking oh shit I don't even know where my gear is. After scrambling around the dugout like a chicken with my head cut off, I run out on the field to start playing. My arm was so tight because I hadn't thrown a ball all game. After a few throws to warm up, the games began.

This is all I could hear from the crowd: "Get your fat ass back to the bullpen!" ;"You suck! You are the backup!"; I'm pretty sure I heard a "How does your ass feel from sitting on the bench for so long?" Either way, I was in the game and I was pretty pumped about it. Once I quit thinking about the tounge lashing I was recieving, I settled in behind the plate. I was feeling good. I don't even remember who was pitching, but we were in the zone(I was reminded yesterday that it was Roger.Roger and I were in the zone). Then we got a guy to groundout. 1 out. Then we struck a guy out. What do you do when you strike a batter out with no one on base? You throw the ball around the infield, and make it look as crisp as possible. What do I do?

Instead of throwing the ball to the third baseman, I come up throwing as hard as I can and I launch the ball in to left center field. You would have thought someone put a ball on a tee and tried to rip a double into the left center gap. I completely overthrew the third baseman, and made a fool out of myself. Most people would have felt pretty embarrased. There was no way I could feel embarrased when I looked in our dugout and Coach F. was holding up his arms yelling, " The field goal is good!" I could only laugh. This got the opposing crowd all fired up again and I proceeded to get dog cussed out about how badly I sucked. It was great.

Then I came up to bat. This was maybe my 5th at bat ever. Coach gives me the take sign. So there goes a fastball off the outside corner, for a ball. The count is 1-0. He doesn't give me a sign and I step back in the box. Little did I know, I was supposed to take again. What did I do? I hit a dribbler to the third baseman and got thrown out by 30 feet. My fat ass wasn't even half way to first base before the umpire was calling me out. I ran all the way through the bag to try and preserve some of my dignity. I didn't realize I was supposed to take the pitch until after the game. I guess the coaches figured it wasn't even worth telling me during the game. I already had to deal with getting cussed out the entire time I was catching.

Well it was the worst road trip I ever went on. We got beat by a team that we never should have lost to, and I recieved the worst verbal abuse of my life.Somehow that made me a better baseball player(obviously not or I wouldn't be writing this story right now. I would be in the Cape dropping bombs). Not only did they beat our ass at their place, but they came to our place this year and beat us again.

So damn you TCU. (BTW "Cotton" that fell in love with the stripper plays at TCU).

P.S. I am waiting to write the "It's Ferg" story until tomorrow because I just got back from a really good dinner with even better wine, and the hot tob at this place sounds a lot better than sitting in front of this computer. See you tomorrow.

Tonight's Preview

"My First PT At An Away Game:Field Goal"
Player Profile: "It's Ferg."

Next Week's Preview

I am heading out of town this weekend, so I'm going to put a hold on the posting until Sunday night. Next week you can expect some more player profiles, as well as a few of these stories:

"Taking A Beating From My Roommates"
"Picking Up Chicks From The Dugout"
"My First PT At An Away Game:Field Goal"
"The Best Rain Delay Ever"
"Dirty Dave's Adventures With The Right Field Wall"
"Bloodshed In The Dorm"
"Nearly Bloodshed In The Dorm"
and many many more...

"Darkness" and "Ron" Player Profiles

I had the pleasure of playing baseball with "Darkness" and "Ron" last summer in Dallas. You might wonder where these nicknames come from. Darkness is one of the darkest skinned people on this planet. No lie. You could not see him at night. When I say Ron, I am referring to Ron Jeremy. Yes, the porn star legend.

I remember the first day I walked up to the baseball field to meet my new summer team. It's always weird to look around at all these new people and wonder who you are going to become good friends with, who are the assholes, and who are the nice guys. There is never a sure way to tell within the first five minutes and most of the time your first impression is all wrong.

When I first saw Ron, I could tell he wasn't 100% percent American. He had a little flavor to him. Turns out Ron has some serious Puerto Rican blood in his system. His dad is almost a full blown Puerto Rican, and might be one of the funniest men alive. Ron was the first guy I talked to when our first team meeting was over with. He came right up to me and introduced himself and then proceeded to tell me he lived in a sweet house near downtown. He then invited me to come pregame there that night. It was the first night in Dallas, and Ron already wanted me to come party at his house. I knew from this point on that me and Ron were in for an exciting summer together.

The best way I can describe Ron's look and personality is that of Ron Jeremy. My Ron looked like a much more athletic, younger Ron Jeremy. I mean the hair was the same. Long and curly. Not only did "Ron" look like Ron Jeremy, but they have a few things in common. I won't go in to detail(as much as I would love to), but we will just say that Ron had experiences with a 38 year old mother, as well as our team mascot over the course of the summer(just for starters).

Those Puerto Ricans have some serious fight in them, let me tell you. I don't care if Ron and his dad had a smaller build than most, I would put my money on both of them in any fight. The best part was when Ron and his dad would get in to an argument. You could not understand either of them because they were yelling so loud and talking so fast. The only words I could ever make out were the fucks, shits, damns, and assholes. The great thing is that they would be about ready to beat the hell out of each other, and the next minute Ron's daddy was giving us some cash and telling us to have a good time.

We had many a night at Ron's house and I was lucky enough to meet Ron's group of friends that he ran with in Dallas. I was also pretty intrigued by Ron's band, in which he was the drummer.

On the field, Ron was a scrapper. He wasn't the biggest guy on the field, but he didn't play like that. He played like he was a big man. I will always remember how fundamentally sound Ron's swing was. And of course I will always remember his dad yelling some sort of gibberish at Ron from the stands.


Now let's talk about "Darkness." I had trouble with this nickname because I was debating with two different names. I was tempted to call him T.O. He is the closest look-alike of Terrell Owens that you will ever see. There were many times that people had to do double takes when looking at him that summer. They are both genetic freaks that look like they could be football players as well as baseball players. You know what? The more I think of it, we should call him T.O. So there we have it.


T.O. was playing on our summer team after playing for two years at one of the best baseball colleges in the country. He was and is a freak of an athlete. He can run a fly ball down in the outfield as well as anyone in the country, and he goes down as the fastest teammate that I have ever played with (besides my college room mate, who is a cheetah). After all, T.O. turned down 400,000 dollars out of high school to go play in college. I sure am glad he turned down that money, because I would have never met him.



As black "looking" as T.O. was, he loved white girls. Every time I turned my head, there was T.O. flirting with the best looking white girl in the bar/house. Speaking of parties, sometimes it was hard to find T.O. when we were at house parties outside. When it would get dark outside, you honestly had to look hard to find T.O. He was that black. Every now and then someone would yell, " Hey T.O.! Smile so we can find you!" Then T.O. would crack a smile and we would see his pearly white teeth floating in the sky. He had the biggest smile I have ever seen, and trust me when I say that T.O. did a lot of smiling. That made him a pleasure to be around.

Where are they now? T.O. was drafted this year in the 12th round of the draft and I could not be happier for him. I'm glad that he is fulfilling his life long dream, and I wish him the best. He is one of those "tools" guys that has no ceiling on his potential. I'm not too worried about him.

Ron? Well besides chasing girls, Ron is continuing his baseball career at a great D1 program. This past year, he hit for a very good D1 average and I'm sure he did well in the field. I know he has ambitions to get drafted next year, and I have all the confidence in the world that he can meet his goals.

Ron and T.O., I know you both read these stories and I can't wait to see you guys again. I will be there later this summer, and I realize T.O. might already be gone to start his pro career, but I'm sure me and Ron will make it happen. Save a spot on the couch for me. And yes, I will get in touch with Mandy.

Tonight's Preview

"Darkness and Ron Player Bio's"

A glimpse into the characters of Darkness and Ron. The darkest skinned guy in America, and the Puerto Rican look-alike of Ron Jeremy.

"Cotton Is In Love With a Stripper: The Legend of Mandy and the Clubhouse"

Sunday is what we like to call "fun day". Get a group of guys together on a really boring night. Add alcohol and a lack of females to that equation and you only end up with one solution: the titty bar. It just seemed like the best idea at the time. When I say at that time, I guess I mean most Sunday nights that I spent with my summer team in Texas.

There was not a lack of strip clubs to choose from. It seemed like there were 50 different strip clubs to go to in Dallas, and every one of them sounded better than The Pony ( no offense to the extremely classy girls that work at that great establishment). It came down to one factor: money. We were all broke ass college baseball players in a town that we knew little about. We had luck on our side though, because there were a couple of local kids that played on our team. "Goose" told us about this place called The Clubhouse that was always half off on Sunday nights. Like I said, we were always up for Sunday Fun Day.

The first night we went was a new experience for us all. We gathered at our normal pre-game spot (my host house) and let the festivities begin. One by one the team would slowly show up at my house ready for a night filled with cheap beer, and cheaper women. We found out that this "fine establishment" was a bring your own beer/liquor club. This was music to our ears. After getting most of the underage guys in with fake id's our team would stroll into The Clubhouse with 30 packs of Keystone Light and Grey Goose bottles filled with Bernette's. We were obviously not trying to hide our lack of money by strutting in with Keystone, but I'm not quite sure what we were thinking with the fake Grey Goose. Either way.

We would always stroll over to a corner in this huge place and just set up shop. Cheap beer everywhere. We looked like a bunch of fat kids in a candy shop the first time we walked in there. This place put The Pony to shame. Before long, pretty much every girl in the place was in our corner because they knew that all 10 of us were more than ready to waste all of our money on what I would describe as a "nicer hug."

We got to know this one "professional dancer" that night named Mandy. I could tell by the sparkle in "Cotton's" eye that my buddy had fallen in love with Mandy immediately. Mandy told us that she had just graduated high school, and that she "really wasn't like this" but she had to make money for school somehow ( if I had a dollar for every time we heard that line I would have all my money back that I wasted in this place last summer). Each time it was Mandy's turn to do her dance on the big stage, we would see Cotton sprinting across the room to be front and center for her show. How cute. For the rest of that first night, Mandy never left "Cotton's" side. He was smitten, with a stripper.

The first night that we were all there, they had to force us to leave. It was about 4 a.m. I guess and we were the last people in there. There wasn't even anyone dancing anymore I don't think. Who knows what we were doing. Well, I know what Cotton was doing. He was chatting with Mandy. Right as we left The Clubhouse that first night, Cotton professed his love for Mandy. It was classic. He had the most serious look in his eye and he said, "Guys, Mandy likes me. I can tell. And I like her back." He could not have been more serious. I guess what Cotton didn't understand was the he had just paid her about 100 dollars over the course of the night for her to "like him." He claimed that you could not put a price on love, and he was going to marry her someday.

We were frequent customers on Sunday nights that summer. Everyone in there looked forward to the dumb college kids with the cheap beer because they knew we were going to waste all of our gas money on their "dancing" skills. This became the highlight of Cotton's summer. He was so nervous about seeing Mandy that he would get dizzy almost every time we walked in there. He could not wait to see the recent high school grad with the chipped tooth. Yes, Mandy had a slightly chipped tooth. But you know what, as long as Cotton didn't mind it, we weren't going to say anything about it.

During our games, the whole team would be yelling "Do it for Mandy!" every time Cotton came up to bat. He would always get this huge smile on his face when we did that. We knew he was thinking of that "extremely classy" dancer with the chipped tooth and the high school diploma.

At one point, Mandy ended up giving Cotton her phone number. This was the dagger for Cotton. There was no turning back now. He was love sick. That was his proof,in cottons mind, that she really DID like him a lot. We all figured it was a fake number, but it turned out to really be her. This was even worse. Now Cotton could call Mandy when he would get really hammered, only to receive the cold shoulder. I guess Cotton thought of this like Mandy was playing hard to get. You better believe we had to listen to Cotton bitch about Mandy not answering her phone all summer. Every time we would go back to The Clubhouse, Mandy would just say something like, " Oh baby I'm sorry I must have had my phone on silent (57 times)." Cotton bought every bit of it.

These Sunday nights never got old, and they were a great way to relieve all the stress that summer ball in Texas put on our shoulders (living away from your parents for a whole summer in a badass city with fellow baseball players is extremely stressful).

Mandy, or whatever your real name is, we will never forget you. I hope have graduated early from college at the top of your class and are now going to med school. With all the money you made from us, I hope you had time to get that chipped tooth fixed. I would really appreciate it if you would just answer one of Cotton's phone calls because I think he is really worried about you. And Cotton, I know that Mandy is probably in med school right now, but I think you should see other women. You are better than Mandy. Yes Cotton I know that she said she was in love with you, but that is only because we all "chipped" in and paid her to love you for the entire summer.

I will be back in Dallas at the end of this summer for a summer ball reunion. Mandy, if you are reading this, gather your troops because the whole team is coming back to see you one last time. Maybe this time we will bring some Bud Light and real Grey Goose.

Stay classy.

Tonight's Preview

"Cotton Is In Love With a Stripper: The Legend of Mandy and the Clubhouse" is tonight's story. This is one of my favorites.

In Honor of Father's Day : My Two Most Memorable Home Runs

I owe it to my Dad and to my little league coach to tell these stories for Father's Day. I know I'm a few days late but humor me.

Growing up playing baseball, the only way my dad would ever miss a game was if he was out of town for a business trip. Other than that, there was no way he was missing a game. A lot of the parents on our team were die-hard like this, but I'm putting Big Steve at the front of that list. I can probably count on one hand the amount of games he has missed since I was 8 years old.

It was the summer before my senior season of high school. I had just come off of a very average junior year, but I was looking forward to playing for my high school that summer. Everything was normal that day until I got home from school. I remember being in my back house with one of my buddies when my Mom came outside and told me that something was wrong with my Dad. They still don't really know what happened to him, but it it sounded like a stroke and it scared the hell out of me. The ambulance came to our house and everything. I don't know if I've ever been that scared.

The next day my Dad was still recovering in the hospital. He was doing much better, but at this point I did not know what to think. The last thing on my mind was our baseball game that night. As it crept closer to game time I didn't have any desire to go play. I was too worried, and I couldn't stop thinking about my dad in the hospital. For one, he hates hospitals and he tried to play it off the whole time like nothing was wrong. I guess that helped a little. I had no desire to go play in our game until my dad put his word in. I'm not trying to make this a sob story or anything like that, but he told me he would feel better if he knew I was having fun playing baseball.

I tried to focus on the game that night, but my mind kept wandering. I couldn't stop thinking about Big Steve. My last at bat came, and I think I maybe had a hit earlier in the game. I ended up getting a good pitch and I put a good swing on it to hit one of my first home runs of my high school career(if that's what you want to call it). That wasn't the cool part. Don't get me wrong, I was was really pumped. The great thing was that someone went and got the home run ball and gave it to me because they knew that my dad was in the hospital and had to miss the game. I know it killed him to miss the game, but it sucked for me even more because I knew he would have like to see me hit the homer.

Anyway, later that night I went to the hospital and gave my Dad the home run baseball. It was a little emotional, but I know he loved it. On the other hand he was pretty pissed because he hated missing the games. He would have paid to be there that night. I'm just glad that fan gave me the ball.

If you know Big Steve, you know that hes alive and well, kicking it with his two favorite dogs. So happy belated Father's Day if you are reading this Pops. Hope you like it.

I want to dedicate the second quick story to my little league coach, Coach Tommy. He was my second dad growing up. I was with him every single day of the summer from eight years old to thirteen years old, and he treated each and every one of us like we were his own kids. I've got many more stories about Coach Tommy and "Tommyball" so I'm going to leave his intro at that.

We were playing in a tournament out in Germantown and I believe we were 9 years old, maybe 10. Anyway, it was the championship game of whatever tournament we were playing in. Coach Tommy would stick up for us even when we were younger, and he had to get thrown out of games more than any other coach in the league. We loved it. It always got us fired up, and most of the time we think he did it on purpose. We were losing this game when I came up in the last inning, and Coach Tommy had just been thrown out of the game. He was sitting under some trees in center field, probably still yelling at the umpire from all the way out there.

This kid named Gunner was pitching for the other team. He was always one of the better athletes in this area when he got older and he was a great high school player. Could have been a great college player I believe. Anyway, we were 9 so none of that shit matters, I am just trying to give Gunner some props. Gunner hung a curve ball and I hit a bomb (probably like 200 feet because these were like baby fields)and I swear it either hit Coach Tommy or he caught it. It was a game winning homer. It was great. Coach Tommy got the ball and jumped over the fence to run and celebrate with us. I'll never forget it. He always had a big chew in and he would always spray us with it on accident when he got all excited. This isn't the last you will hear of Coach Tommy, that's for sure.

So to Daddy #1 and Daddy # 2, Happy Father's Day and I love ya both.


p.s. Right after I wrote this story, this happened:

This would be Big Steve asking me to put a beer in that basket that he just dropped from upstairs...

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Tomorrow night is "Cotton Is In Love With a Stripper: The Legend of Mandy and the Clubhouse." This might be my favorite story of all time.

Tonight's Preview

We are going to keep it clean tonight.

"In Honor of Father's Day : My Two Most Memorable Home Runs"

The Fallen Summer Teammate: The Story of "Mickey Mouse."

I only knew "Micky Mouse" for one week. Micky Mouse was no Micky Mantle, and we found that out pretty quickly last summer in Texas. Mickey Mouse was from somewhere far far away. I'm pretty sure it was Michigan. Every team has "that guy." Micky Mouse was "that guy." Micky Mouse was the guy that had eye black all over is face. I mean he pretty much just got a paint brush and painted his entire face black. He also wore at least 12 wristbands on each arm. From the wrist all the way to the shoulder. I didn't even know they made wristbands that fit that high. One could tell he was that guy that was just trying a little bit too hard to look the part.

If you can't already tell by some of these stories( Texting while coaching story), it was pretty much impossible to get in trouble. We had the coolest coaches of all time and they let everything slide as long as we weren't being entirely too stupid. They would always tell us before the road trips not to do anything that would "embarrass the team." Lets get serious. The players AND the coaches did shit that embarrassed the team every single time we went on a road trip. That was the best part. I don't think anything would have ever happened to Micky Mouse if he hadn't made about 10 errors in his first 10 attempts to catch a ground ball. I'm a catcher and I swear I could field a ground ball better than The Mouse.

We were on our favorite road trip. I won't tell you what town we were in, but we always looked forward to it. It was a hoppin' college town. Tons of people were in summer school, and the bars were always packed with great looking Texas girls (Yes, I have a thing for Texas girls). We made friends with the visiting team's diamond girls and we would usually go out with some of them after the games.

We were at a little house party and the next thing we know, Mickey Mouse is hammered drunk. He must have been inhaling that whiskey because I had only had a few beers at this point, and Mickey didn't even know his name. Mickey Mouse was being "that guy" again. We could tell it was going to be a legendary night for the Mickster. Before long, Mickey was half naked trying to swim in the baby pool in this chick's backyard. He was out of control, and we kind of got the feeling it was going to get sloppy.

We put up with Micky Mouse's shit for a little while longer before we decided we should get him back to The Hilton. We rounded up one of the responsible guys on our team that was sober and could come get us. By the time we got Mickey Mouse back to the hotel/brothel, he was pretty much out. We were wondering how the hell we were going to get him up to the room, and then we got a genius idea. There was a bellman's cart that you put your luggage on sitting right next to the front doors of the hotel.

A couple of us carried Mickey's drunk, fat ass to the cart and dropped him. Yes we made sure that no arms or legs were going to get caught on anything. We figured that if we could get him back to the room before the coaches realized what was going on, he might be in the clear. If this had happened to anyone else, we would have just called our coach and told him to come help us. In this case, we knew that they were just looking for an excuse to get rid of his ass. I think he was wearing to many wristbands to physically catch a ground ball anyway.

We are almost back to his room when "The Godfather"(our legendary coach that you will hear a lot about) sticks his head out of his hotel room and sees Mickey's drunk ass on the dolly. Even coach laughed. We were all laughing. He probably still had some eye black on his face from the game 6 hours earlier. We pretty much knew Mickey Mouse was screwed. Maybe he would have been okay if it wasn't the first weekend. Wait, who am I kidding? The kid couldn't catch a damn cold. It's like he was using an ejecto-mitt.

We knew that he was getting sent home. He was sitting in the stands the next morning at our game thinking that maybe he would have to miss a game or two. The next day Mickey Mouse was on a plane heading back to Michigan. How do you think that conversation went with his parents, who had just sent him half way across the country for the entire summer? He only lasted a week. Now a part of me feels like Mickey Mouse would have been good for our party scene later in the summer, but I couldn't stand to watch him boot any more ground balls like it was his job.

Mickey Mouse, if you are reading this, don't take any offense. Just go pay whoever taught you how to field ground balls a lot more money and say your prayers. And maybe next time you decide you are going to sip on some alcohol, you should stick to some Smirnoff Ice like I do..

Tonight's Preview

The Fallen Summer Teammate: The Story of "Mickey Mouse."

"My First Dip"

There are a few things that will always be associated with baseball. Some of these include peanuts, tights pants, flat bills, spikes, and the wave. One thing that mainstream America "frowns" upon in the game of baseball is tobacco. Everyone has seen the giant "lippers" and the circular outline in the back pockets of the Pro's uniforms. Even the NCAA is now enforcing strict penalties for the use of tobacco during practices and games. Matter of fact, if a player gets caught with tobacco during a game, then the player and the head coach get tossed.

I had my first dip when I was 13 years old. A few of my teammates had already started dipping at this point, and dipping was "what baseball players did." Of course I was curious. On this day I was over at my buddy "JC's" house. We were watching "Major League" or some other classic baseball movie. As soon as the movie starts, JC reaches into his bedside table drawer and pulls out a can of Kodiak Wintergreen. This is my perfect opportunity. When JC asked me if I wanted a dip, I accepted it as if I was a seasoned veteran dipper. No way I was going to let JC know that this was my first time.

I carefully studied every move JC made while he was "packing" his dip. Then I watched him place it in his lip perfectly, not making any sort of a mess. It didn't look too hard to me. I had this in the bag. So I got the can and packed it pretty nicely. I was feeling good. Half way there.

I then got my pinch(the pinch was entirely too big for the first time, but JC didn't feel the need to tell me this)and attempted to put it in my bottom lip. The shit went everywhere. I think the dip was everywhere except where it was supposed to be. I gagged instantly because half of it was in my throat. Okay so I got off to a bad start. Eventually I got most of it packed in my bottom lip and I was feeling like a freaking champ. The movie was playing and I think "Roger Dorn" had already made a few errors by this point.

Everything was fine until the room started spinning around me. I couldn't even get up out of my chair because I was so dizzy. I had never felt like this before in my life. I asked JC if this was some sort of "special" dip because it was making me feel funny. He told me it was normal and that I was just experiencing a "buzz." Looking back on that feeling, I haven't even felt like that from drinking.Ever.

I tried to play it off for as long as I could, but then came the tipping point. I was about to yack everywhere and I could feel it. I somehow managed to get up out of my chair and I took off in a dead sprint (zig-zagging down the hall because I might as well have been hammered drunk) towards the nearest bathroom. I made it just in time and I was "hugging the porcelain king" for the next 20 minutes. I literally felt like I was going to die. JC kept coming to the door asking if I was okay and I assured him that I was not sick. I wasn't feeling any better.

I decided that maybe if I got in a bath I would feel better. So I filled up the tub and soaked for about another 15 minutes, just praying that this feeling would go away. After a while, I thought I was in the clear. I sprayed some "smell-good" stuff all over the bathroom so it wouldn't smell like "wintergreen yack" and I went back in the room to watch the movie. I told JC I had a wicked stomach ache.

10 minutes later I was back in the bathroom shaking hands with Mr. Porcelain once again. I was dying. I knew I was dying. I was just positive I was going to be the first person in the world to die from taking a dip. I was so sure of this that I called my mother and told her she had to drive 45 minutes to come pick me up. My mother, being the wonderful mother that she is, made the road trip to come get me because I had told her I was having awful stomach cramps that weren't going away.

So I lied through my teeth the entire trek back home. I got out of the car and about five seconds later, my dip-drunk ass started yacking again. That's when I popped the question: "Mom, I took a dip and I think I'm dying. Am I dying?" I don't remember what she told me, but after a few more trips to the bathroom that night I was convinced I was going to pull through. I wasn't going to die after all.

Let's just say I didn't have any good experiences with dip after this. Even a few years later I would still take dips and yack everywhere. I have now learned that I'm not, and never will be a dipper. However, magically I can enjoy a chew every now and then. Damn Kodi-yack.

Children, you do not have to dip to be a good baseball player. But it does make you look really cool, so go get some Skoal Bandits and work your way up to Cope. All the good players are doing it....

Tonight's Preview

"My First Dip"


I'll be back from my weekend "vacation" tonight to write some stories. I know I am going to do the Dip story for sure, but maybe a couple more as well. See you then.

"The Hat Tip"

Many of you are familiar with the tradition of the "tipping of the hats" after our baseball games. This is a great tradition and makes the players feel very appreciated and supported. We could get blown out by 20 runs, but we always knew that after the game we would start hearing "Hotty Toddy" from all directions. First it would start in left field. They would usually do about two different "Hotty Toddys," followed by the tipping of our hats.

Then there were the students. God how we love the students. I think they reason they are always so supportive after our games is due to the fact that they should all probably be arrested for public intoxication. But, that's why we love them. We really feel the love coming from that crowd filled with gentlemen and southern belles. I will be featuring the "Swayze Crazies" many times throughout this journey.

I wanted to show you guys the painting my father did of "The Hat Tip." Some of you have seen it and even purchased prints of the original. Here is a picture of the original painting. This photo really does not do proper justice to the original painting. So I guess this is my official "Thank You" to all the fans that support our team, no matter if we win or lose. (I'm tipping my hat to you right now).

Manhood and the Hotel Porno

We were 12. Just a year after the "Oakleys/Playboy" incident(earlier story). Traveling with the baseball team of course. Somewhere in Alabama. Same group of fools I've been with since I was 8 years old. You know by this time, we had been through everything together. Well not quite everything.

You know when you were little and you got on the hotel TV to order a movie? Most of the time we would order something like "Cool Runnings" or "US Marshals". That was when our parents were in the room with us.

I don't know how it happened, but about 5 of us were sitting in "Jimmy's" hotel room alone. No parents. Hell we hadn't even heard from a parent in about 30 minutes it seemed like. That's when "Willie" got a genius ( so we thought at the time) idea.

There they were. The "Adult Films". We knew little about "rockin' and rollin', but we did know that only adults did it. We were so curious. We hadn't seen "Jimmy's" Mom in about an hour at this point, so we decided to order "Debbie Does Dallas".(of course that wasn't the name of it. How am I supposed to remember the name of the 12 year old porno) I don't know how I convinced Jimmy that it wasn't going to show up on his bill, but I do remember coming up some bullshit that sounded believable. We figured that if Jimmie's mom came back we would change the channel really quick and act like nothing was going on. So Willie pressed "Order" and it was on like Donkey Kong.

I can't even describe to you what was on that screen. Hell none of us knew what we were watching, but we knew we liked it. Was that....sex?

I guess no one even realized Jimmy's mom was opening the door. We were so fucking dumbfounded by all the skin on the TV that we didn't even flinch when the door opened. Then we heard a woman's voice, " What are you boys doing in here?".

You've never seen a group of kids scatter so fast. Shit was going everywhere. The remote control had been thrown somewhere across the room, so Debbie just kept on doing her thing on TV. Poor Jimmie had nowhere to go. It was his room. Poor Jimmy. I ran out of the room into the courtyard and the first thing I saw was a tree. I've always been a little climber, so for some odd reason I thought the best thing to do was hide in the tree for the next hour. So I did. I didn't move an inch for an hour, scared to death of what was going to happen to us. Nothing happened. Jimmy's mom never even came out of her room. I was in the clear.

I tell you what though. The next morning was the most awkward breakfast of our lives. "The Porno 5" was all sitting at the same table just waiting for Jimmy's mom to come in the lobby.

Her reaction to us was so unexpected that I think it scared the shit out of me even more. She didn't say a word to us. Never even looked in our direction. It took a solid month for me not to act awkward around her, but she never ratted on us. Not one parent found out. (Yes Mom if your reading this, all my friends saw their first porno when they were 12 on a baseball trip. Yes mom you were right across the hall. No mom, of course I didn't watch the movie I was looking the other way the whole time)

We became that much closer to being men that day. Thank you "Debbie Does Dallas" for opening up an entirely new can of worms for the "The Porno 5".

___________________________________________________________________________
Heading out of town..."Bosa" and more on Sunday. Taking Saturday off..See you Sunday.

Tonight's Preview

Player Profile: "Bosa"
"Manhood and the Hotel Porno"

Two Stories tonight. Headed out of town.

"Scuba Steve"

Scuba was a teammate of mine this past summer in Dallas. There are a few things you need to know about Scuba before you read his story. Scuba is a submarine pitcher. For you non-baseball folk, this means that he pretty much throws the ball underhanded. Secondly, Scuba is the son of two missionaries. In case you haven't thought about this yet, the son of two missionaries playing college baseball is the perfect setting for disaster.

Scuba came over and hung out a lot during the summer. My host family had a sweet pool that we would all chill in, drinking cold beer that my host family would provide. Over the course of the summer, it became very obvious that Scuba had terrible, no good, awful luck. It seemed like nothing went his way.

We decided we were going to throw a party. The only problem was where? At this point in the conversation, Scuba piped in and told us that we could throw it at his host family's house. They were going to be out of town for a while. Perfect. My teammates and I started calling all of the girls that we had met so far to tell them about the party. It was going to be awesome.

The next thing I know, Scuba is at my front door telling me that he has been kicked out of his house. I was in shock. I couldn't imagine what this son-of-a-missionary had done to get kicked out of his house. He didn't do anything at all. In fact, it was my friends and I that got him kicked out of his summer home.

Through a very large and nosy grapevine, his host family got wind of the party that was going to be thrown at their house soon following their departure. I guess Scuba lied to them and told them he didn't know anything about it. In fact, that was true. Scuba didn't know a damn thing about the party except that it was going to be at "his" house. At least Scuba had a home now.

No one gets traded in summer ball. That just doesn't happen. I've never even heard of it, well until Scuba got traded. Before we knew it, the right-handed submarine pitcher was on another team. No more Scuba stories for us. I was bummed. Scuba was hilarious. Hearing him talk about girls was great. I thought I had heard the last story from Scuba. Not the case.

Scuba and his new team were unloading their bus after a long road trip. I guess Scuba decided to put his laptop on the ground right next to him, while he gathered his other belongings. It must have been in the middle of the fucking street. Next thing he knows, a Mazda Miata zooms by and crushes the shit out of his laptop. Not only did Scuba get kicked out of his house for no reason, but he was "traded" and got his laptop shattered to pieces.

Scuba, wherever you are, just know one thing. Your luck could not get any worse. At least you have that going for you.

2 Coaches, 1 Pitcher

Sometimes before practice started, some of the freshman pitchers were allowed to throw off the mound to live hitters, instead of throwing a bullpen. This was the case on this day. It was a Friday afternoon, after a very long Thursday night. I was feeling like shit, and so was "Captain and Coke". C and C was the pitcher on this day. CC wasn't feeling too hot, but it was fine because he wasn't going to be throwing to our hitters. He was going to be throwing to two of our coaches. No problem right?

"The Giggler" and "Mossy Oak" were the coaches that were hitting today.

This was the Giggler's time to shine. He claims that we do this drill for the pitchers, but we all know it's just so he can get back up to the plate with a bat in his hands to relive his glory days. I'm sure back in the day he was a stud athlete. In fact, I know he was. But come on, he is now an out of shape old guy. No way he's getting a hit.

Mossy Oak. Mossy Oak is a quiet guy. He is a man of a few words if you don't know him very well. However, you better listen when he has something to say because it is usually very important, and it will probably help you out. Mossy Oak looks like he could run down any fly ball in the outfield, even at his age being a coach. Now granted he's not an old hag like the Giggler ( I hope you are reading this).

Mossy Oak is up first. Captain and Coke is on the mound, not looking too hot, but he was throwing to the coaches so it was going to be fine. Mossy Oak works the count a little bit, then gets a low and outside slider. I would have never even swung at it. However, Mossy Oak sticks his little ass out and hits the shit out of it. I look up in amazement as the ball flies out of the ballpark. That might have been the quietest home run I have ever seen. Mossy Oak walks out of the batters box, maybe cracking a smile, even though he knows he just took one of his players deep. He could contain himself, unlike me, laughing behind the plate. Ok so one coach hit a home run. It will never happen again.

Now its Giggler's turn to hit. I wasn't worried about it. Giggler was being way too serious to have any success on this day. Captain and Coke works the count to 2-2. CC's changeup is working good on this day, so I call the changeup. As CC releases the ball, I can tell its going to be a little high, but no big deal. Giggler doesn't have a shot. Right as the ball is about to cross home plate, Giggler pretty much takes a "Happy Gilmore" crow hop and fucking lays into the ball. As he makes contact, Giggler lets out this ferocious yell that would have scared any young child. I swear on my grandmother's grave that the ball went 450 out of the stadium.

So that's 2 home runs that the coaches hit off of Captain and Coke. At this point, not even quiet Mossy Oak can contain himself. I don't think I've ever seen Mossy Oak laughing so hard. He could barely stand up. I was on the ground in the fetal position laughing so hard that I couldn't breath. Giggler is strutting around trying to act like its no big deal, but we all know he might as well have won the lottery in his mind. Captain and Coke? Well CC just had this look on his face that read "Where the hell am I".

The coaches got the last laugh this time. Well so did I. But I have a feeling the next time they step up to the plate against Captain and Coke, they will get shut down.

"Heat Stroke Henning"

It has got to be about 105 degrees on this day. At least it felt that hot. My junior year of high school, maybe my senior year, who knows. At this point I still played for my high school during the summer time.

"Chinaman" is what he goes by.

Chinaman struts up to the baseball field on this day not having a clue what was going to happen to him in the next few hours. For all he knew, we were going to cruise through this game not giving a damn who won. After all, it is high school summer ball. No one cares.

This game is going by so slowly. I mean it is freaking torture. At this point my protege "Stiffy" was already behind the plate, so I was sitting on the bench with Chinaman. I figured it was going to be a very un-eventful last few innings, until I saw what Chinman was reaching for in his bag.

It was a can of dip. Skoal Wintergreen, maybe even Skoal Mint. This is beside the point. Now Chinman is a very skinny guy. Not much meat on those bones. To certain people, dip is powerful. I mean I know every single time I take a dip (not a pouch) I projectile vommit everywhere. I know to stay away.

Maybe it was boredom. Maybe it was ego. Whatever it was, Chinaman had to have a dip in the dugout. So he puts the fatty in his bottom lip. I mean this is no small dip either. This is a "manly dip". A few minutes go buy. Nothing. Ten minutes later, nothing. About twenty minutes later, Chinaman looks like he is about to keel over and die, right there in the dugout. I mean my homeboy is drooling and shit. Looks like a scene out of some horror film. His skin was as pale as my white bed sheets at this point.

I don't know how it happened, but Chinaman had a heat stroke right there in the dugout. Doctors claim that he was dehydrated, and that is why he almost died right there in my arms. Bullshit. The ambulance came and everything. We thought we had lost a compadre to the dip devil.

Turns out Chinaman would be fine. His scary dad would never even find out that he was dipping, which caused him have a stroke (its science). At least that's what I thought. So "Scary Dad" comes walking in the dugout to get Chinaman's belongings so he can leave and go be with his dying son at the hospital. And then he saw it. Scary Dad found the can of Skoal in Chinaman's glove. The look on his face was epic. I will never forget it. It was a look of anguish and concern over his son's health issue, but at the same time we all knew by that face that Chinaman was going to be put in solitary confinement if he ever pulled through.

Chinaman pulled through, so we hear. Although I haven't seen him since then. I will go to the grave believing that he would have been just fine if he just hadn't put a fatty in his lip.

Chinaman, next time its 120 degrees outside and your dehydrated, maybe you should consider some Berry Blend Pouches.

There is No Crying in Baseball,but there is Texting

Everyone who knows anything about baseball knows about this rule. No matter what, no matter what happens, you cannot cry in baseball. What some people have not figured out yet, is that it's okay to send text messages to girls during games. It's also appropriate to receive nudey pictures of women during baseball games..

At least that's what my summer baseball coach believed. We are going to call him "The Godfather". You will understand in the next few months why I have given him this name. Godfather would literally be in the third base coaches box checking his text messages to see if Linda, Sara, Robin, or any one of his women were texting him. Most of the time they were.

So it's a really tight game. We are playing away. It's the 9th inning, or maybe the 8th, so Godfather decides hes going to call the pitches. Not once, but twice in this inning, I look over to get the sign and he is texting the shit out of god knows who. I mean his fingers were moving so fast that there was no way he was making any sense.(His favorite text to send girls was " Why don't you come over here and let daddy pull those panties down). The Godfather is 37 years old for Christ's sakes.

I would be in the hole (the third guy up to bat) and Godfather would tap me on the shoulder to make me read his texts. I mean how the hell am I supposed to focus at the plate when my coach shows me a picture of two girls making out 2 minutes before I'm supposed to bat? I'm not. Maybe that is part of the reason I had a batting average that was less than my weight. And I am no lightweight either.

Win or lose, we could always count on one thing in our post game meetings. We knew that by the time the game was over, Godfather already had a group of girls lined up to go out with us that night. Not only that, he probably had a party for us to go to as well.

You baseball critics might say that coaches should never display behavior like this, especially during a game. I say bullshit. I say if a coach wants to text girls instead of calling pitches, go right ahead.

Half of the stories I will be writing would never be possible if Godfather didn't send and receive naughty texts during our games. To you Godfather, I am forever in debt.

Tonight's Preview

"Heat Stroke Henning"
"2 Coaches, 1 Pitcher"
"There is No Crying in Baseball,but there is Texting"
"Player Profile: Scuba Steve"
and more..

My Attempt at Pimping a Home Run (The ball hit the fence, and was clearly short of a bomb)

At this point in the Summer, I don't even remember the last hit that I had. It must have been like 4 weeks since the last time I got a hit. Let's just say that summer ball in Texas made me appreciate pro baseball players even more than I already did. I'm no stud hitter with a metal bat, but once I got wood in my hands I forgot what it felt like to make contact with a baseball.

So we were playing in a place I will call "They Valley", Texas. This was always our favorite road trip because it was a really fun town, and the hotel we stayed at was pretty nice.

It must have been the 5th inning or so. Here I come walking up to the plate with a wooden "D-Bat" in my hands. At this point, most of the opposing infielders quit watching the game, and the outfielders sit down and start picking clovers in the outfield. Let's just say I wasn't known as Babe Ruth in this summer league.

Here comes the pitch, I swing my ass off. Holy shit I make solid contact! I can actually tell that the ball is getting out of the infield! It has been so long since I hit a home run that I forgot what it feels like at this point. So I'm feeling like a million dollars, pretty much walking to first base, slowly rounding the bag and heading to second. So I look up to see how far the ball landed, and the left fielder is throwing some baseball to the shortstop. I round second base, trotting like Bonds after hitting a home run, and the shortstop comes up to me and tags me with the ball. He is laughing so hard that he almost fell down.

I hadn't hit a ball in so long, that I just assumed I crushed it when I finally made contact. The ball that I had just "crushed" hit the bottom of the fence, and was not even close to being a home run. I tucked my tail in between my legs and jogged back to the dugout as my whole team was crying from laughing so hard.

Thank god we were playing in "The Valley". If I was going to be pulled from a game for doing something stupid, this was the place to do it. The coaches, fully aware of what was going on,sat back and watched me and my fellow "benchwarmers" enjoy some of the finest margaritas that we have ever had, in the dugout. We just put the yellow frozen margaritas in Gatorade bottles and quenched our thirst for the remaining of the asswhooping we were receiving.

Always run out fly balls. Especially the ones that don't go over the fence.

"The Curfew Scare"

As freshmen living in the athletic dorm, we were all pretty scared about getting caught for being out after curfew. It was so easy for the coaches to check, because all the coach had to do was show up at the dorm and see if we were there. Most of the time we would be worried about curfew at the beginning of the night, but by the time curfew came around, it never even crossed our minds. So we partied.

On this night, me and my newly acquainted teammates were probably at a bar that I will call "The Archives". This was our spot. After a night filled with rumplemints and cold beer, we decided we would all pack into a car and go to a late night party. Everything was fine, until I saw the look on "Tom's" face. He was pale, and he was staring at his phone while it was ringing in his hand. I looked down at his at his Nokia and it said "Coach____" Calling. It was about 2 a.m. Long past our curfew. We were absolutely fucked. All kinds of thoughts were racing through my mind. I was thinking about how much we would have to run, and in the back of my mind I thought we might get kicked off the team.

We packed into a teammate's car who was sober (always have a DD) and we drove 90 mph back to the dorm, expecting Coach____ to be waiting at the front door. We all sprint up to the dorm, but "Tom" is nowhere to be found. I look back at the car, and "Tom" is laughing his ass off and staring at his phone.

Turns out that "Tom" still has a girlfriend back home. I guess he had met a Southern Bell here at school because by the time I got to him, he was chatting away on the phone with a girl. I could tell by the baby talk, mostly. I'm scared to death asking him why he isn't running in the dorm with us. Then "Tom" says, "Oh shit my bad dude, I didn't want (girlfriend back home) to see a girls number in my phone. I just remembered that I put "random chick's" name in my phone as " Coach ____" last week when I met her so "Girlfriend at home" wouldn't get mad at me". You have got to be fucking kidding me. I almost suffered a heart attack because my homesick teammate was smuggling girls numbers into his cell phone, and forgot that he named her "Coach_____". Very tricky "Tom" but it would have been nice if your drunk ass had remembered that before we made the "Fast and Furious" drive back to the dorm.

Girlfriends back home never work out.

"Hungover Baseball Camp"

You have all done it. You have all had a little too much to drink the night before, when you knew in the back of your mind that you had something really important to do the next morning. I don't have time to document all those mornings that I've had like those, but I do have time to tell you about a morning that my buddy was lucky enough to experience. His name is "Stewwy".

Me and Stewwy knew we had to go to a camp the next morning. The only reason a high school kid goes to these camps is to hopefully get seen by a coach, and eventually maybe sign to play at that college. So of course you would never want to be blackout the night before.

Me and Stewwy decided to stop by a little shindig that one of our friends was throwing. We were not going to drink. At least that's what we were telling ourselves. We were fine until these two chicks showed up. We had heard about these chicks, because they were going to be featured on "MTV"s Sweet 16" later in that year. We knew what we had to do. We had to consume enough booze to get the balls to invite ourselves to their Sweet 16 Party. So it was on. Let's just say by the end of the night, we were pretty confident that we weren't going to be lead out by bouncers once we got in the MTV party.

The next thing I knew it was the morning, and me and Stewwy were on the way to camp. After I blinked my eyes once or twice, we were at the stadium. We somehow managed to get out of the car, and then it happened. As soon as Stewwy got out of his driver's seat, he started projectile vomitting all over the place. I mean I don't think I have ever seen someone get that much distance on a barf in my entire life. It was not pretty, but it was very impressive. I'm pretty sure he had a little bit of puke on his face and shirt when we finally made it in to the camp and said hey to the coaches.

Stewwy ended up getting a scholarship offer shortly after this camp, one of many that he would get. How he managed to pull that off, I will never know. He couldn't even spell his name, much less throw a strike while we were at that camp. He must have had an angel with him, "Angel's in the Outfield" style. (Of course I didn't get an offer, I looked like a 13 year old "World of Warcraft" fatass when I was a senior in high school)

The Sweet 16 party that we attended later that year wasn't bad either. I'd say the juice was worth the squeeze in this case. Thank you Stewwy.

"Some Words From Cole"

I want to keep these stories humorous, although there are going to be a few things I post that really aren't meant to be funny. Some if it will be random, but it will all relate to baseball.

I met Cole while I was living in Dallas last summer playing baseball. I met a lot of people while living there, and Cole was one of them. Cole plays baseball at a college up North. Although he wasn't playing in a baseball summer league, he hung out with our team every now and then. Cole is a good guy. And a really smart guy too.

I was talking to him about starting this blog, and he told me to check out his "About Me" section on his Facebook. I checked it out, and I really liked what he had to say. I wanted this to be the first story of the day, so thanks Cole. Cole writes:

"Extra innings, double-headers, broken bones, tendonitis and bruises. We play through it all. We do it because playing under the lights is holy, because sprinting 90 ft. frees your spirit, because the battle that emerges in 60 ft. 6 in. of distance is thrilling, because we can party in the locker room, because you're immortal in between the lines, because a diamond is the most sacred of shapes, because a nice hit can make you smile all night, because bruises are battle wounds, because the crack of a bat and the pop from a mitt is a rhythm to live by, because its possible to throw fast and hit far enough TO LEAVE LIFE BEHIND. We do it because we love it"

Tonight's Preview

"Hungover Baseball Camp"
"Some Words from Cole"
"The Curfew Scare"
"My Attempt at Pimping a Home Run" (The ball hit the fence, and was clearly short of a bomb)
and more...

Hooters and the Strict Parents

This story is not very lengthy, however I feel the need to tell it. Hooters. The one place young teenage kids ( and their dads) want to go and celebrate after they win a weekend tournament.

St. Louis, Missouri. We were about 11 or 12, and we were competing in the AABC( I think that was it) World Series. They had a skills competition the first night, and it was a team event. The events included a home run derby, throwing challenge, and speed challenge. We won the entire skills competition, of course. So what did we want to do? We wanted to go to Hooters.

All the parents were cool with it, except one family. Im just going to call this guy Bob. Bob's parents were super religious to the point that they would not allow their child to enjoy the amazingly tasty wings that Hooters had to offer. They refused to comply with the "victory ritual" and everyone went somewhere different to eat.

I remember this pissing me off so bad, and I could not understand how parents could be that damn close minded. It was a team gathering, and of course we just wanted to go because of the menu.

The next year, their 14 year old daughter got prego and had a baby.

(No offense to the 14 year old daughter. She is happily married these days, and I wish you the best. If your reading this, you know it makes for a good story.)

The Demise of My First Pair of Oakleys= Introduction of Playboy

I was 11. We all thought we were the coolest kids ever. Every time we would go with our parents and teammates on a summer road trip to play in a tournament, we always ended up at the mall. I'm pretty sure this incident took place Paducah, Kentucky.

On this day, I had just purchased a pair of Blue Oakley M Frame's with some sweet fire-looking lenses. We all strutted around the mall in a pack and looked like a little baseball gang in caps and Oakleys. I was so proud of those Oakleys, because we all saw the Pro's wearing them all the time.

Anyway, we make it back to the hotel where we discover there is a little bookstore inside. Me and a few of my teammates decide to go check out the bookstore, and of course I was wearing my brand new pair of Blue/Fire Oakley M Frames on the top of my hat. So I'm cruising down the isle and I see some magazine that says "Playboy". The title just sticks out over the top of the other magazines. I decided to pick it up.

I pulled the Playboy off the shelf, and I didn't really know what the hell I was looking at. All I remember was that there was a girl, and she had these two huge things on her chest that looked like they were bigger than her head.Anyway, in the worst timing ever, the store owner comes walking right around the corner just as I am staring in amazement at these two basketball-looking-things on this babe. I didn't have time to think, so I just dropped the magazine and ran out of the store as fast as I could.

Thinking I was in the clear, I stopped to catch my breath. Then I realized that I was missing something. My Blue/Fire Oakley M Frames were no where to be found. I went back to the store to look for my glasses about 30 minutes later, and there I found them. My glasses were broken to pieces. In the panic of my great escape, the glasses had come off my head, and I had crushed them to pieces when I ran away.

My glasses were very short-lived. However, one must always look at the bright side of things. I was introduced to Playboy on this day.

Profile: Chez A.

Chez. I met Chez while playing summer baseball in a collegiate league in Texas. Chez might have one of the best northern accents that I have ever heard. Chez became famous on our team for his favorite saying " Look at that ass". If you heard him say it for the first time, it was almost like another language. It is pronounced like this: "Look at dat eeeeaaaassss." He also said that girls were "foooooine."

Chez was the only pitcher I ever caught that would verbally talk to me, pitch to pitch. Lets say that the big fat guy from the visiting team was up to bat. I always wanted to throw this guy a bunch of offspeed junk. Plus, Chez had a pretty nice slider/curve. If I threw down 2 fingers for a curve ball, instead of shaking his head like most pitchers to shake me off, Chez would yell from the mound, " Nooo, I don't want dat pitch." He would yell at me from the mound until I called the right pitch, and then I would hear " Yeeeea I like dat one" and he would fire the fastball to me. Most of the time, the batter would strike out because he was too busy laughing at Chez. I could barely contain myself behind the plate. This is just the beginning of The Chez. More from his Yankee ass later.

P.S. Chez signed with the Boston Red Sox today, so congrats my man.

Daddy's Reasurrance

If you know me, you know that I still piss my pants when I even hear about a tornado. If you knew me when I was younger, you know that I pretty much had a panic attack every time a drop of rain would fall from the sky.

My 10 year old summer. Me and my "Tigers" were playing in a tournament in Slidell,Louisiana. I saw the clouds coming from a mile away. To me, it looked like one big blanket of death creeping my way. I am crouching behind home plate, not even caring if I was looking at my pitcher or not. All I could think about was this giant storm coming.

Before the umpires could even clear the field, my ass was already running out of the batter's box towards the concession stand to hide from the storm. The ladies at the concession stand were real bitches, and wouldn't let me chill inside. So I remember sitting on my dads lap as the storm rolled in. I started getting even more nervous, feeling like I was going to throw up all over Big Steve.

Right when it got real bad, my dad leaned in and told me " Don't worry son. We are in the safest place we could be. We are in no danger." Before he could even finish his sentence, lightening struck the transformer that was on a pole about 5 feet from me. It exploded like a giant bomb and came crashing down right next to me. I don't remember, but I probably peed myself. Let's just say that's when I started looking for my mother whenever it rained. Thanks for trying Dad.

This is just the beginning of the storm stories. I will explain "The Rutland Rule" later..

The Gas Station Wisdom

I will never for get this encounter for the rest of my life. I was a 16 year old in Millington,TN who just got finished with an afternoon game at USA Stadium, just outside of Memphis. Lets just call this umpire "Blue". You will be hearing many stories about different "Blues" as you read.

I was pumping gas for my mother (being the angel child that I am), when one of my favorite umpires walked up to me and began giving me words of wisdom. After many cliche life lessons, he ended by telling me to never quit until I make a college baseball roster. Let me tell you his reasoning why. It wasn't because of the gamesmanship, or even the relationships that I would build. The last words I heard from this "Blue" were, " College baseball players get the most pussy." Thank you "Blue" for those wonderful words. You will never be forgotten.