Absent Captain

Felipe Castro, our somewhat shy, "lead by example" $97 million outfielder, was anointed captain of the team yesterday by manager Rick Churches and GM Alvin Kirby. The news, delivered through the time-tested method of word of mouth, was met with a bout of jovial silence. In truth, most everyone on the team loves Felipe. He works as hard, or harder, than anyone on the roster. He runs and dives and never dogs it. Probably a good choice.

Probably.

Why my air of dissension? Number 1, Felipe hasn't shown up to camp yet. In effect, he was anointed Captain in absencia. I'm sure he'd like to be here in a perfect world, but since his mother's kidnapping in Venezuela, he's been home, I assume trying to help. Not really sure since we haven't had any contact (not that we should). My guess is that Rick and Alvin went about this course of action to pump up the man who is the key to this year's team. Which leads me to number 2...

Number 2, Felipe will be the first to admit that his first season with the team, last season, was his worst on the field since his rookie year in 2000. He only hit 16 home runs (they projected upper 30s), only had 69 RBIs (they projected 100+), stole only 12 bases (another 30+ projection) and only hit .261. I bet Alvin's glad that contract is backloaded.

Number 3, Felipe has been on this team for one year. One. There are guys here who've been here for ten times longer, who played for this team during its championship runs, who also command tremendous respect in the clubhouse. I tend to think that, upon reflection, there may be some unhappy campers in this space over the next few weeks.

Number 4... Well, I can stop at three.

Your first thought, possibly, is if I'm angry, or jealous, since this will be my 14th year with the club. No, not really. I mean, who doesn't still have dreams of leading their forces to victory? Sure, if they'd come to me I would have accepted the responsibility. But I doubt they would ever do that because I only play once every 5 days. I don't have any control over how we play the other 4 days and a captain, I think, needs to have his fingers in the pie all the time. Me, I'd just eat the pie and have to work off the excess calories before they found themselves lodged under my chin. Either way, my time with the team is running out. Felipe's got 6 years left on his deal. I'll have five chins and no scalp hair by the time he gets an extension or moves on.

Besides, the day I wrote Word One of this blog was the day I was taken out of the running. I'm nobody's best friend down here. Many guys are a little wary of me, concerned they'll say something in confidence and I'll break that confidence, spilling the beans here. My intention with this isn't to lose friends. But it has influenced some to consider becoming enemies.

Speaking of Rick (I'm pretty much kidding), he did give us an update on Felipe. He's been working out at home with a team-appointed personal trainer and said, no matter what, he'd be up here by the 15th. He'll get in 2 weeks of games, enough to (hopefully) get his timing down before the regular season starts on April 1. (I'm not counting the 2 games between Arizona and Philadelphia in Japan starting on 3/25.)

When Felipe shows up, I expect he'll get a warm welcome. He's been through a lot. And with his new appointment, he's going to go through even more. I hope he enjoys the welcome he gets, because none of this makes sense. It's a surprising call from the powers that be. For Felipe, it's only going to get harder.