Action and Reaction

Split squad games today with half of the team taking the bus to Fort Myers. It's about a 3-hour drive. Times like these I'm happy for my veteran status. The guys had to be on the bus by 7:15 this morning. I showed up around 8 AM. The locker room was quiet, just the way I like it. This place can get crazy, especially after a big game that we won. But routines the way they are before a game can give the room a jungle-type of atmosphere. It's harder for me to concentrate then, so I savor the times when it's completely quiet and I can be alone.

When I arrived, my locker was filled from top to bottom with pieces of crumpled papers. A sign above the stall said "Jimmy's Frivolous Lawsuits." I guess my being sued just brings out the comedian in some people. I paid a clubhouse boy $50 to clean up the mess and put in a call to my tax attorney to see if I can write the tab off as a business expense. You should have seen the boy's face when I asked for a receipt.

Manager Rick Churches didn't make the trip. He sent Chazz Waters to manage the group playing in Fort Myers. Chazz is Rick's bench coach and managed us to two world titles back-to-back, in 1999 and 2000. I was disappointed when Chazz was fired in '02, but not surprised. Less than two years from a championship and the guy gets canned because half the team is in the hospital being cured of the biggest injury bug to ever hit the franchise. That 5 1/2 years seems like a long time ago.

Alvin hired Chazz to be Rick's right hand man. I know Rick had his eyes on a few other folks, but since this is Rick's first managing job - ever - Alvin only let Rick hire one coach, batting coach Matt LaConte, probably because it was a no-brainer of a decision. Matt works harder than anyone here. He's got no life outside of this team, but that's the way he is. Matt made the trip to Fort Myers with Chazz.

The dynamic between Rick and Chazz is interesting to see. Rick is clearly insecure around a man who, one could argue (although I don't know this for certain), would like his old job back. I haven't seen or heard Chazz doing anything unprofessional, but Rick does what he can to keep everyone apprised of who is boss. That's probably why Chazz will spend 6 hours on a bus today and Rick won't even get on an exercise bike.

As my locker was being cleaned out and sanitized (I have OCD when it comes to a baseball locker room), I was in the whirlpool. I've started using it before my day begins to help me loosen up. I feel like I'm close to the best shape of my life (except for my elbow), but still, as I near 40, my body needs whatever help it can get to give me a leg up on stiffness and and soreness. Ten minutes into my session, Rick came into the room (but not the whirlpool). He asked me to pay him a visit in his office as soon as I was done. I said okay and hung out for another 20 minutes.

After dressing and straightening out my locker, I entered Rick's office. It was about five minutes before batting practice (Baltimore was in today for a 1:00 game). "Where the hell have you been?" Apparently, Rick had wanted me to leave the whirlpool as soon as he asked me into his office. "You said come in when I was done," I said. He just shook his head. I know I'm like the dog that can do nothing but wrong for his owner, but at least I didn't poop on Rick's rug.

He pushed a piece of paper across his desk. "Read it," he said. I picked it up and saw the heading, CONFIDENTIALITY AGREEMENT BETWEEN RICK CHURCHES & JIMMY SCOTT. I stopped reading. "What?" he said. I put it back on his desk and walked out of the room. My lawyer called me an idiot for signing the agreement with the team shrink, especially without having a lawyer read it first. When I asked my anonymous lawyer what choice I'd had, he said I had two choices, sign it or not. He would have leaned toward the not. Learning from my mistake, I leaned toward the not with Rick.

I was pulling up my uniform pants - the locker room was pretty crowded by now - when Rick came back my way (this is about 4 minutes after I'd left him). He handed me another piece of paper. "What's this?" I said, pulling up my zipper. He turned and walked away. I looked down. It was a bill for $350 from some seven-named law firm. I crumpled it up and threw it on the floor. Before I had a chance to look up, a whole garbage can full of crumpled up papers was poured onto the floor. It was Rick. He'd taken the practical joke refuse that had been cleaned out of my locker and littered the entire space between me and that one piece of paper. Now I looked up. He was, um, upset. But rather than say anything (the very full locker room was painfully quiet), he pointed toward his office. I got up and followed him inside.

The door slammed. "I'm not going to pay $50 to clean that mess up," I said.

Rick stepped into my face (no witnesses, so this will always be his word against mine) and told me he never wanted me to pitch for him again. "Why, did Chazz get promoted?" I could tell Rick was this close to popping me in the jaw. But that action would have brought a reaction he would not have liked. I'm not saying I would have popped him back. I am saying half the team would have seen me walk out of his office with no teeth - when I had teeth going in - put one and one together and not believed me when I said I'd walked into a door. After my filing another grievance, and quite possibly winning this one too, Rick would have been fined, suspended, and eventually fired. Chazz probably would have gotten promoted, thus making me a soothsayer.

Rick Churches is a very smart man. I hope I have never led you to believe otherwise. His one flaw is his temper, at least with me. Lots of other guys think he's a breath of fresh air after Larry Picketts, who I liked but many players thought was too excitable when spurned on by umpires or nasty fans. It was Larry's uninvited call to Sports Radio WTEM (The Team!), in reaction to fan criticism, that got him canned last year. A "heart-attack temper" is how Alvin described the man he fired six hours after Larry hung up the phone. Rick would never make the same mistake Larry made. And that's why, after I laid out the scenario above about what would happen should Rick knock me silly, he sat down and smiled.

"I want to win," is what Rick said. I told him I did too. "I don't think we need you to win," he said in return.

"You're wrong," I volleyed back. He didn't say anything for a moment. "If you don't think you need me to win, that means you're not totally sure," I said. "You could have said outright and unequivocally, 'We don't need you to win.' You didn't say that, so there must be a little doubt somewhere in that head of yours. And that means a very small part of your growing body thinks you do need me."

He shook his head. "I don't want you." I laughed and said I didn't want to sleep with him, I just want to play baseball. Winning baseball. He called me a Wisenheimer, a name he's called me about 50 times this month. I've played for 20 years and never had a nickname. If Rick does one thing to me before I retire, he'll get Topps to replace the name Jimmy on my baseball card with the name Wisenheimer. It would just come back to haunt Rick, however. Wisenheimer is such a long name, I'd need a bigger plaque in the Hall of Fame.

I told him that too. He shook his head again and pushed his confidentiality agreement toward me. He really, really wanted me to sign it. I said no, that this was a manager's office in a baseball team's clubhouse, not a Madison Avenue conference room in the firm of Lawyer, Lawyer & Lawyer. "Treat me like a man, like a ballplayer," I said. "Or give one of these to every reporter covering the team. Let's see what kind of reaction the back page of the NY Post gives you then."

A knock on the door interrupted us. It was 80 year old Gums Murphy (there's no way anyone would ask him to spend 6 hours on a bus). The team was on the field taking batting practice. Rick should be out there with them.

Rick said thank you to Gums and stood up. Since taking the job in October, Rick has literally put on 20 pounds. I always thought stress was supposed to do the opposite. No, I didn't tell him that. He would have punched me in the jaw.

I reached out my hand, an action I hoped would be met with a reaction of the same. He shook and told me to think a little bit more. Over the last two weeks, I've been prosecuted by the media for inaccurately blogging about Felipe Castro and sued by the team psychologist for accurately blogging about my sessions with him, against his wishes. "If you really want to play baseball," Rick said, "you'll give up the blog bullsh*t and just play."

I nodded and told him I couldn't do that. I promised myself I wouldn't fall back into the good old boy baseball routine of having no control over what's said about me and my family and what I say in return.

He shrugged. "If negative headlines and a lawsuit are your definition of control," Rick said, "I'm afraid you're in for a very long baseball season."

He walked through the locker room and out to the field, leaving me in the silence of the clubhouse, just like when I'd entered, just the way I thought I liked it.