High & Tight With Jimmy Scott

I've Moved

2008-07-18T15:40:00.001-04:00

This blog is now dead. It's inactive. I refuse to come back to it.

Or I might if, just for the heck of it, I feel like it. Otherwise, I've got my full website up now. It's called Jimmy Scott's High & Tight. You can go there here:

www.jimmyscottshighandtight.com

It's amazing. Lots of audio clips. Working on the video. You're gonna love it.

Angry Manager, Managing Angry

2008-05-20T06:05:00.003-04:00

Look at what happened back in 1993:

Well, now all you need to do is multiply this by about 15 and convert it to 2008 standards. You see, Rick Churches, my manager (who is a bit high-strung), went completely over-the-top nuts last night in the clubhouse. I haven't seen any video of it yet anywhere - it happened right before the press came down after last night's game - but maybe one of the guys here caught it on his cell phone and will upload it in the near future. Anyway, it was nothing like this:

First of all, when Rick went nuts, it didn't take place in the shower. He was sort of half in his office and half out. And he wasn't really yelling at the team. He was just sort of yelling overall at the state of the world. I turned away when he began to bring world affairs into his rant for fear he'd make eye contact with me and I'd start to laugh. I wouldn't have been laughing at him. Well, yes, I would have been laughing at him. And that's just something a player shouldn't do to his manager, especially when his manager is going on a tirade.

It started somewhere in the 8th inning when Rick got thrown out of the game for arguing balls and strikes. You can't do that with umpires. While the majority of umpires are good men who are doing a professional job, some are terrible. Some have giant egos, larger than the egos of people like me, and you can't get past those egos for a second. Rick argued with an umpire's ego and got tossed. We were soundly trounced in a one-game rainout makeup, 10-2, our two runs scoring in the first inning. I think Rick was more upset that we were no-hit the rest of the night. Take away our first three batters and they pitched a perfect game against us.

Nobody likes to be beaten like that. Especially a manager. So Rick went nuts. Kookoo. Over the rainbow. Crackers.

Oh, I wish I had video for you. The papers had a few sentences about it in today's editions, but since Rick was done early, it's all hearsay. None of us (or is it we?) players would be directly quoted as to the full content of his anger. Even here, I'm not going to give you every last detail. Not today. I want to see what the team does in response. Or what Rick does before I spill all the beans and get lambasted for it from everyone I know. So, I'll just confirm that Rick was engaged in fury last evening and we deserved every word he said.

Nearly every word. I'm not completely bald just yet.

Call To The Bullpen

2008-05-19T05:38:00.002-04:00

As we've known all along, I'm new to this bullpen thing. I think I've pitched in relief less than 10 times in my career, and that includes the 2000 Series Championship when I came out and pitched the last 3 innings of Game 7 on 0 days of rest (let me just add how I won Game 6 and pitched 7.2 innings - ahh, the glories of a youthful arm). You see baseball from a different perspective in the outfield, behind a big fence. You're not as close, like if you're watching from the dugout. And the TV isn't as good as in the clubhouse, should you slip back there during a game for a beverage or a bathroom break. It's all different, but that doesn't make it bad.

Billy Weston has been this team's closer for 3 years (this being his fourth). I know saves aren't as big a deal to loads of people because most come after only 1 inning of work, but the fact that Billy has averaged 39 saves over his time here still says something about how well he's pitched his 1 inning per game. Nobody expected him to get hurt two weeks ago, especially him. He owned this bullpen due to his dominance. From what I'm hearing, he won't be back for up to four months.

Billy had a a bunch of superstitions whenever the call came for him to start warming up. First, if he was sitting, he had to get off of his butt and take a first step with his left foot (not his right). He had to carry his glove in both hands and make it to the bullpen mound (not the rubber) within 8 steps. In some stadiums, where the mound is farther away from where the relief pitchers sit (like Arizona and Pittsburgh), Billy had to take 8 very large steps. When he tweaked his hamstring in 2006, it was a result of one very large step, some damp ground and a slip. He had to brush his left foot over the entire topping of the bullpen pitching rubber and then take three long, deep, cleansing breaths before asking, in Spanish, for the bullpen catcher to throw him the ball. "Pelota," he'd say. He'd throw 11 pitches minimum and pronounce himself ready. He wouldn't throw any more than 21 pitches for fear of gassing himself too early. And the bullpen catcher had to yell out numbers as soon as Billy got to 8. Just the catcher could do it. Anyone else and he'd get thrown off.

Then there was his music. His theme song was/is "Eruption" by Van Halen. It had to be begin being played, in his home stadium (this goes all the way back to 1997), the moment his right foot (not his left) touched the outfield warning track (definitely before either of his feet touched the outfield grass). He had to make it to the infield by a certain point in the song, skipping over the edge of the grass that separates infield dirt from the outfield, then make it to the mound by another particular point of the song.

I could go on. It involves shaking hands after a save, the way he disrobed after a game on the road vs. at home, the length of time in the shower, etc. It gets a little much.

So when I got back up to the bigs and started spending my time in the bullpen, I was a shock to the inhabitants of this space. I'm not a real superstition guy. I have certain quirks, like what I will and won't eat before a game and what time I need to get to bed the night before, but my ways aren't as colorful as Billy's.

The music, now that's apparently a big deal. Fans really want to get pumped up when their closer comes onto the field. That means the team is ahead and merely 3 outs from victory. The last season and 1/6th (because we're 1/6th of the way through this year), there have been few opportunities for a closer to come out because we haven't won too many games. But that seems to be changing since my call up from the rehab assignment. In the 9 games that we've played since I've been back, I've pitched 6 times. Considering we were 12 and 23 back then and are now 20 and 24, we've made some good progress. We were 11 games back and now we're 7. 7 games from first with 5/6ths of the season to go is not too big a mountain to climb. Especially when you're closer (that's me) is 6 for 6 in save opportunities and hasn't given up a run yet. Especially when your closer has struck out 8 batters in 6 innings. Especially when your closer runs in from the outfield to"Working For A Living" by Huey Lewis & The News.

Huey Lewis & The News? They're supposed to pump the crowd up?

Well, I don't know. I was asked what song did I want and this one popped into my head. I always liked the band and liked this version of the song. It kind of pumps me up. It's upbeat and fun and I like how the harmonica solo leads into a cool guitar solo. So, is it the coolest song for a closer to come in with? Is it "Hells Bells" or "Eruption?? Nope. It's Huey. I like it. It's what I want to hear when that call comes for me to head out and pitch the bottom of the 9th.

And as long as the song finishes between the time I release my 7th warmup pitch and when the catcher catches it, less than a second later, I'm happy. But don't end it early or late. That'll screw up my whole day.

Jimmy Scott's High & Tight

2008-05-16T05:48:00.004-04:00

It's launched! "But," you say, "what is Jimmy Scott's High & Tight? Is it a Broadway show? Ooh, I love Broadway. Is there singing and dancing?"

No, it's not a Broadway show, thus, there is no singing and dancing.

"Is it a diner? I love to eat. Do you serve both steaks and chops?"

No.

"Then which is it? Steaks or chops?"

It's not a diner.

"Is it a set of designer underpants? You're almost 40 Jimmy. You're at the stage in a man's life when the pants are either lifted above the stomach or below. Is it a set of designer underpants?"

No, but I like that idea. May I steal it?

"Jimmy," you say with gusto, "I'm stuck. What else can a famous formerly 'greatest pitcher of his generation' do that would be called Jimmy Scott's High & Tight?"

I'll tell you.

Go here: http://www.jimmyscottshighandtight.com/

That's it! It's a website.

"A website?"

Yes.

"What on earth is a great baseball player who is definitely starting to go bald doing with a website?"

Stuff. I'm doing stuff. This blog? It's gonna go up there. The podcast interviews? They're gonna go up there. Video interviews? I'm gonna do some of them and put them up there. Oh, you'll feel joy learning more about my family, my team, our management. There is a Forum section where you can write nasty things about me. There is a poll up with more to come so you can act all American and vote. There are links. You'll see pictures. The list is not endless. It ends there.

"What will it cost me?"

Nothing. I'm a multi-multi-multi-millionaire. What am I gonna do with your money? Spend it on more underpants?

"Lord, I hope not."

That makes 3.2 million of us.

"What do I need to do?"

Go there, young man. Go to http://www.jimmyscottshighandtight.com/. Participate. Comment on blogs. Join the Jimmy Scott Fan Club. Click on the Syndicate button and let the daily website changes come to you. The site is like a ground ball. You need to set yourself into proper position to field it cleanly.

"I don't understand that last metaphor."

Neither do I.

"Are you still gonna blog here?"

Yeah. Still gonna blog, but probably more often. I want to have contests and give things away. I want you to become more involved in my life.

"Will we have sex?"

Nope. Vanessa would be mad.

"Will you have me over for dinner?"

Chances of that are extremely remote. What's in it for me?

"I'll go to your website."

Okay. Deal.

"Will you serve steaks or chops?"

Ha ha. You're funny. Enjoy the website. Enjoy your weekend. Root for me. I'm rooting for you.

Media Protection

2008-05-15T06:19:00.004-04:00

I love baseball pundits. These are generally men somewhere in their 40s who like to talk and be heard. Much like politicos who you see and hear in all of the roundtable shows that cover Obama and Hillary and Bush the whatever and McCain, these guys like to be guests and they like to be hosts and they like to have their views heard over everyone else's. It's their job to be confident, pompous, arrogant. It's their job to be part of the landscape. They share the spotlight with the players and they love it.

You can tell I'm a little down on them right now. Sure, there are great, great guys who cover baseball, both locally and nationally. There are guys who really know their stuff. Some of them even still play semi-pro ball in their free time. But in my experience, those guys are few and far between. To be in the 21st century sports media, you need to be a certain type of person. You need to be aggressive. You need to be creative. (How is it possible to make someone read your column if you're writing about a last place team that's been in last place for a decade?) You need to be able to make relationships with front office people. You need to get scoops.

I have to see the media every day. There's radio, TV, internet, and print. In New York, we have loads of papers: the Bergen Record, the Star Ledger, the Daily Record, the Journal News, Newsday, the NY Post, the NY Daily News, the NY Sun, the NY Times, the Wall Street Journal (sometimes). We have our team website, the National Baseball League website, CBS Sportsline, Fox Online, ESPN.com, and a bunch more I can't think of. On TV, we have ESPN, our own network, NYS, plus national and local networks: FOX, TBS, WCBS, WNBC, WABC, the CW, My9, NY-1, News 12 NJ and more. There's national print too. Sports Illustrated, The Sporting News. So right there, I've added up 29 different organizations from this paragraph, and that doesn't include the AP, Baseball America, Yahoo! Sports and the 75-100 members of the Japanese media here to watch Kai Goto. This means, before and after every game, a whole lot of people get the opportunity to see me naked. Even worse, they also want to talk to me.

I've been good. I've kept my promise. I haven't spoken on the record to the media since January. I'm so great.

That doesn't mean they haven't quoted me, or quoted others quoting me. You've seen me quoted without my knowledge. Such is the life of a sports superstar. Or a guy like me.

My goal in writing this blog has been for the media to take my quotes from here. They do occasionally. I've read stories in various publications that are based upon the stuff I put here. That's good. It means my plan has worked at times.

But it's backfired more often than not.

I mentioned above the characteristics of a successful 21st century sports media person. I also mentioned how they need scoops. In this particular case, they get angry with me because I've had a couple of scoops they didn't have (it helps to be the only person on the scene willing to write about whatever is happening at the time, like all of my woes with the front office). They're even more upset because they're seeing that I'm now interviewing players and uploading the interviews, unedited, here in this space. I put up my first podcast two days ago. The crowd of media instantly went Hisssssssss. Very upset that I'm stepping a little bit more on their turf. One guy even said, and this sounds straight out of a black & white 1940s film, "Leave the reporting to us."

It's funny. Did this guy, a print person, say that to the Internet crowd 10 years ago when that revolution started? Did he say that about Chris Rock when Chris reported from the Republican convention in 1996? Does he say it about The Daily Show?

C'mon, man. Lighten up. When I quipped something back to him, you know what he said in return? Here it is: "You don't see me on the mound throwing fastballs." No, I don't. And he doesn't see me making a living from writing a blog. Yet, I'm treading on his water. I'm wearing the pants in his baseball family.

He's insecure. And he's not the only one. There are others who are literally afraid that I'm going to start a revolution; that every athlete is going to start doing this, taking organized journalism out of the equation.

That's not going to happen. Most athletes don't want to write their names on a bad contract, much less attach them to something like this. In fact most athletes can't write at all. Sure, we have name power. But power of the pen? Not for the vast majority of us. Other guys blog. It's fun sometimes. But it becomes a hassle too. Once you start, you either have to keep going or quit. I don't want to quit because:

a) I'd be embarrassed
b) I don't want to hear all the world say, "I told you so."
c) All of the above

There was an interesting exchange a few weeks ago between Deadspin's Will Leitch and author Buzz Bissinger. Go here to see it: http://deadspin.com/385770/bissinger-vs-leitch

Bissinger hates bloggers. He thinks they're bad and will bring down journalism.

I'm here today to tell you that is not my goal. I don't want to take away jobs. I don't want to hurt people's feelings. I don't want to outscoop the scoopers. I just want to be heard. Just like the guys who would like me to be silenced.

I won't be silenced, only because you can't make me. But don't worry. If you ever need a story, you can come right here and see what I wrote that day. Maybe you can steal some ideas from me.

The Dr. Mike Marshall Podcast

2008-05-14T11:31:00.006-04:00

To make it easy to find, I thought I'd give Dr. Marshall his own special entry. To listen to the interview I did with him, click below.

The Dr. Mike Marshall Interview

They're Calling Me Barbara

2008-05-14T06:31:00.009-04:00

I don't like it. The "they", taken from the Latin root from the title above, "they're", is composed of my teammates and a handful of media folk who line my big league clubhouse with their fancy pants and designer shoes (the media guys don't wear either, just regular pants and sneakers). It seems the interview I posted yesterday with Dr. Mike Marshall added more to the negative feeling about me. Here were some comments and from whence they were derived:

NEWSPAPER GUY (NPG)

NPG: Hey, Jimmy, I listened to your Mike Marshall interview.

Me: Doctor.

NPG: Well, yeah. Dr. Mike Marshall.

Me: It's what he is.

NPG: Anyway, I think -

Me: No, there's no "anyway" here. He's a doctor. He's got a PhD. What's so bad about that?

NPG: Nothin.

Me: Do you have a PhD?

NPG: No.

Me: Neither do I. That makes us both idiots.

NPG: May I quote you, Barbara?

Me: No. And don't call me Barbara.

OUTFIELDER (OF)

OF: (rattailing my naked buttocks)

Me: Ouch. What is this, summer camp?

OF: Why don't you quit your pitching job and take a gig with ESPN?

Me: It doesn't pay as well.

OF: Really, Barbara?

Me: Who's Barbara?

OF: You. You're a little Barbara Walters.

Me: I'm probably taller than her.

OF: Still -

Me: And heavier.

OF: You and -

Me: But she probably has more hair. Even though she's pretty old now.

OF: Why don't you get her on your show?

Me: Why don't you?

OF: Nice comeback. Where'd you think that one up, summer camp?

He rat tailed me again on the tush just as I turned away.

MANAGER (RICK CHURCHES)

Rick: Jimmy take a seat.

(I should state that we were in his office when this exchange occured.)

Me: (sitting without a wisecrack)

Rick: What's this about you wanting to retire?

Me: I don't want to retire.

Rick: You're going to be forced into it if you don't lay off the computer stuff and start spending some time on pitching.

Me: How much time a day can I throw a ball?

Rick: It's more than throwing. It's watching video. It's studying the other team.

Me: All right, let's say that takes up 3 hours of my day.

Rick: It's getting into top physical shape.

Me: Add another 2 hours

Rick: You don't work out 2 hours a day.

Me: Yes I do. You just can't see my raging abs. My clothes are big.

Rick: I'm saying your focus should be here, on this team and on this game.

Me: I'm saying that if you take the 5 hours a day of prep work for this gig we call baseball, and then -

Rick: There's the game itself too. Add in another 3 hours.

Me: 4 if it's Interleague. My point is, you take 6 hours out of 24 and that leaves... Umm...

Rick: 18 hours.

Me: Good! That's a lot of hours of nothingness. I can blog then and interview people and talk about what I'm going to do when I retire.

Rick: Do you want to retire?

Me: No.

Rick: Then put your focus on the game. You won't have to anytime soon if you pay more attention to baseball.

Me: We're starting to run in circles.

Rick: At least you'd be working out, Barbara.

POTENTIAL PODCAST INTERVIEW CANDIDATE (PPC)

PPC: No, don't interview me.

Me: Why?

PPC: I don't want to do interviews with the media. Why would I want to do one with a ballplayer.

Me: It could be fun.

PPC: Who do you think you are, Barbara Walters?

Me: No.

PPC: I'll pass.

I'm a trailblazer, a pioneer. I am an icon. I will be the man, many years from now, who historians will look back upon and say, "This was one semi-balding man who became a giant in his field, a greater giant than all of the others combined. He took risks. He followed his heart. We erect this statue of him in his honor. We're sorry he couldn't be here today. He had a prior engagement interviewing Barbara Walters for his groundbreaking podcast show."

Finally, let me add one more exchange between me and my jealous/envious closet admirers.

"RED" SCOTT (NYS GAME ANNOUNCER AND, ALSO, MY DAD)

Red: What's this about you interviewing people?

Me: I'm interviewing people.

Red: I heard.

Me: Good.

Red: Why?

Me: Put down the microphone.

Red: Hmm?

Me: I'll talk to you off the record.

Red: We are off the record.

Me: So put down the microphone then.

Red: It's off. Don't you trust me.

Me: No.

Red: What kind of man can't trust his own father?

Me: The kind of man whose father is untrustworthy.

Red: You think you're better than me?

Me: No. Wait, let me rephrase. Yes, I do.

Red: You're not. You're just like me.

Me: I'm not like you at all. Why do you always try to lump in my extracurricular activities with the way you've treated your family since the day the earth cooled off from its origins as a flaming fireball.

Red: Speaking of flaming fireballs, they're calling you Barbara. Did you know that?

Me: Yes.

Red: It bugs you, doesn't it?

Me: Put the microphone down.

Red: Call you mother. She'd like to talk to you. Give me 5 minutes to prepare.

Me: You're not taping my call with Mom. That's illegal.

Red: Oh. Good day.

Me: Good day.

And he walked away, the man who never retired from baseball. The man who, at 72, I fear I will turn into one day. Yes, I must figure out my life before I'm his age, hanging around guys 50 years younger than me and watching them rattail each other. That's just sick.

Figuring Out My Life

2008-05-13T06:31:00.008-04:00

I got home after Saturday's game a little upset. I'd just blown my first save of the season (but gotten my first win - only 12 to 300! - wait, I'm not supposed to be excited about personal goals. Never mind.) and Vanessa was home waiting for me. I grumbled a little to her about something trivial and she told me off. I won't reprint her words here because they're private (actually, I forgot most everything she said, but the "privacy" thing makes us sound private). The gist of it all was this: Jimmy (that's me) is going to not be playing baseball for the rest of his life. The assumption is that Jimmy (me again) will one day retire and have to fill up the days of his life with...something.

Vanessa: You better find out what that is.
Me: We can go on a second honeymoon.
Vanessa: If living with you during retirement is like this, you can go on a second honeymoon with your second wife.

Well, no husband wants to hear that, especially from his first wife. So I said something dumb back to get the last word in ("Maybe I will," I believe was the phrase.). She said something back, not so dumb, and got the last word in anyway (truly forgot what that was due to my not getting the last word and not fulfilling my momentary goal).

I moped around the house for a while, doing a lot of nothing. I do that when I get home after afternoon games. My nights can be filled with the following:

1. Moping around and being bored
2. Watching cartoons
3. Bothering Vanessa or my kids with queries like, "What are you doing?" and "Want any help?" To which I receive the response, "You should get a hobby."

I thought this blog was my hobby, but it only takes 35-45 minutes a day. If I subtract 45 minutes from 24 hours, there's still at least...um...lots of time left in the day to do stuff. My problem is I have no "stuff" to do. And that upsets my lovely wife, making her threaten me with a divorce to be named later.

Then it hit me: Ask somebody what to do! It's thrilling to come up with an idea on your own. But who to ask? I had a shrink - team supplied - who's not talking to me. I have a wife, but she's not the one who'll give me answers I need since she's biased against me. My kids' guidance counselor at school? Good idea, but she's a lady and would probably not be very impressed with the balding that's beginning on my scalp.

Then it hit me: Ask former ballplayers! They're retired! They must have all the time in the world to talk to me about what they're doing with the rest of their lives since they're currently living in the "rest of their lives" time period.

Thus, I reached out to Mike Marshall first, former Cy Young Award winner (1974) while with Los Angeles. He holds all sorts of records for relief pitchers, like most pitching appearances in a season (106) and most relief innings (208).

But there's more.

He's Dr. Mike Marshall to you and me. I saw him on HBO Real Sports a couple of weeks ago with Bryant Gumble, talking about his efforts to eliminate injuries to pitchers. Coming off a 2007 season in which I threw two pitches before getting injured and missing the rest of the year, I suddenly wished Vanessa had yelled at me in 2006.

I'm no doctor. Far from it. (Vanessa won't even call me Dr. Love when I ask during those "private" times.) Maybe Dr. Marshall could help me. Maybe he could give me some advice. It was worth reaching out to him.

I went to his website, http://www.drmikemarshall.com/, and sent him an email. He responded and agreed to speak to me. So we did. And I recorded it. Unwilling to turn this into some Linda Tripp/Monica Lewinsky thing, I told the good doctor I was recording our conversation. He said fine, as long as I posted it on my blog. I said fine, as long as - Well, I had no counter to his proposal, so I'm posting our conversation here.

The Dr. Mike Marshall Interview

Give a good hard listen. You finally get to hear my voice after my not talking to the media for so long. And, in the background, you'll hear some interesting music.

More important, you'll hear what Dr. Marshall has to say about pitching and baseball. His website http://www.drmikemarshall.com/ has loads of free information young kids may find interesting. Maybe old kids will find it interesting too. You can even send him emails on your own with questions. There's a free book, some video, all sorts of neat stuff. You'll love it. And you'll love him (but not in "that" way).

As for me, I'm going to start doing more of these legal recordings. I've called more people and am going to speak with other former big leaguers, like Tommy John (nice, since I had his surgery last year), Richie Hebner, Rick Minor, Dave Baldwin and more. I'm even going to speak with a sports psychology consultant to see if I can get my head on straight.

Thus, I will no longer just be an incredible pitcher who fans adore, I will become a man who my wife adores and who my two adolescent kiddies tolerate. It's gonna be great!

Good To Be Home

2008-05-12T06:17:00.004-04:00

On Friday night, I slept in my own bed for the first time in 6 weeks. Terrible experience. I was up half the night because of a pillow that was too firm, then I tried sleeping without a pillow, like I did until I was 10 years old (Jewish kids have a bar mitzvah when they reach manhood, my mom gave me my first pillow). That threw my neck out of whack, so I angered Vanessa by waking her up (a sharp toenail to her right calf did the trick) and stealing her pillow when she went to the bathroom. No good. So I just layed there (or is it laid?) and stared at the dark ceiling. By 3AM, I was exhausted and must've fallen asleep around 3:30 (still AM). I awoke at 11:15 (thoroughly AM) to the sound of men outside cutting down a tree. Lots of men with chainsaws and loud voices. I felt crappy, covered my head with both my lousy hard-as-a-rock pillow and Vanessa's no-good pillow, and pretended the sawing was an air conditioner. After suffocating for about 3 minutes, I got up, sweating like a pig.

It was good to be home.

Alyssa and Grace were already out somewhere and Vanessa had to run some errands, so I was left with 10 minutes on my own before having to get ready for my drive to the ballpark for a 4:15 (that's PM) game. The time broke up like this:

1 minute: Find where the cereal is and choose a variety.
1 minute: Pour the cereal into a bowl, then pour some milk onto the cereal while first making sure both cereal and milk have not past their self-imposed expiration dates.
22 seconds: Rush to get a spoon so I can eat the milk-empowered cereal before it gets soggy.
38 seconds: Pick up the 9 spoons I dropped on the floor, spilled in my haste to begin eating the cereal before it gets soggy.
3 minutes: Eat the rapidly drooping cereal, which is not only losing its solid shape but also its flavor.
39 seconds: Realize I have no beverage.
11 seconds: Wait for a waiter, remember I'm home, then get out of my chair.
1 minute: Find a cup, discard it due to something "crusty" on the inside that's probably just part of the cup but still freaks me out, then refer to our collection of glasses (non-prescription - ha ha!) before...
10 seconds: Heading into the dining room.
1 minute: Find a very expensive wine glass, carefully remove it from the breakfront, then try to secure the breakfront doors shut without toppling the damn piece of useless, but very expensive, furniture.
10 seconds: Head into the kitchen.
50 seconds: Lament the travesty of soggy cereal.

My 10 minutes were up and I arose to get dressed while choking on a bit of nut from my Honey Nut Cheerios breakfast.

I only tripped once while taking the stairs to my bedroom and was able to properly break my fall by landing on my surgically repaired right elbow. Don't worry, the only pain was in the bone, not the UCL. I was a little stiff after that, but soldiered on. I had a game to catch! (Actually, I'd pitch, but you know what I mean.)

I showered and washed my hair, remembering halfway through that I had showered and washed my hair the night before in the locker room (we lost 5 - 1). With lather running down my face, I elected to continue the process I'd begun. What was my other option? Turn off the water at that moment and drive with soap in my eyes? You have to get up pretty early in the morning to get one past me!

By 11:53, I was in my bright yellow Hummer, ready to go. But I couldn't leave. There was a gigantic truck in my driveway, blocking my path. It had a gigantic wood chipper in tow and what looked like half a California Redwood being fed into it by 7 men wearing blue jeans and T-shirts telling me to go screw myself.

In the old days, I would have just driven on the lawn to get to the street. (I do have a Hummer after all. The theory is I can drive anywhere I want.) But we fenced in our property at the end of the winter, so my lawn jockeying would have been for naught. There was nowhere to go but back.

I got out of the Hummer and asked the guys to move the truck. They couldn't hear me because the chipper was loud and I didn't yell. They had earplugs on too. I think they knew what I wanted, because one of the guys lifted a finger with the international "One more minute" sign. After 15, they moved their truck.

Now I was late.

I rushed through town to get to route 24, which would take me to 78 and then the NJ Turnpike. Traffic. Everywhere. As far as the eye could see.

But I'm flexible. I took shortcuts, did an end-around. I even back-tracked a bit.

I hit more traffic. I looked as far as my eye could see. More traffic. Everywhere.

I swore quite a bit and switched on the radio. At 8 minutes after the hour, I heard cause for all of the traffic: Lots of cars on the road.

Needless to say, it took me three hours to drive what normally takes 55 minutes. I arrived at the stadium just about an hour before game time.

Rick: Where the hell have you been?

Rick Churches, my manager, and I haven't gotten along as famously as we'd both probably like.

Me: My car.
Rick: Why weren't you here?
Me: Traffic.
Rick: You shouldn't live so far away.
Me: That statement took me 14 years to figure out.

He's a busy man before games. He left me alone to get changed and tell 9 different reporters I wasn't speaking to them. I had to tell Ted Feldman, our PR guy, that I wouldn't go on TV for a quick interview with FOX (we were the regional game of the week). I had to tell Ted that three times, actually, because he asked me three times. Sorry, I said as he began his fourth plea. Tell them to read my blog.

Long story short, we won the game. I pitched a 1-2-3-4-5 9th, giving up 2 hits but no runs and notching my first save ever. EVER. This is my 20th season and just now I got my first save. The fans cheered wildly, which was nice. I've always gotten along well with the fans. We're good at co-existing.

After the game, I ignored the media and showered for the 3rd time in less than 24 hours. If anything, I had a clean day.

Driving home was smooth sailing. I listened to callers complain about how our team stinks and I'm "finished" and "done" and not "the answer" to our underachieving ways. I hate the fans sometimes. It helps balance out our co-existence.

By 10 PM, I was back in bed, back where this story started, staring at the black ceiling with my head resting on a rock hard pillow. I took a deep breath and closed my eyes. Screw it. At least it was my pillow. At least we won the game. Maybe tomorrow I'd ask Vanessa why my favorite tree had been cut down today. Or not. I'd have to see if she'd make my breakfast first.

The State of Things That Are

2008-05-09T06:22:00.006-04:00

I have harbored this idea, ever since starting my rehab assignment, that when I was called back up to the big club, I'd be the savior, astride a white horse and spreading good will and innocent laughter. I pictured myself riding bareback and sprinkling sparkly fairy dust over my fellow teammates, bringing them joy and, of course, victories. I dreamed my flowing robes would be touched by catchers and outfielders and short shortstops, each man becoming awash with relaxation. Meanwhile, my smile permeates any negativity. My glistening white teeth shine through the darkness of past losses. My hands are the hands that make the team whole. I am their messiah. Kiss my naked feet and glow with me.

Real life swatted these images out of my mind like a human's palm crashing down on a slow summer fly.

For various reasons (read yesterday's post), I missed Wednesday's game in LA. I did make the team flight back to NY, but it was a very cold and bitter trip for me. First, there were some grumblings because I never even went to the stadium once I landed (actually, it was my plane that landed) in LA. The game had ended upon touchdown (we lost 9 to 1) and for me to spend an hour driving to a quiet clubhouse simply to turn around again and drive back to the airport sounded ludicrous to me.

"Not when you play on a team," said Rick Churches, my fiery manager who's especially fiery when it comes to your truly. "You should've been here. We could've used you."

I told him my story and then iterated that the team was losing 6 to 0 in the 4th inning. If I'm their closer, they wouldn't have used me in the game. Plus, I'd pitched the night before. Why use me two days in a row if you don't need me and I'm coming off a major injury?

Don't question your manager. Not a good thing. Here's why:

Rick: You telling me how to manage my team?
Me: No.
Rick: Don't.
Me: I didn't.
Rick: Sounded like it.
Me: (wiggling in my shoes - no bare feet were kissed)

By this time, I was getting a little self-conscious because we were not on the team plane. We were in the airport near a Starbucks (I'd just ordered a grande skim hot chocolate with whip.). I could sense a few eyes (one person had a patch on, like a bad pirate) peering toward us.

Rick: We could've used you tonight.
Me: Mmm.
Rick: What?
Me: What?
Rick: I don't want to hear your "mmm" crap. Just tell me what you're thinking and don't patronize me.
Me: You said, "Tonight." It was a day game.
Rick: What difference does it make?
Me: None. It makes no difference. Do I have whipped cream on my lip?

He didn't answer. (I found out moments later, in the bathroom, that I did. How embarrassing.)

"Last call for flight 1803 to New York."

I swore because I was in the bathroom and not getting onto the plane. I got my stuff together and rushed to the gate. I couldn't find my ticket and the airline guy wouldn't let me on (even though it was a charter flight and I'm famous beyond famous). They had to call John Brock, the team's traveling secretary, off the plane to come and sort out my status as a member of the team. After 10 minutes, I was leading (John didn't want me to follow for fear he'd turn around and I'd be gone) him down the ramp and into the plane.

There was no white horse between my legs. My robes were non-existent. None of my teammates, some I've known for years, some I met for the first time in spring training, were looking at me as the savior. I had no sparkly fairy dust to sprinkle upon their heads. However, I did knock the back of big J.D. Bryant's head with my carry on. "Ouch!" he said.

"Sorry."

First Class. That's where I sit on the plane. It's in my contract. Yes, the whole team had the plane to them/ourselves. But there aren't 25 First Class seats on an airplane. The richest guys, the most successful guys, the guys with the most unscrupulous agents - they're the ones who get the First Class seats on every road trip. I've won 287 games, am making about $16 million this year, and have Jack Perry as my super agent. Yeah, I get First Class.

That doesn't always make it right. I couldn't help but feel as if I didn't belong. My 2007 season was lost: one game, one run, two pitches, an ERA of infinity. This season at Nashville? Here were my final stats:

G IP W L SO BB ERA SV
19 17.2 0 2 14 9 5.75 6

My numbers with the Hounds look pretty hideous, but let me point out that in my last 6 games with them, I didn't give up an earned run in 6 innings and had 8 strikeouts in 6 innings. And the most important point is I felt no pain.

Still, coming up to the big squad with the horrible resume from Nashville didn't give me much confidence on that plane. Neither did my Starbucks run-in with Rick. Neither did the handful of glares I received from some of the guys who are upset that I'm doing this instead of keeping my mouth shut (or talking to the traditional media instead). Oh, and the fact that I missed the game and the team is in last place doesn't help them or me get along just yet. Here are the standings as of Friday morning:

TEAM W L PCT. GB

Florida 23 12 .657 --
Philadelphia 19 15 .556 3.5
Atlanta 18 16 .545 4.5
Washington 14 21 .400 9
New York 12 23 .343 11

So we're in last place and already, to put it kindly, buried. We're not hitting. We're not pitching. Our defense has been porous. And Rick is already on the hot seat, 35 games into his managerial career. Now you can understand why he was a little upset with me in the airport.

It didn't help us any further that I sat behind him on the plane.

Rick: Stop kicking my seat.
Me: I'm not.
Rick: Then what is?
Me: I don't know.
Rick: Then stop whatever you're doing.
Me: I'm not doing anything.
Rick: Maybe that's why you started the season in AAA instead of with us.
Me: I see no connection between my seat on this plane and my status with the team.
Rick: You have no status with this team.
Me: I thought you had groomed me to be your closer.
Rick: You'll be lucky if you get the 5th inning of a blowout.
Me: That's smart thinking. Let your freshest arm, your hottest pitcher ride the bench.
Rick: You telling me how to run my team?
Me: Nope.

And that was it. Don't worry. I'm his closer. I want to be. I will be. Yes, it took a while to overcome the fact that I wasn't going to be a starting pitcher this year, like I have been all my life. But my head is clear now. I can do this. I will do this. At least until Billy Weston, our real closer, comes back.

That's when I leaned over to Bobby Spencer, our pitching coach, and asked him when, by chance, they expected Billy back. "I don't know," Bobby said. "Maybe mid-July."

It's May 9th. That gives me two months to prove to Rick, the team - to myself - that I can be successful. This is a big two months for me. If I can't do it, I know I'll pretty much be done after this season. I'll be living home this time next year, probably cleaning out my closet after Vanessa tells me to move out because she can't stand living with me 365 days out of the year.

I have to be good this year. I can't retire yet. What would I do then?

The First Class Cab Ride

2008-05-08T05:56:00.007-04:00

After the call on Tuesday night that I was done with my rehab assignment in the minors and to report to LA for a Wednesday afternoon game, I did what I do best in situations like that. I went to bed. It was past 10PM west coast time. The hotel room had already been paid for. And did they actually expect me to take a midnight flight to LA, arrive in some hotel room at 3 AM and then be ready for a 1 PM game? Well, yes, they did expect that from me. But sometimes, sports fans, it's what we expect from ourselves that matters the most, especially when we're sleepy. I was sleepy on Tuesday evening, so I went to bed.

I was up early on Wednesday. You must give me credit for not sleeping late. By 7 AM, I was shaving my armpits and humming Streisand songs (both parts of the "You Don't Bring Me Flowers" duet). By 7:20 (also in the AM timeframe), I was sitting in the Days Inn lobby (there's no Ritz Carlton for AAA players, even fading superstars like me, since there's usually no Ritz Carlton in the little cities where AAA players play) signing autographs for the staff of 2 when my taxi arrived to take me (or is it bring me?) to the airport.

Now I don't know Tucson at all. It's hot and dry. There. That about imparts to you my knowledge of this city. Don't ask me for directions anywhere, which is what the cabbie did. "Which way should we go to the airport?" That was her question. I told her I didn't know. The best way. The right way. The fastest way. You're the cab driver. You're supposed to know. She had already pulled out of the parking lot and started driving, so I couldn't jump out and call for a different cab. Instead, I signed loudly and shut my mouth.

5 minutes passed. 10 minutes. 15 minutes. At some point, I realized no signs mentioned the airport and the Days Inn where I'd slept and shaved and hummed not too long before was two blocks away. "Um," I said in my strong man-voice, "you don't know where you're going, do you?"

It appears that the driver was a substitute for her dad who needed the morning to "sleep in" after a late night riding a mechanical bull. "His back is kinda stiff," the girl said. When I write "girl," I mean it. Maybe she was 17. Maybe not. I'd say she reminded me of my own daughters, only I wouldn't hand the keys to the family business over to them at 15, 16 or 17, mechanical bull or not. I told her she should pull over at a gas station and ask for directions. I had a 9:45 AM flight (arrival at 11:10; I'd get to the ballpark by noon) and now it was 7:45. Plenty of time to make it to the airport, but I didn't want to sit in a cab with the windows open, my hair blowing everywhere but the part of my head that's quickly going bald. She pulled into a Lukoil! (I added the ! - it just seems that there's one logo that could use a !, remember the band Wham!?) She asked directions. She listened intently. I did not. Not my job. I was busy licking the undersides of my fingers and flattening out my hair over my bared scalp. We pulled away.

5 minutes pass. 10 minutes. I don't wait for 15. "You still lost?" I asked. She slowly nodded, not being able to talk because she was, I just realized, crying her eyes out. "Sorry," I said. "I meant we."

I sat back and thought. Cell phone. I had one (only one, since I don't have a girlfriend, thus there is no need to hide any calls from my lovely wife, Vanessa, who doesn't go through my bags looking for "something suspicious" and doesn't scroll through the phone numbers programmed into my cell [since I don't expect myself to memorize any] looking for evidence that I called some "Gina" or "Lola" or "Marla" or some other groupie one-night-stand name that ends with an A). I'm completely lost. Let me review all the stuff before the ( and )...

Okay. Back on track.

I whip out my cell (phone, not the microscopic thing that contains nuclei and cytoplasm and protoplasm) and called my super agent, Jack Perry.

Me: I'm lost.
Jack: Never get into a taxi that doesn't have GPS.
Me: I did.
Jack: In the future, don't.
Me: Okay.

Thus, we were basically done. I edited out the part where he said I should have flown out the night before like I was supposed to.

I called Vanessa.

Me: (hitting a pre-programmed number, since I don't memorize phone numbers)
Person: Hello?
Me: You're not Vanessa.
Person: No.

The line went dead. There was no instant dial tone like in the movies. Just silence on the other end for a handful of seconds.

I rifled through my carry on bag and pulled out a cheat sheet I'd made (actually, a cheat sheet I'd had made for me) of phone numbers. You know, the In Case Of Emergency Call... kind of thing. There, in three letters, was the name that I knew could help.

Me: Hi.
Mom: Where are you?
Me: Arizona.
Mom: Why aren't you in Los Angeles?
Me: I was sleepy.
Mom: I was sleepy when I went into labor with you, but I didn't go to bed until after I'd pushed you out.
Me: This is different.
Mom: How is it different?
Me: I was sleepy.
Mom: Then I can't help you.

I edited out the part in which she said I should have just flown out the night before.

My phone rang shortly after that. Well, it didn't ring. That Chingy song my girls had programmed as a ringtone started playing. I knew enough not to tell the girl cab driver to turn off the radio, since the radio wasn't on. Even though, as I lifted the phone to my ear, I could sense her boogieing a wee bit to that infectious Chingy beat.

Me: Hello.
Vanessa: Jack called and said you were lost.
Me: Yes.
Vanessa: You told me you were going to fly out last night.
Me: No, I said the team wanted me to fly out last night.
Vanessa: I'm assuming you felt your plan was better.
Me: I was sleep-
Vanessa: Jimmy, be quiet and listen very carefully. Look at a street sign. I am sitting at a computer and will tell you where you are and where to go. Now look up.
Me: (listening to the sound of my pride deflating like a Party City barmitzvah balloon)

Successfully, because she's more awesome than me in every way (she told me I had to write that as payment), Vanessa directed us to the airport. When the girl asked for an extra $10 to subsidize the extra gas she had to burn to get me to the airport, I told her to have her dad write it off as a business expense since, for cab companies, gasoline is a business expense. The girl drove off and didn't say thank you. No, she didn't remind me of my kids at all (sarcasm).

I peeked at my watch. 8:25. I had time to make it to my flight and still even stop somewhere for a cup of orange juice. Maybe even an everything bagel, except hold the sesame, onion and those little tiny black seeds that get stuck in between your teeth. Everything was going to be fine.

My plane was clean and my luggage was stowed away. I sat in first class and closed my eyes. I was suddenly a little bit sleepy. When the captain gave made his announcement, I knew my day was not going to improve.

"Sorry folks, but due to some problems with the engine, we're going to have to de-board and get ya another one."

So much for my plans. So much for my making it to the ballpark by noon.

I sat in a chair, surrounded by people who kept wondering if I was who I am and if that's my real hair, and watched CNN. A cyclone somewhere I'd never heard of killed maybe 100,000. Hillary and Barack are fighting over who's going to lead our nation through another four years. This person killed that person and some company was going to lay off 1000 workers because of the financial crisis. Yeah, I was comparatively pretty well off. The worst thing that could happen to me is that I'd fly in very late, miss the game and miss the flight home with the team, creating a greater wedge between Rick Churches, my manager who prefers to not like me, and me, who I like very much.

Guess what happened?

Two Bad Calls And An Unexpected Pleasant One

2008-05-07T06:10:00.004-04:00

It's weird how one little event can set off an avalanche of repercussions. We were losing last night in the top of the 9th, down 1-0. We'd had no hitting. In fact, we were being no-hit. One baserunner from a walk in the 5th. Other than that, zippo. Then, the little event occurred.

Nobody on base, one out. The Tucson pitcher, Daryl Ryan, who'd been nearly perfect, throws an inside slider to our 17 year old Rey Marcos. Rey jumps out of the way, getting pretty dirty, then gets right back into the box. Ryan does it again, knocking Rey down. 2 and 0 count. Now I know Rey pretty well by now, and he's got this competitive fire inside that's hard to duplicate. You either have it or you don't. He's got it. He dug in once more in the box. A third pitch, way inside, hits Rey on his right shin. (Daryl pitches from the right side, Rey bats from both.) After some gentle prodding from his teammates and the home Tucson crowd that had been becoming less gentle ever since the first brushback pitch, Rey took the advice of someone and charged the mound.

I don't want to take full credit. Partial is fine. A week or so ago I explained to Rey, who calls himself my prodigy son, that he's going to be a target this year, and for a number of years, because of his youth and incredible skill. Lots of guys, both on his team and all the other teams, are going to be jealous/envious of him. And he's going to have to fight back every time. Don't take it, I said. But don't dish it out unless you absolutely need to.

Rey didn't take it last night.

He reached Daryl Ryan in front of the mound and, since this is the minor leagues, they had a moment to really go at it before anyone attempted to break it up. When the dust, and there was a lot of it, settled, Daryl had to leave the game - his first no-hitter! - with an injury to his foot (from trying to kick Rey in the same shin he'd thrown at) and Rey was booted. No big deal for us. A pinch runner took over for Rey at first base. Me.

So Ryan made the first bad call of the night, to pitch inside one too many times to our fiery rookie and future mainstay of the New York infield. The second bad call was coming up.

I took my lead off of first (I'm neither a very fast or very smart baserunner, but manager Dusty Graves had utilized nearly every bench option due to two players having the flu, two being too sore to play, and the rest already being used.) and dove back on what I thought was a throw over by the new Tucson pitcher. Of course, he didn't throw over. He just stepped off the rubber to tie his shoe. I made a couple of thousand people laugh. Always lovely to be the butt of a good joke.

I took another lead. This guy's first pitch is wild. I take off for second and make it without a throw. It's not a stolen base (I've never had one) but I pretend it is by pulling the base oout of the ground and hoisting it up over my head. The crowd loves the move. Dusty is more than upset. We're trying to win the game and I'm fooling around. He yells something at me from the dugout, something that most newspapers wouldn't print, and an umpire tells me to settle down. I feel like I'm in kindergarten all over again.

The base back in its place, resting comfortably on the ground, I take my lead off of second. A pitch and ground ball to the right side send me with no throw over to third. Two outs. Still a no-hitter. We're still losing 1-0.

Third base coach Willie Fernandez, who you remember from his 40 HR season for us three years ago (and now 40 like me and out of the game for his second season due to two knees that will need to be replaced before he turns 50), pats me on the butt and calls me an idiot for lifting up 2nd base. He chatters to me about my lead. Don't be too conservative, he says. I take another step. C'mon, a little more, he says. I look at the bag, which is about six inches away, and realize a little more aggression won't hurt anybody. Two feet, three feet, four feet, five feet. Now I've got a decent, but still conservative lead.

The pitcher (I don't know all the guys down here at AAA) looks over and with the speed of some superhuman slips his right foot off the rubber and whips the ball over to the third baseman. I dive back and get my hand back under the tag. After a timeout for me to brush off my once sparkling gray road uniform and some unkind, unprintable words from Willie, I take my lead again.

Since I've hardly ever run the bases (my lifetime batting avg. is .141) and really haven't at all since September of 2006, I was a little rusty. But the pitcher in me got the wheels in my head churning. If I was protecting a one-run lead with two outs in the ninth and a not-so-good runner on third base, what would I do? I figured I'd concentrate on the batter and not the runner. At worst, the runner could score and tie the game. At best, the batter makes an out. Since between 7 and 8 times out of 10 a batter does make an out, the odds are nearly always on the pitcher's side (that's how I like to look at it, at least).

Thus, the pitcher does what I think he's going to do and starts to completely ignore me. My lead grows. Five feet. Six feet. He doesn't even look over. Seven feet. Eight feet. Willie tries to whisper as loud as possible that I'm getting into "stupid" territory and should stop. Nine feet. The guy goes into his windup, throws and...

The ball gets away from the catcher. I run. I run hard. The ball doesn't bounce away, nor does it roll very far. It kind of trickles away, not far, but far enough for me to make the play at home close. The pitcher races me to the plate. The catcher, realizing he's close enough to get me, ignores the pitcher (second time in seconds a pitcher had been ignored) and lunges for me just as I slide in, feet first. I completely miss the plate with my feet and feel the Thud! of a big leather catcher's glove slap my chest just as my left hand gets close enough to the plate to make it a photo finish. The umpire, in horrible position (which is why he's a minor league ump and not in a larger stadium with ten times as many people earning ten times the salary), calls me safe.

Our dugout goes wild. We've tied the game and still not gotten a hit. I slowly get up - had the wind knocked out of me from a 235 pound man slamming his glove onto my lungs - and am embraced by a bunch of very happy boys (most of them are still boys in AAA, especially when a 40 year old like me is telling the story).

Dusty gives me a bear hug and tells me I was out "by a country mile." I don't ask what the difference is between a country mile and an urban mile, but figure suburban sprawl has something to do with it. He tells me I'm a lucky man I didn't get hurt and orders me to drink some Gatorade and loosen up because I'm going to pitch the ninth.

So the umpire made the second bad call of the inning, the score is tied, and the game's karma is totally changed. We go on to suddenly knock the ball all over the place. By the end of the inning, we're winning 5-1 and the Tucson crowd is throwing things onto the field. Since it's Cactus Night at the stadium, hundreds of cacti are tossed. The game is delayed while the grounds crew, made up of teachers and off duty pharmacy clerks, tries to pick up the pointy plants. It takes a while because it hurts to get stuck with a cactus thorn. But they get it done, I come out for the bottom of the 9th and get three quick outs. Game over. Visiting Nashville Hounds win 5-1.

In the joyous clubhouse after the game, I got a phone call. It was Rick Churches, my NY manager who's been good to not speak to me since the end of spring training. He said plans have been changed. Our closer, Billy Weston, who's had finger problems on his pitching hand for almost a month, is being placed on the DL. I'm being called up and am to meet the team in Los Angeles, where the Vets are playing a 3-game series. I'm going to be the closer while Billy heals up.

Wow, is all I can think. I'm going to make it back. I'm going to make it back for real right away. No more waiting. I'm ready and the call, this one a good one, has been made.

I go into Dusty's visiting manager's office and tell him. He nods and said he'd just heard. He shakes my hand and asks me to wait for a second. I sit down while he leaves the office. Two minutes later, he calls my name. I go into the heart of the clubhouse to a standing ovation. The players, my teammates for the last 6 weeks, are applauding me. Then Dusty presents a gift. It's second base, the base I'd held up not too long before. I accept and hold it up high, smiling. My minor league career is over. I'm back to the bigs.

See you in LA!

Halloween In May

2008-05-06T06:19:00.009-04:00

An early game yesterday (10:30 AM) marred by two things:

1. We lost 5-1. I did not pitch.
2. Halloween in May

We were a flat team yesterday. Teams do that sometimes. Everyone just picks a day, subconsciously, to have no energy and go through the motions. We did that yesterday. Dusty Graves, our manager, was furious by the 4th inning because of this. He was tossed by the 5th. We didn't even see him after the game until we got on the bus that took us to the airport for our flight to Tucson. He was already on the plane as we boarded. He said nothing, just stared straight ahead. That's about all a manager can do on days like that.

The other thing that brought us down was a Halloween in May promotion the team ran. It got fannies in the seats (about 6500 in attendance), but it also distracted the hell out of a bunch of the guys. First, there was this:

These two were sitting right behind home plate.

Then there was this kid:

He never sat, the whole game. Just kept running up and down the aisles, screaming, "I'm dead! I'm dead!" It got worse when he'd start screaming it in Spanish. "Soy muerto! Soy muerto!"

Rey Marcos, our 17 year old superstar in training and my trusty ward, was freaked out. He kept looking at me from out on the field at shortstop, like I could do something. When he'd come in, I'd tell him to relax. But since my Spanish is about as good as my cooking, I don't think I got through to him. As a result, he went 0 for 5 and made two errors, one leading to a 3-run fifth for Salt Lake.

Finally, there were these two young ladies:

If you weren't Rey Marcos, then your eyes were here. Lots of chatter in the dugout about the costumes these femmes elected to wear to a 10:30AM minor league baseball game. They also put on a pretty interesting show during the 7th inning stretch. We went down 1-2-3 (on 5 pitches) shortly thereafter. Maybe Dusty should have been focusing more on the goings-on off the field. Or maybe that was his problem too. Maybe he was just as bad as everyone else. It's tough to be 50, I assume. I'm only 40, so what do I know.

Since the Jimmy Scott Foundation now owns the Nashville Hounds, I'm thinking of aborting future Halloween in May promotions. Why let the fans have fun when there's a ballgame to be played? Or maybe we'll just have it at night and make it harder for the players to see. Or maybe we turn the promotion into Nun Day. We can make a new habit of it. Get it?

Terms of Endearment

2008-05-05T06:08:00.003-04:00

"Just when I thought I was about to make a clean getaway..." Great line by Jack Nicholson at the end of Terms of Endearment, the only movie that made me cry in 1983 (it was E.T. in '82).

Jack had just paid a visit to Shirley MacLaine, whose daughter was dying. Jack and Shirley had had a little affair together earlier in the movie, and as she drops him off at the airport, she tells him she loves him. Jack continues on, poised to walk into the terminal, when she shouts out to him, asking if he heard her. It's then that Jack says, "Just when I thought I was about to make a clean getaway." Remember his answer? Scroll to the bottom.

Thus, my story today begins with that line. Well, the line it really begins with is one of my final lines of Friday's post, in which I alluded to our front office personnel as "vermin." I don't actually know what vermin are. I just know they're probably yucky. My use of the term was not one anyone could consider endearing.

I didn't think much of my use of that word. It was hidden inside a paragraph and it just flowed out of me. That's what I told my wife, Vanessa.

Me: Like water from a river.
Vanessa: Like stupidity from an idiot.
Me: I like my simile better.
Vanessa: Do you ever think before you do these things? Or do you just hope nobody notices?

You see, Vanessa read my post. She doesn't usually read them, claiming not to have "the time." Somebody in the front office read my post, because that somebody told others in the front office. Of course, the media caught hold at some point during this process, which spread to newspapers, television, the internet... I can't think of any other media. Billboards. No, nobody's going to reprint portions of my blog posts on a billboard yet. They'd need my permission. But I digress. Lots of people ended up reading my comment about the front office being composed of "vermin." Vanessa eventually became one of the "lots of people" and her frustration with me was proof.

I didn't answer her questions, by the way. Still in search of the perfect psychiatrist/psychologist mix, I don't feel I can answer anything deep without consulting with someone who'll give me the right answer to repeat to people like my wife.

So, of course, I'm not speaking to the media, which makes my line blow up even more. And more questions are raised: Do I think all people in the front office are vermin? Even the interns? Even the people from the cleaning service who empty trash cans after 8PM? Or was there one or two specific folks I considered vermin? Either way, didn't I owe an apology to the entire front office, including interns and cleaning service people?

To me, it was clear, if you read the entire post, which most people probably didn't, that I was not calling interns, cleaning people, assistants, assistants to assistants, or the DHL guy, vermin. Those are fine people who don't need to be offended because they should know I was not referring to them. Still, I'll be a big man and apologize to them, their families, their ancestors and their descendants. The front office people who make the front office run are not vermin. They're very nice people with fancy haircuts and nice shoes.

It is clear I was referring to our General Manager, Alvin Kirby, who's been called a lot worse than "vermin" by a lot worse people than me (or is it I?). Alvin is a big boy who can handle a rogue player like me call him a name. Sticks and stones, right? The line it was a little quip I embedded into a much larger post that might have stung a little, from Alvin's perspective, but he's got much bigger problems, such as the sexual assault lawsuit, his pending divorce, the fact that the Vets are 14 and 16. I mean, if he hadn't tried to screw around with my super agent, Jack, and me a week ago, none of this would have ever happened. Needless to say, I apologize to Alvin for the public mockery of his title. He is a respectable man who has overcome a lot, especially racism, to become the first black GM of the Veterans and one of only two black GMs in baseball over the past 6 years. He should be proud of himself. I write that not to patronize, but to point out a point. I'd be damn proud if that were me.

However, the firestorm was in full swing by Saturday night. We blew away Salt Lake at home and were feeling good after winning two games in a row. I pitched an inning, gave up a hit but struck out two. Nice effort, if I do say so myself (and I say it a lot lately). After the game, I showered and walked back to my trailer in the parking lot with Andy, my personal trainer turned security liaison. Guess who's waiting there?

Alvin: Hi, Jimmy. Am I vermin?
Me: Not literally.
Alvin: I'm upset with you.
Me: I guess I can tell, since the team is in Phoenix, your office is in New York, it's Saturday night and you're standing in a Nashville parking lot with somebody who insulted you.
Alvin: Everything's a joke to you, isn't it? Wait, don't answer.
Me: Not answering.
Alvin: May I see this famous trailer of yours?

I bid Andy a good night but told him to stick close in case he hears me scream in terror. Then he could run away.

Alvin followed me inside. He commented on my accommodations, but I couldn't tell if he was insulting me or not. What do you think "small like your pea brain" means? Then he got right down to it. He flew into Nashville that day, a planned trip, to see me pitch and check out some of the team's AAA prospects. He thought I pitched well, better than the reports he'd been getting. I told him I'd been pitching better than the reports he'd been getting for a while. That's why he shouldn't have negotiated to have me play in Nashville for two more weeks. He told me I was $1 million richer because of those negotiations. I agreed and told him I would have settled for $250,000. He smiled. "I would have paid $2 million." I made a mental note to fire my super agent.

Alvin: You've got to stop making controversy with your blog.
Me: You've got to stop doing controversial things to me with the power of your position.
Alvin: I could release you in a heartbeat. Then you'd have nothing to look forward to this year, no seeing your wife and kids after home games, no rapport with the fans who've supported you for 14 years.
Me: It's not good to make decisions like that purely on emotion.
Alvin: Which is why you should think before releasing your stuff.
Me: I see you've been speaking to Vanessa.

We argued a little bit more, but it wasn't really too intense. He knew he was right and I knew he was right. I also knew that I'd probably make the same mistake again.

Alvin: Why can't you learn from your mistakes?
Me: I can as a baseball player. Hit a grand slam off of me and I'll know to throw high and tight to you for now on. But as a human, I am merely mortal.
Alvin: Most people know, eventually, that if they hurt others with their words that they shouldn't do it anymore.
Me: Okay. I won't bring up how you've tried to screw me and my contract twice in the last six months.
Alvin: Good. I won't bring up how you didn't rehab for the first six months after your injury.
Me: I was depressed.
Alvin: I was angry.
Me: As an aside, I'm not going to kiss you when we get to the make-up stage.

Alvin smiled at that. He really has had a rough go of it personally since February, and I assume since before then. Like me, he's made mistakes and probably said some inappropriate things in her non-baseball life. And like me, he just wants to put that behind him and win a world championship this year. If he doesn't, this is probably his last as our GM. And if I don't pitch well, it's probably my last year as a player. Vanessa won't like that. She thinks the controversies I'm going through this year are a direct result of my fear of the future. If I'm driving her crazy now, what's our life going to be like when I'm home every day for the rest of my life?

Alvin Kirby left around midnight. He was going to fly to Phoenix first thing Sunday morning. I had a game Sunday afternoon (we won again, I pitched another shutout inning). Today, Monday, we have another one of those 10:30 AM games. Weird timing. But today is also Halloween Day at Pepsi Field. Show up in a costume and get a free hot dog, courtesy of Ballpark Franks. Looking forward to seeing you at the ballpark today.

Oh, I found out what vermin are: Animals or insects, like cockroaches or rats, that are annoying and destructive.

No wonder nobody considered that a term of endearment.

Jack Nicholson's answer: "I love you too, kid."

The Sound Of Silence

2008-05-02T06:02:00.004-04:00

Sorry for the blog blackout this week. Very sensitive negotiations were going on that just concluded last evening. For my career over the past year, this has proven to be a typical negotiation. But instead of jawing about it, or writing about it here, I used some decent judgement and kept a lid on my thoughts until all was through. Had I lifted a finger toward my keyboard, you know I would have been unstoppable. That's not good when you're negotiating with management.

Let me start from the beginning of this particular saga. I had an agreement with the team that I would be called up from Nashville on May 1st. No ifs, ands or buts. On May 1, I am in New York with the Veterans. My super agent, Jack Perry, received an email - not a phone call, an email - from GM Alvin Kirby last Friday, April 25th. The team, looking for more consistency from me, wanted me to stay with the Nashville club for an extra two to three weeks. Jack, a reasonable man, did not forward the email to me on account of my most likely making it public seconds later. Instead, Jack called Alvin and ripped into him for wanting to break an agreement and not being professional enough to call Jack about it. Apparently, someone hung up on someone, because the story didn't end there.

I received a call from Jack on Saturday (not an email) and was filled in on the new development. I called QVC and had my new luggage order put on hold while I sat on my hands and waited. Well, I didn't sit on my hands because I pitched Saturday night. My head, which as you know has not been as clear as it should be for someone being paid many millions of dollars for throwing a piece of dead cow at someone holding a dead tree, clouded over even further as I took the ball on the mound in the 9th inning. Before I walked off the mound 39 pitches later, our 2-run lead had somehow turned into a loss by three runs (in other words, I gave up five runs). Thank goodness we were in Omaha. I could pretend the cheers for the three run home run by what's his name rehabbing for K.C. were for me and not what's his name rehabbing for K.C.

I got back to my hotel room and starting posting a furious post in this space about how the team is screwing with my head and has been ever since this winter, when they offered me an extra buyout so I wouldn't opt into my contract; how I've been, in my head, demoted to relief pitcher, picked on by the front office, and languished in the minor leagues for a month with a (finally) healthy arm. And now I'm told the team wants to extend my stay in AAA by two to three more weeks.

Vanessa, my rock, my steady influence, my counselor, the one who will only enable me if what I'm trying to do is good for the greater good of society, our family, and me (not always in that order), told me to immediately delete the post. Do not upload it, no matter what. After arguing about it for ten minutes, I acquiesced to her wishes and threw my laptop out a second story hotel window in Omaha (just because I was mature enough to listen to her doesn't mean I was mature enough to like the decision).

We had a day game on Sunday. I didn't pitch because I'd thrown too many pitches on Saturday. So I sat, grumbling and mumbling and stewing, in the dugout. My Nashville Hounds manager, Dusty Graves, tried to cheer me up by letting me manage the 8th and 9th innings. Under my direction, the team blew a 2-0 lead and turned it into a 3-2 loss. By the time we'd made it onto the bus to the airport, I was no longer the only man over the age of 40 who was grumbling and mumbling and stewing.

I hit rock bottom on Monday. Back "home" in Nashville, I was booed by the 5000+ fans who came to see me pitch on what was supposed to be my final three games with the Hounds. We were losing 9-0 in the top of the 9th when I only needed to throw five pitches to get us to the bottom of the inning. The cheers I heard after that effortless half inning were sarcastic. I've been so inconsistent, the lack of pain I've felt (a good thing) has been outweighed by the fact that some nights I'm great and some I'm awful. Down by 9 runs, the fans are thinking, what pressure is there for a guy to throw a meaningless 1-2-3 inning? Answer: On this night, all the pressure in the world. Because...

By this point, Jack had gotten the Players Association involved. Legally (not in the real world, but in the baseball world), the team had to call me up on May 1. I've been down here on a minor league rehab assignment. The maximum number of days a player can play under those terms in the minor leagues is thirty. 28 days were complete and the team didn't want to call me up. Because of issues on the big league roster, they didn't want to cut another player because they had to call me up. They wanted two more weeks to "evaluate" the team (at that point, the Vets were 11 and 14) before making decisions. Their pitch to the PA was that I was still injured. I physically couldn't play in New York. My 1-2-3, 5-pitch inning on Monday kind of proved the flaw in their thinking.

But I stayed quiet. I was furious - still am - but didn't say anything to Dusty or you or any teammates. "Let Jack deal with this," I said.

I shouldn't have sent the email to Alvin Kirby. You don't tell yourself you're going to let your super agent fix a situation and then go behind his back and email your GM about what a jerk he's acting like. But I did it. Alvin, this time acting professional, didn't respond to me. He went to Jack. Called him. Apparently, they went at it pretty good. Just like Vanessa and me when I told her about what I'd done. (I would reprint the email here, but cooler heads have convinced me to delete it from the hard drive of my (then) new computer, which was found the following day in a dumpster behind the stadium hotel in a condition the police would later state as "mangled beyond recognition.")

Tuesday comes. Nothing. No news. I hate that. Just when you need to hear something - anything - you hear nothing. I think in this case, Jack and Alvin purposely kept me in the dark as punishment for the email. While that would be unprofessional, I wouldn't put it past either man. Because when you hear no news, you become paranoid. By Tuesday night, I was more paranoid than a serial killer at a detectives convention.

Wednesday drops by. It's now April 30. Do I stay or do I go? We have a very weird 10:30 AM game time. Stadium still sold out. I pitch the 9th inning, us down 3-2, and get out of a man on third, no outs jam by striking out three consecutive Mountain Men (on 11 pitches). Standing ovation as I leave the mound (this ovation for real; no sarcasm). Yes, they all believe I'm done in Nashville, my beyond-the-bleachers, Pepsi Field parking lot trailer home to be auctioned off with the proceeds going to a local food bank. They love that I was here and are probably happy that I'll be gone (just because the team has been horrible this April). I don't know whether to smile or cry. Where will I be on Thursday?

I found out an hour later (while taking a taxi to a Best Buy to get myself a new laptop). Finally. A deal was made. After the game, I was removed from the DL, called up, and placed back on the DL. While the Vets had to make a corresponding roster move for the thirty seconds that I was up on the team - a move they hadn't wanted to make - they got their ultimate wish for me to stay in AAA for 15 more days.

What did I get? The Players Association approved my receiving a "special bonus" for my troubles, a bonus of $1 million. Jack, my super agent, never budged from that ridiculous sum of money. All along, the team wanted to pay me nothing extra. So I went from two weeks at my base pay to two weeks for $1 million. I can't cry over the deal. After all, it's a million dollars.

Thus, I began my official final two weeks for AAA Nashville by pitching a second day in a row Thursday night, my Hounds down 5-0 already, and mowing down the Mountain Men in order. My head has cleared somewhat. My wallet has bulged quite a bit (don't get all upset, after taxes and commissions, I'm donating the full amount to the same Nashville food bank that's receiving the proceeds from the auctioning off of my trailer). I know for sure now that with my health and this final 15 (now 14 and not the 21 the team was insisting on) days with the Hounds, I'll be that much better for the Vets. I can feel it.

As per my relationship with the NY front office? It stinks. But you know what? That's why I have a super agent. Let Jack deal with the vermin who run the Vets. I'm a player. The clock is ticking down to my first appearance in a year with NY. I think you're going to be happy to see me. Lord knows, I'll be happy to see you.

If I Never Got Hurt Last Year...

2008-04-25T05:57:00.006-04:00

It's done. There's nothing I can do about it. These are the two phrases I tell myself every morning that I wake up not with my team in New York but with a minor league franchise based out of Nashville. I got hurt a year ago. My surgery was 385 days ago. Physically, I'm fine. Mentally, I just can't get over myself. I've been a starting pitcher since Little League. Heck, in 1980 I threw my first no-hitter, all 6 innings of it (I hit a home run too). Relief pitchers can't throw no-hitters. Relief pitchers put out fires other people started, usually starting pitchers (like I used to be). Relief pitchers wait, warm up, sit down, warm up, sit down, get angry with their manager, then shower and never get in the game. Relief pitchers get frustrated and have to have incredible egos and incredible self-confidence. If I never got hurt last year, I wouldn't have to think about this. But I did get hurt. And now I'm a relief pitcher. There's nothing I can do about it.

I'm not a control freak, or never was before. But I think I'm becoming one. Is that possible? To change later in life from a colorful, flexible fellow to a colorful control freak? I guess so. It's happening to me. Just like that injury. It is what it is, as someone recently said.

I don't like to sulk. It generally doesn't get me anywhere. I spent about 180 of the last 385 days sulking and all it did was get me fat and help me notice the bald spot growing on my forehead. Valuable lesson learned. If I'd never gotten hurt last year, I'd never know sulking was bad.

Relief pitchers can't sulk. They have to be ready every day to play, kind of like outfielders, only more in charge than outfielders, who just stand around waiting for something to happen to them. Relief pitchers make things happen. Pitchers make things happen. I've always been a pitcher. Always tried to make things happen - good things. Maybe I've always been a control freak and didn't know it.

Imagine if you spent your whole life doing something, then something happens and you can't do that thing anymore. Like breathing. Imagine if you could breathe your whole life, then you suddenly can't. It stinks. Horrible metaphor, but that's how I felt while sulking. I couldn't breathe. I thank my lucky stars, I thank God, Yahweh, Buddha, Reagan - I thank who or whatever it is/was that taught me to breathe again. Now I'm breathing one inning a day, one day at a time. I'm used to 7 innings every fifth day. So if I can get around the possibility that I could conceivably pitch 7 innings in a week (one per day - stay with me), I'm therefore pitching just as much as I ever did before. I'm just spreading it out.

It's like if you put a big hamburger on your plate. You want to eat it. And there's a lot of it. Now put that same hamburger, cut up, onto 25 plates. It's not as effective, in terms of presentation to one's hunger palette, as one big burger on one plate. I used to eat one big burger every fifth day. Now I'm eating White Castle every day.

There's more. If I never got hurt last year, I wouldn't have spent as much time with my family last year as I did. Which makes this time, right now, even harder. You get used to things. I was used to a life on the road before the injury. Then I got used to life at home. Yes I was sulking, but I was doing it in the presence of my wife and daughters. They hated me for it, but that's their problem. Now, I'm healthy and on the road again (17 of the first 24 days of the Hounds' season are on the road - and my family isn't even staying with me in my Nashville trailer). And I'm missing my three girls (I threw my wife in there as a "girl" to make her feel better after my previous "that's their problem" statement regarding my sulking at home earlier in this paragraph. Oh, I could have deleted the statement and never had to throw in the "girl" line as an apology gift to my wife, but I didn't so sue me.) Bottom line: If I never got hurt, I never would have known how important my family is to me.

There are other things that have happened that may not have occurred. If I never got hurt last year...

I never would have had the off season contract dispute with the team.
The Vets wouldn't have had to fire Larry Picketts and hire Rick Churches to manage.
I never would have gotten into heated arguments, many times publicly, with Rick Churches because he wouldn't be my manager, laid back Larry Picketts would be.
Rick Churches would still be in the NYS (our regional sports network) broadcast booth, not managing, and my father, "Red" Scott, would still be anywhere but New York broadcasting games.

If I never got hurt last year...

I'd already have my 300 wins. Now, as a reliever, it may take me 3 seasons to win 13 more games. Do I want to play that much longer? More important, does anybody else want me to play that much longer?
I never would have started this blog.
I'd still be talking to the media.
I never would have "grown" and "matured" and would be my old, happy, ignorant, lovable self.
I wouldn't be in as good a shape as I'm in right now.
I wouldn't be playing in the minor leagues, on rehab assignment. I'd be in New York on a starting assignment.

If I never got hurt last year...

My Nashville Hounds would probably have a better record than 4 and 16.
I probably would not be a de facto owner of my Nashville Hounds, thanks to billionaire Charlie Walker.
I never would have met Andy, my personal trainer who also serves as my security "detail" in Nashville. (He's very big. Don't mess with him.)
I never would have been sued by the team psychologist (not psychiatrist - there's a difference), Dr. Henry Cohegans, for breaking the terms of our confidentiality agreement because I wouldn't be blogging or even going to him because I never got hurt.

If I never got hurt last year...

I never would have had public run-ins with my father, "Red" Scott, NYS broadcaster who's mad at me for not talking to the media (him) on the record but blogging instead.
I never would have been as fulfilled as I am right now with my life.
I never would have been turned into a relief pitcher.

You know what? It happened. It just did. And there's nothing I can do about it except move on. No more sulking. No more regrets. I got hurt last year and now I'm better. I can't wait to prove myself again in New York.

Selling Spit On eBay

2008-04-24T05:54:00.009-04:00

I was told it had to happen, but I just don't think about these things. I'm busy getting my work in, making my right arm not fall off at the elbow. I'm busy traveling with this minor league team, my Nashville Hounds, wondering how much longer I'll have to play in AAA. I'm busy staring into a mirror and looking at the upper right part of my head, where the hair used to be but is slowly deteriorating into something horrifying to me that the scientific community calls "male pattern baldness." My father, the dreaded "Red" Scott, is not bald. And I heard my mother's father, whom we'll call Grandpa and is the one my biology teacher in high school said mattered the most when it comes to the condition of my follicles, still had hair in his forties (he died at 50, so we'll never know how his hair would have developed or regressed). So I stare at the mirror, finger the growing presence of flesh, and watch the final dismantling of my youth, almost like the Russians taking down some nukes aimed at small towns in Iowa, towns that just, by chance, happened to have nukes aimed at Russia. These are the things I think - some say worry - about. Not the presence of my DNA up for sale, by someone else, on eBay.

During the Hounds' last homestand in Nashville, a week ago, I had the pleasure of drinking from a bottle of water, Poland Spring, I believe, on my walk from the stadium clubhouse to my trailer in the Pepsi Field parking lot. Feeling hydrated, I was looking for a garbage can to dump the bottle and small amount of remaining liquid. That's when a stranger, whom we'll call Grandpa - just kidding; this was a woman who, from the look of her, enjoyed her Southern cooking - saw me, asked for an autograph (I obliged with my adopted Southern hospitality) and said she'd throw out my bottle for me. I didn't think twice as I handed her my bottle and thanked her.

Flash forward to yesterday (Wednesday). Here we are in Omaha, about to play the Cats, when, in response to the PA guy, about 3000 fans suddenly throw their bottles of water onto the field. While batboys and team employees scurry about, picking up the plastic containers, Hounds manager Dusty Graves comes over to me, pats me on the back, and tells me I'm now officially "green." I have no idea what he's talking about.

An Omaha Cats employee - could've been a marketing person, could've been an intern, could've been their GM (one minor league employee typically performs the tasks of 5 of their big league counterparts) - comes to our dugout and asks Dusty if it would be okay for me to join him (the employee, a very tall one - skinny too) on the field to mention something about Earth Day and recycling. Dusty laughs and shrugs. "Fine with me," he said. The employee comes over, shakes my hand, and asks me to follow him. I do, happy to have heard the subject matter Dusty had just agreed I would speak about.

There's a loud ovation. "Spit King" flashes on the board. I'm oblivious. The employee asks me to turn. Then I figure it out. eBay and Poland Spring have jointly sponsored the evening's game because of me, because of the bottle of water I let a fan throw out for me. There on the scoreboard is a scanned photo of the bottle. It's part of an eBay website page. It's up for auction. The most recent bid was for $467.55. All for a piece of plastic holding a half-ounce of my backwash. There were 16 hours and 33 minutes left before bidding would close.

I turn back and am told the ballpark is sold out. There weren't 3000 fans there (3000 bottles were thrown, but not every fan elected to throw their bottle), there were nearly 8000 fans. All there for Earth Day's "Spit King" festival, sponsored by eBay and Poland Spring.

I spoke into a microphone set up at home plate. "Baseball been berry, berry good to me." The older Saturday Night Live crowd, the ones who remember Chico Escuela, the former fake ballplayer played by Garrett Morris, laugh. That's about 150 people. Meaning my remark basically brought silence to the crowd. That's a real confidence booster.

I continued. "You know, Omaha, recycling is good, right?" Some hand claps. A whistle, probably aimed at a hot groupie or another man who had more hair. "I think Omaha should always recycle, especially on Earth Day. Right?"

Were they as bored as I was, I wondered. I was happy for the preparation time I'd been given. "Omaha, I've always loved you, as you are part of the Earth, Mother Earth, my Mother Earth, the planet that raised me from a wee pup."

A few more whistles. Some more clapping. Then, it hit me. There was one reason alone why I'd been forced into this situation. But it was nothing a little supply & demand economics couldn't cure. "Omaha, Nebraska, I have an idea. After the game, let's line up and I'll drink a little bit from your bottles of water. Then we can all go on eBay and make some money. Huh? What chu think 'bout dat, Omaha!"

I had them going. "Why should one kook make all the money when 8000 of you should have the same opportunity? Am I right, Omaha? Nebraska? Tell me I'm wrong and I'll just slip into something more comfortable and go to bed."

Now the cheers were there, supporting me, letting me be the dufus I've always had the ability to be. "So sell your Poland Spring bottles on eBay. Those left over, recycle them. Let's save our Mother Earth. Because she been berry berry good to us!"

Those 8000 fans had the power and fury of at least 8250. They were that loud.

Then what happened? Well, I spent 4 hours after the game sipping from water bottles. By 2Am, I was done. When I woke up this morning - extremely tired; being a dufus always comes back to haunt me - I went on eBay and saw not one, but 679 bottles of water featuring my DNA backwash up for bidding. The original bottle? Almost at $500, but no longer climbing at the speed of sound. I considered my idea a success. The large, crazy (yet probably very smart) Southern lady wasn't going to get the amount of money she thought she'd get from me, I had some new friends in Omaha, and Mother Earth could relax for one last day. Who knew that my spit could change the world?

When Going Public Backfires

2008-04-23T06:17:00.004-04:00

The little spat my father, Vets announcer "Red" Scott, and I have had over the past few days grew larger last night. We beat Albuquerque in the afternoon and I pitched a 1-2-3 ninth inning, probably my best outing since the return of my healthy arm. The game ended around 3:45 and we were on plane flying to Omaha by 7:00 (what were 11-hour bus rides in AAA as recently as the 1990s are now 3-hour plane flights). I got to my lousy hotel room (what were lousy hotel rooms as recently as the 1990s are still lousy, only 10 years older) by 11:30 and, as I turned on my laptop, got a text message on my cell phone: "Jimmy, I'm going to kill you."

Now before you start thinking this is going to turn into a horror movie (I guess the demented serial killer with the manual miter saw would be waiting for me inside the box spring of my bed), you should know who wrote the text. No, not a fan who lost a bet on me (I have received death threats in the past, seriously, from guys who stood to owe lots of money to bookies if I pitched well on a particular night). My father wrote the text. And he isn't really going to kill me. He's just mad.

Because...

He said some dumb, untrue things about me on a couple of NYS broadcasts. I posted some true, but possibly dumb, things about him here. The media has printed and said plenty more, which he liked at first, since he's part of the media and I refuse to speak to them. His "brothers" were going to stand beside him. That's what he thought. Because I don't speak to the media, he thought the media would automatically side with him in this dispute, whether he was right or not. Only, he's starting to get skewered just as badly as me. He's starting to look as bad as me (even though I'm definitely going bald - I can just tell - and he's still got a full head of hair). The media have turned their backs to him.

So that has angered him. But it isn't the sole reason for the horror-inducing text message. There's more.

There were two voicemails on my cellphone that I didn't mention earlier. Both were from my super agent, Jack Perry. The first:

Jack: Jimmy, call me.

The second:

Jack: Call me now.

Jack's a no-nonsense kind of guy. If he needs you to call him right away, he's most likely got a very good reason for you to do so. I decided to eat before speaking to him.

Around midnight, just as I was stuffing my mouth with a piece of toast smothered in grape jelly (the kitchen in this dive of a hotel only makes breakfast for room service starting at 11PM in the evening), my phone went off. My girls stole my phone for a little bit last week and put on a bunch of ringtones. Now, if I receive a call, some hideous Hip Hop song bleats out of the phone's tiny speaker, reminding me of when the 19 year old guys come up to bat in these incredibly (compared to as recently as the 1990s) nice AAA ballparks. Thus, I had a piece of toast (rye) halfway down my throat when I hit Talk, instantly ridding the room, my ears, and the serial killer in my box spring of the hideous Hip Hop song.

Me: (unintelligible choking sound)
Jack: You didn't call me.
Me: (more choking)
Jack: Swallow, please.

I guess you can now tell Jack has heard me answer the phone with a neck full of food before.

Me: (after swallowing, taking a drink, the liquid going down the wrong tube, coughing and then clearing my throat, then having another drink and clearing my throat again) What?
Jack: You didn't call me.
Me: Yet. I hadn't called you yet.
Jack: Don't get all tense with me.
Me: You're funny when you make jokes about the English language.
Jack: Huh?

Great agent - a super agent. Terrible sense of humor. Just ask one of his three ex-wives.

Jack: Got a call from Mrs. Delaney tonight. She owns your team.
Me: I have heard of the woman.
Jack: She wants you and your father to make nice immediately or he's going to be suspended or fired.
Me: But nothing will happen to me?
Jack: You'll feel really guilty.

So it was now up to me. Either man up and speak with the father I wasn't speaking to so we could end our public squabble, or keep up the public squabble and see him removed from office in disgrace, eventually led away from a Chevy Caprice in handcuffs, a dark raincoat draped over his embarrassed head (that is less bald than mine even though it's 33 years older than mine).

It was 2 AM on the East Coast. I couldn't call Vanessa for her thoughts. She was busy asleep, probably dreaming of men with hair. I couldn't call my shrink since I don't have one anymore as a result of his lawsuit against me for breaking the terms of our confidentiality agreement. There was only one person I could call.

The phone rang. I heard a real ringing sound, not the latest hit by Chingy. The "Hello" was spoken clearly, the voice deep and respected.

"Dad," I said, "it's me. I'm sorry."

Public squabble over.

"Red" Scott

2008-04-22T16:00:00.003-04:00

There is nothing scarier than the fury of a parent. Even if the son is 40 years old, an angry father in his early-70s can still be like seeing the shark for the first time in Jaws.

I received a phone call this morning about my dad, "Red" Scott. "Red" is now announcing for the NY Veterans, parent club of the AAA Nashville Hounds, which I'm currently rehabbing with. In typical "Red" fashion, he threw me under a bus in last night's telecast from Chicago. Our problem stems from some misinformation "Red" gave to me in spring training, then a lie he spewed about me to reporters over the weekend. He likes to use his access to me, his son, as a way of drawing attention to himself. (Hey, I credit him for doing this and not Munchausen by Proxy.)

I called him out in my post yesterday, after protecting him for a month, for giving me the embarrassing misinformation in spring training, which I blogged about and which subsequently became a big deal due to my inaccuracies. By all turns furious with my "outrageous behavior," (his words last night), "Red" spoke on the air last night about me as if I was the devil himself. Here's part of what he said:

Red: That Jimmy... He's a piece of work. Maybe if he worked a little harder he'd be in Chicago tonight with the team instead of languishing away with his computer in Nashville.

If I had been in the booth with him, here's what I would have said:

Me: Shut up.

Our conversation would have continued like this:

Red: No, Jimmy. You've never worked as hard as I did at baseball.
Me: Maybe because I had talent.
Red: And where did you get it?
Me: Mom.
Red: Not true. Your mother can't even hold a hot dog right side up.
Me: I thought hot dogs were based on the horizontal principal of -
Red: My point is you are who you are and you are where you are today because of me.
Me: I'm not really in this booth with you. This is a fantasy.
Red: You can't even fantasize right. If I were you fantasizing right now, I'd be in Angelina Jolie's bed, not in a booth.
Me: I'm not tired.
Red: Wisenheimer.
Me: How can I be who I am if I'm nice and don't use people.
Red: All you do is use people. You're a big league ballplayer. It's in the job description. You blow your nose and somebody picks it up for you.
Me: The tissue, you mean.
Red: Huh?
Me: Paraphrasing, you said my nose, if blown, would end up on the -
Red: Why don't you just play baseball? Quit with the blogging. Quit with drawing attention to yourself. Play the game.
Me: Said the man who draws attention to himself like Michelangelo.
Red: I do it for you.
Me: You embarrassed me in front of the whole world.
Red: Did not.
Me: Did too.
Red: You deserved it.
Me: You know in court, your last phrase would mean you admitted to embarrassing me.
Red: So what?
Me: More admission of guilt.
Red: I'm going to the bathroom.
Me: Lotta good this fantasy did for me today.
Red: Yeah.

He's an upsetting man. You can't win with him. But in this case, he thinks he's got the last word. I added up how many people were exposed to his "last words" last night:

NYS Telecast: 350,000 viewers
Print Media Coverage: 1.4 million
Web Media Coverage: 6.75 million
YouTube: 679 hits (as of 4:35 EST today)

I average 647,000 hits on this blog daily. Add that to all of the numbers above, then subtract 679, and I'm ahead. If he was a better man, he'd pledge $1 to charity for every viewer on NYS who hears his reaction to this post tomorrow (the game is in progress in Chicago, so he won't get this in before it ends - burn on him). He's not a better man, nor is he rich, so the charities can keep their wallets closed. You won't see a dime from the guy.

Still, Mom always said to be better than Dad in everything - baseball, marriage, life in general. Hmm. Maybe that's where I got "it" from.

Let's revisit my broadcast booth fantasy:

Red - My point, again, is you are who you are today because of me.
Me - You forgot one thing - Mom. Well, she's not a thing. She's a person. But what I'm trying to say is I got everything from her. She made me better than you. You only served as a benchmark for me to achieve my greatness.
Red - (sitting in thought, scratching is gray hair that was never, ever red) See. I was a benchmark. Without me, you're nothing.
Me - I'm going to the bathroom.
Red - Lotta good this fantasy revisit did for you.
Me - Yeah.

Bottom line - I love you Mom. Dad, I love you too. I can't stand you, but I love you. Say what you want on the air. Try to ruin my blogdom (instead of kingdom, which he thinks I want by blogging). Try to make me in your image by talking to the press and doing all the things every other baseball player since Jesus (I hear He had an awesome splitter) has done. Try not to let me be an individual. I don't care. I am who I am. It has nothing to do with you. And it probably never will.

My Broiling Self-Inflicted Anger

2008-04-21T12:35:00.003-04:00

Let me restate for the record (or CD, or mp3 if we're going to stay current and I'm going to feel "cool" amongst the younger crowd), I am not speaking to the press. The "press" in my case is defined as:

1. Print media
2. Online media
3. Television media
4. Radio media
5. Telepathic media

"Media" is defined as the stuff you read, watch, see, hear or sense, respectively.

In other words, if you're in the media and you want a quote from Jimmy Scott (that's me), you need to come here.

You know where you don't go? You don't go to my father, "Red" Scott, currently a TV analyst for the Vets' network, NYS (New York Sports). He's not my spokesman. Yes, he's the male reason for my birth, but since an incident in spring training, we haven't spoken.

The incident? I've purposely not alluded to it over the last month out of respect for the elder Scott's new position at NYS. I didn't want him to get off to a bad start, even though he did something to me in March that made me look foolish for a news cycle and bloggers in general look irresponsible for two to three news cycles. It also showed this man's true colors, which are self-promotion first, family second.

Back in March, "Red" told me that management was going to appoint Felipe Castro as team captain. I wrote about it, questioning the thinking on management's part while trying to support the decision, as Felipe is a great teammate who's currently going through the hell of wondering about the fate of his kidnapped mother in Venezuela every day.

For my comments, I was broiled under a hot, fiery furnace. I was criticized as someone looking to promote one's self. Hey, I never denied the fact that a scoop would be cool. I thought I had a scoop because I trusted the then unidentified source. Instead, I was lied to and caused unnecessary friction within my clubhouse for a short time.

Fast forward to today. Headlines in the NY Post and Daily News (just a note in Newsday) and North Jersey's Bergen Record state how my injury last year was self-inflicted. In a nutshell, the report states I caused the UCL in my pitching elbow to snap and ruin my 2007 season 2 pitches in on my own. Little did they realize my season was ruined 1 pitch in when Lyman Gaye hit it for a Home Run (that I believe is still traveling).

The source of this new story? "Red" Scott, my father. He says I told him in the spring that, because I was out of shape at the start of the season last year, and my overweightness (that's not a word, is it?) added undue stress to my UCL. Pop! Out for the year because I'm fat. He says I said this to him. Read the articles. He's quoting me.

Of course, my mailbox fills up in seconds on my cellphone with calls from local and national media from the 5 categories above (which is weird; the telepathic media shouldn't have to call if I can read their minds). I deleted each voicemail. My email in box filled quickly. All deleted (including, accidentally, an email with a great offer from a Nashville porn shoppe selling the best in Southern pornography [note: if you're from Nashville, you don't spell shop with two P's and an e]). Being in Albuquerque for our series against Albuquerque Sunshine, I'm a half-step further out of the loop than had I been in New York. Thus, this all came rather quickly and was a complete surprise.

So, I'm due a rebuttal and some other remarks.

JIMMY'S OFFICIAL REBUTTAL

I didn't arrive into 2007 camp out of shape. I didn't hurt myself in the first game of the year last year. By no means was my UCL damage "self-inflicted." It hurt too much to be something I'd do to myself.

What I think happened here is I told my father in the off season, while I was going through some contract issues with the team, that I was out of shape then. In November. I was fat and going bald. The baldness couldn't be helped (I'm told). The fatness could. Once our contract issues were ironed out, I worked my tuckuss off to get to spring training in good shape. I wasn't perfect, but I was damn close. Currently, I'd say I'm in the best physical shape I've been in for years. (Mentally I'm a mess, but that's neither here or there nor somewhere less fun than the aforementioned two.)

In essence, my father either misheard comments I made (that gives him an easy out) or he twisted them to make this story (I was going to describe the word "story" as "cockamamied," but I don't know how to spell "cockamamied." [spell check helped, never mind]). Either way, they are false, untrue, and not something I ever said.

END REBUTTAL HERE

"Red" and I have had our missteps over the years, but this is the first time that he's thrown me under a bus so publicly. He hurt me last month and he hurt me this weekend. I guess I'll be due again in May.

Nevertheless, I put in a call to my super agent, Jack Perry, who put in a call to ownership. "Red" is out of control and needs to put a damper on his mouth. I can't imagine a father doing somethings like these to his son, then again, it's happened to me twice now so I should get a little more creative quickly.

What does my mother think? Good question. I asked and here was her official response (media, please don't bug her, she has a good right hook):

Dear Jimmy,

I'm sorry your father behaved irrationally again. Next time you're together, I'll let you give him his medication, as much of it as you like.

Love you,
Mom

I think that about sums it up. My plan is to overdose my father into pulling a Jimi Hendrix.

So now you have all of the official statements:

1. From my dad, which was false.
2. From my mom, which gave me permission to medicate my father against his will.
3. From me, who is angry but feeling better now.

If you have any questions, don't call. I'll just delete your voicemail. That goes for you too, "Red." Don't dial the number. It won't work for you.

The Home Team

2008-04-18T06:09:00.003-04:00

Seems like none of us can read a schedule. Vanessa came to visit Wednesday and was going to stay until Sunday. Now she's going to fly home Saturday morning because my Nashville Hounds have to fly to Albuquerque after Friday night's game. You could blame me for this scheduling screwup, since I don't really look at the schedule until the last minute, at least down here. In fact, I was in the act of being blamed when something happened.

We got a knock on the door of my trailer Thursday night after the game. It was about 11:30 and we were just about to go to bed (I like games that end in less than 3 hours, especially games in which I don't pitch). Andy, my personal trainer turned security "detail," has a special knock that he uses. I thought this was one of them. I say "thought" because I can never remember which special knock he's using. He tells me, I look him straight in the eye and tell him I'm listening, then space out thinking about chunky tomato sauce or something.

So...uh, oh yeah. Thursday night. A knock. "Maybe it's Andy," I said to Vanessa. She tells me to look out the window. I tell her I don't need to. I know his knock (even though I was extremely unsure). Thus, I open the door and...it's our (Vanessa's and mine, not Andy's and mine) two daughters, Alyssa and Grace, standing outside, shivering. I look around and don't see Andy anywhere. So much for security.

Hugs are exchanged. Squeals of delight spew out of Vanessa. I smile because I haven't seen my girls since March 30th, almost 3 weeks. We sit down and I grill them:

Me: How did you get here?
Alyssa: Plane.
Me: I mean, who arranged this trip?
Grace: Me. There's this think called the Internet.
Me: I've heard of it. Free porn, right?
Vanessa: Jimmy!
Me: How did you pay for your tickets?
Alyssa: We didn't.
Grace: You did.

Instantly, I'm lost. I did? Just as I had forgotten Vanessa was going to come by the day before, had I forgotten my two spawn were going to come by tonight? Surely, Vanessa would have told me, or reminded me.

Me: Surely, Vanessa, you would have told me or reminded me they were going to visit.
Vanessa: Yes, I would have.
Me: But you didn't.
Vanessa: Correct.
Me: (wrinkling my brow, desperately trying to figure this out)
Alyssa: It's not math, Dad. Surprise.
Me: That doesn't answer my question. How did you pay for this trip?
Grace: Ever heard of credit cards?
Me: Yes. (but said like a dufus)

Silence. Nobody finished Grace's thought. It just floated in the air above us.

Grace: What are you looking at?
Me: (looking down) Huh?
Alyssa: You gave us credit cards for Christmas. We used them to pay for our flight.
Me: (nodding and happy that the world was no longer shaped like an octagon)
Vanessa: Your father is tired and just misses you.
Me: Missed. They're right here. The missing is over.

We talked for a while. They're doing well back in their own school. I didn't like the fact that they flew by themselves from Newark to Nashville. But it was still good to be together, the whole family, the four of us, in my trailer built for two - maximum.

Me: (yawning) So where are you staying tonight?
Vanessa/Alyssa/Grace: Here.

"Here." Another word that floated in the air above us.

Grace: What are you looking at?
Me: (looking down) Here?
Vanessa: Where else?
Me: Has anybody seen how small this trailer is? Do you know who I am? I'm Jimmy Scott. Baseball star? You expect me to -
Vanessa: You can sleep in Andy's trailer.

Knock knock. "What?" I said it was me. "Who?" I said it was me. Baseball star? Andy opened his door. "You didn't use the knock." I apologized. He looked at my blanket, my toothbrush and toothpaste, the pajamas draped over my frame. "What? Did Vanessa kick you out?" I told him about my visitors. "And?" I told him about the suggested sleeping arrangements. "Fine."

Andy is a big man. He's not fat. Personal trainers aren't allowed to be fat, just like defensive ends in football aren't allowed to be skinny. Andy is just a big-boned, huge African-American man. "You ever play football back in the day?" I asked. He said no. Got in the way of his violin lessons.

His trailer, about as nice as mine, which isn't exactly paradise on wheels, shook with every step he took. He showed me a couch where I could sleep, then turned off the lights and began to sing. (Andy's a great blues singer.)

Andy: Take me, woman, to that place -
Me: Andy, you're singing.
Andy: - where you want to be. Take me, woman to-
Me: It's going on 1AM. We should probably sleep.
Andy: -that place where we're going. Oh, oh oh, oh...
Me: Do you sing yourself to sleep every night?

Silence. At least this night, he did.

The Pleasant Surprise That I Should Have Remembered

2008-04-17T06:03:00.009-04:00

We won yesterday! My Nashville Hounds are now 3 and 11, but still only 5.5 games out of first place. While I won't be here for any championship run in August, they're still my team. These are my guys. It's like "Survivor" down here. You're constantly competing with each other to be the next winner (who gets called up to New York), yet each time somebody leaves (occasionally one of us gets cut or demoted), it's sad. We don't cry on camera, gently wiping the tears from our eyes so we don't mess our makeup. But we do feel a loss. I felt that way when Felipe Castro was called up last week, and he was only here for just under half a dozen games. I'll feel that way when I head north for good. These are my Hounds, my boys. Every one is a winner.

I sound like the host of some children's TV show. "Every one of you won today, whether you have a trophy or disgraced your family name. Good luck in life. You're going to need it."

Not sure if you sense it, but I'm a little giddy today. Not due to my performance on Wednesday. To get some good work in, I pitched both the 8th and 9th. The 8th was great. 1-2-3 inning. I needed that. The 9th, not as good. Leadoff HR and two more hits before getting out of it. 2 innings, 3 hits, 1 run. That's not good enough yet. However, the 8th is what I'll remember. I felt good and pitched well. Remember the good, forget the bad, but try to learn from it too. Complicated.

The giddiness - don't worry, I remember - was brought on by... Oh, I won't spoil it for you. But this will help you know why I'll remember the 8th more than the 9th.

I was sitting in the bullpen beginning in the 6th inning and saw somebody familiar behind home plate. I squinted and thought, "Damn, she looks familiar." Then I shook my head and tried to forget about it by spitting pistachio shells all over the place.

Just before the 8th, I was throwing warmup pitches when the familiar woman caught my eye again. I froze, just as my catcher, Einer Rosario, threw the ball back to me, hitting me square in the chest. I dropped to the ground, everyone - I mean EVERYONE - came running. But I never took my eye off the familiar woman. Because I finally realized she was my wife, Vanessa. And I was supposed to meet her before the game. Hell, I was supposed to arrange to have somebody pick her up at the airport.

Um, I forgot.

Now you know why I froze.

My chest will be fine. There's a bruise. It's sore, but only when I breathe. "Serves you right," my lovely spouse said to me after the game as I gave her a tour of the stadium (took about 3 minutes). I just smiled (without breathing). It was so great to be surprised by my wife's visit, even though it technically wasn't a surprise since she told me she was coming. I mean, she gave me all of her flight information, including arrival time. This wasn't supposed to be a surprise.

But I forgot, so, uh, SURPRISE!!

When I said, "What a fantastic surprise," to her, she wasn't sure what I was talking about for almost a full second. Then she shook her head in that You May Be 40 But You Still Need A Nanny To Look After You kind of way.

She came down because she had missed my birthday over the weekend and also wanted to see the trailer that I'm living in in the Pepsi Field parking lot. Not sure if you've seen it. Here you go:

Vanessa slept here last night. Did I mention (yes) a while back that it had two sinks? It does. And let me tell you: Two sinks in a bathroom saves a marriage.

Vanessa got to meet my protege, Rey Marcos, who is 17 but looks 16. She asked me, around 10:30 last night, if Rey was ever going to leave. I told her yes. Around 11:15, she asked me again. I understood this time and asked Rey to leave by 11:45, after Vanessa said she was going to bed. Unfortunately, my trailer only has one room.

So in order for my spousal equivalent to sleep, I had to help Rey leave through the throng of groupies outside wearing thongs.

I assume he made it home to his hotel room since I didn't get a call from his parents (who call me if they haven't heard from him in more than 5 hours) or the police.

I went to bed happy, still giddy about the surprise visit from my wife. She's flying back to Newark Airport on Sunday morning, which will give us some much needed time together and also give her a break from her stalker "friend" Connie, who is as bad as ever. More on Connie tomorrow.

But today, I'm giddy all over. It's nice to be loved, even if you can't remember that you are sometimes.

Throwing Up

2008-04-16T06:14:00.003-04:00

I am so sick. Not the doctor's note, all day TV watching, toilet-hugging, people feeling sorry for me, oh my God he's passed out on the floor call 9-11, somebody get a lone scientist to research and find a cure before it's too late kind of sick. No, I can breathe through my nose, eat a horse and sleep all night without getting up to pee once. My problem is I'm sick of me. Here, in my trailer overlooking the Pepsi Field parking lot (and my security agent Andy's trailer), after my protege, 17 year old wunderkind Rey Marcos has left to return to his hotel room - alone - so he doesn't catch a venereal disease from some Nashville Hounds groupie, I reflect on my stay here in Nashville and feel sick.

I keep throwing up. That's my biggest problem. I keep throwing up.

The ball, that is.

The reason I'm here with the Hounds is to gain arm strength so I can pitch one inning a game 4 times a week. Oh, it would also be a help if, when I pitched, I could get batters out. My arm strength is good. I pitched three times last week and pitched Sunday and Tuesday so far this week. I'll pitch tonight, Wednesday, to satisfy the back-to-back days criteria, then pitch Friday or Saturday. There. I'm plenty strong. Take me back New York. I want to eat a horse and sleep in my own bed again.

Only...

I'm throwing up all the time. I stand on the mound, go into my windup (or motion, you choose your own word for it), and release the ball from my pitching hand. The ball should slither around in the air before landing at or below the knees of the batter.

The ball is landing in the parking lot, denting my trailer.

Because I keep throwing up.

For a pitcher, the "release point" is hugely important. Where the ball leaves the fingers makes all the difference between its dropping low or rising high. My ball keeps rising. It rises twice lately: Once when I release it and a second time when the batter hits it to Kingdom Come.

My record so far down here:

Games: 6
Innings Pitched: 4.2
Strikeouts: 1
Walks: 4
Hits: 11
Home Runs Allowed: 5
ERA: 19.28
Saves: 1
Won/Loss: 0/3

My ERA is actually 19.29 because the math equates to 19.2857142857. But I didn't want to round up after the .28. It's too depressing.

My health is fine. Really. There is no pain. I feel good in the locker room before the game. I feel good on the field before the game. I feel good sitting in the bullpen during the game. I feel even better warming up during the game. I feel good jogging out to the mound. Physically, I mean. Mentally, I feel horrible jogging out to the mound because the whole time I'm getting booed. That's stinky, to get booed. Yes, it's the minors but, man, who wants to get booed? But the jog keeps me loose and I feel great on the mound throwing my last warmup pitches.

As soon as the batter jumps into that box, I feel awful. I feel like throwing up (the puking kind here). Nerves, I tell myself. Just nerves. "You want it so badly, but just relax," a little voice says in my mind. I'm unsure whose voice it is, because mine is kind of high and whiny. This one is low and mature with a hint of debonair. I think it's George Clooney's voice. It's deep and sounds like the speaker has gray hair. Yeah, it's got to be Clooney. We've never met, but I hear he used to be a big fan. Of something. Probably not me. Because the voice doesn't relax me, I still want to throw up (the puking kind), and then I go into my motion (or windup, your choice) and let the ball leave my fingers.

BAM!!!

There it goes. Don't break a window in my trailer.

Bobby Spencer is the New York pitching coach. He called me this morning and told me he's been watching film of me. "Everything's perfect," he said. "Your windup, or motion, depending upon how you want to describe it, is a-ok. Release point is fine. I think it's your arm slot that's giving you problems."

Oh, it's my arm slot.

An arm slot is the angle your arm flies through the air to help propel a baseball out of your fingers. He thinks my arm slot is too close to overhand. "You're at about 86 degrees," Bobby said. (He's a pure techno-geek.) "You want 77."

So tonight - whoa, wait a minute. Our game today is at noon!!! Let me rephrase. Today, sometime between noon and 3:00, I will try for a 77 degree arm slot. Maybe that will keep me from throwing up (the baseball kind).

Because if I don't fix this soon, I'm going to need to hug a toilet and throw up for real. This whole rehab process is starting to make me sick.

The Union Army

2008-04-15T09:49:00.007-04:00

If you listen closely, you can hear the drum beats coming from both sides, union and management, as our Basic Agreement comes to a close very soon. Too soon for fans. You know the story: management wants a salary cap, knows they'll never get it, so they don't ask for it anymore. But they have to ask for something. Thus, they speak of removing teams or arbitration or free agency. Maybe updating the drug policy again so the players don't get aspirin budgets anymore. Their strategy is this: The more they ask for, the better chance they'll get something. Anything, really, is what they want.

The game is going through a renaissance. Revenues are through the retractable roof. More fans came to games in 2007 than ever before, and the projection for 2008 is even better. TV revenues and ratings have grown. Money from the Internet is busting owners' pockets. Finally, the value of teams grows greater with each fan who passes through a metal detector on their way into stadiums. Yes, it's a great time to be an owner.

Yet, the union is wary of all this good news. We're like old farm animals, poked and prodded and screwed over so many times (not sure anymore if the farm animals reference is a good one anymore). There's got to be something coming, something not good (meaning bad).

Pigs

One, or you, could say that the union is just being paranoid. Maybe. But I don't think there will ever be complete trust between ownership and the union. I mentioned how we've been screwed so many times, right? It's like if a spouse cheats on another and gets caught. If the one who didn't cheat takes the cheater back, the marriage is still marred, scarred, and two steps closer to over than ever before. The trust can never completely return, no matter how long you (or one) stay together.

In the ownership/union relationship, we'll be married forever. There's no option for divorce here. They've colluded, they've made cuts in people, salaries, they've supported us as we did performance enhancing drugs, then publicly scorned us for doing so. If this were a church, they'd spend most of their time in confession.

Not that the players are exactly angels. We are the ones, after all, who actually took the performance enhancers. We are the ones who've gotten hurt so many times that certain owners have lost enough money to get out of the game entirely. A greater percentage of players have been arrested than owners. And it's not like we're exactly loyal to the people who pay us either. As soon as a guy can be a free agent, 8 times out of 10 he leaves for more money. We're not saints by any means.

Still, we know to be prepared. Howard Phillips, our esteemed head of the union for the last 25 years, has sent to us a memo stating they're going to begin keeping a portion of every paycheck we receive in an escrow fund so that, in case of lockout or strike, we'll have money to live off of. You're thinking, probably out loud, how can millionaires be afraid of not having enough money for a few months? The answer is this: We're not smart. The owners are smart. Howard Phillips is smart. Players? Bowling balls are sharper than the majority of us. We're great at throwing and hitting baseballs, but we're terrible at money management. We're terrible at self-control. We're even worse at finding someone to control us or our money. Either we don't listen to a solid money pro and screw ourselves or we trust the wrong money pro and get screwed. In other words (heads up cat burglars), there are lots of pillow cases in the homes of big league ballplayers stuffed with wads of cash.

My side on all this is a little more complicated. I am a player, obviously. Always have been. But since billionaire Charlie Walker gifted the Nashville Hounds, the Vets' AAA affiliate, to my charity, I'm technically an owner. Even more technically, I'm not an owner because the charity runs the team since I'm not allowed to play and also own a team, be it big league or minor league. However, let's put all technicalities aside. It's in my, and the charity's, best interests for the team revenues and value to rise in an inverse ratio to player salaries and costs. Thus, I'm on the player's side when it comes to the National Baseball League and the owners' side when it comes to the National Baseball Minor League. See what I mean? It's complicated.

Lots of you would prefer that I keep these problems to myself and just play some friggin' baseball. The Veterans are playing under .500 ball and the Hounds are 2 and 7. I'm no good luck charm, certainly, at this point in the season. But this is how baseball works. It's a terrible, awful cliche that 8 out of 10 free agents like to say, but here I go: Baseball is a business.

Thanks for letting me use my daily cliche. I feel liberated.

Continuing...

I'm a flag flying carrier of my union membership card. I flash it whenever I get into trouble. The union army has always been there to save my buttocks from whatever jam I got myself into. I want the army to know that I stand by them. My allegiance is to the union first, the game second - which is dumb because if there is no game, there's no point in a union. But, as I mentioned, whoever said ballplayers were smart?

I can't imagine there will be a strike or a lockout this year. Which means there will probably be a strike or a lockout this year. I hope not. But you never know. That's why it's good to be prepared. My union is going to be prepared. What about yours?

My Protege

2008-04-14T06:16:00.008-04:00

I'm not sure if I ever gave you my line about how stalking is really just an intense form of goal-setting. But I figured out a little more. Many times the goal-setting stalker is really an opportunity for the stalkee to develop your own personal protege. I've rarely had them on the big club. The older you get as a player, the more the press makes of the fact that this player or that player has been taken under some older veteran's wing. Maybe sometimes, but in general, there is not too much wing undertaking.

A lot of younger players come up and either 1) Think their hot sh*t and don't want to listen to coaches, much less their teammates, or 2) Are so scared they don't want to ask too many questions for fear of rousing suspicion that maybe, just maybe, they don't belong in the big leagues.

Meanwhile, most older veterans are desperate to hang onto their careers. The few who want to seriously go into coaching eventually realize that, to coach, you have to be able to speak with players other than the ones who look back at you in a mirror. But otherwise, the generations stick together in the clubhouse, just like the Spanish-speaking guys stick together and the religious right guys stick together.

Down here in the minor leagues, it's not much different. The veterans down here on rehab assignments don't want to forge too many relationships because 1) They don't want to jinx themselves into thinking they'll be spending more time in the minors than they need, and 2) They're pissed off that they're in the minor leagues and can't get over themselves.

Meanwhile, the young guys are usually too shy to walk up to the veteran guys down here for a cup of coffee and ask questions. It's just like high school. The career minor leaguers are the dorks, the geeks are the guys in the minors dying to make it all the way to the top and the most popular guys are the ones who are down for a week or two rehabbing a hamstring or rotator cuff.

Since we all knew I'd be down in Nashville for up to four weeks (it's already been two, but who's counting) and then, by weirdness and unfortunate illness, I ended up indirectly owning the Nashville Hounds, I've gotten more attention from the players on this team than most guys down here temporarily do. For example, Felipe Lopez was here for 6 days and 5 games. He was called up to New York after yesterday's game (we won and are now 2 and 9, not a good way to start the season). We all knew Felipe was going to be here for a week at most. He's a shy guy anyway, plus his mother still being held against her will somewhere in Venezuela made it hard for guys to go up to him and ask if they should stand in a batters box with their feet 18 inches apart or 19.

A number of players have spoken to me and tried to ask questions, but most kind of fade away out of fear that my Hall of Fame pedigree (you know how great I am, right?) will force me to appear surly and nasty. Then there's Rey Marcose.

Rey Marcos is not the protege I expected to have stalk, I mean, follow me around constantly. For starters, he's not a pitcher. He a shortstop. Second, he's 17 years old. I turned 40 on Saturday (virtually unrecognized beyond a Happy Birthday wish on the scoreboard - I guess even the coaching staff didn't want to pull a prank on me, like leave 40 turds in my new underwear or something [disgusting, but you weren't there for my 30th]). Let me re-read. I got lost in all my () and []... Uh...okay. So, we're talking about Rey Marcos, the 17 year old wonderboy shortstop who's now my protege. Another weird thing about our relationship. He doesn't speak one word of English. Totally serious. The team has an academy and a whole bunch of systems set up so young Latino guys coming up through the minors can learn English and basic life skills, like not to spend all their money at McDonald's (that's true - some Latino American guys make it to America and only eat McDonald's for their first six months, thus they gain 15 pounds that sure as hell ain't muscle). Rey Marcos has passed through the system so fast, he hasn't had a chance to learn how to speak English. When he sits down with me, it's like I'm Robinson Crusoe and he's Friday. I'm stranded down here, he's my only friend, so it's up to me to teach him English.

There are more parallels to the Robinson Crusoe metaphor. Like how I made my home in the jungle, only the jungle in my sense is the parking lot of Pepsi Field, where the Hounds play. My trailer is like my treehouse, only there are only three steps from asphalt to entrance (I have a fear of heights, except when I'm on airplanes - go figure). Rey hangs out all the time, then leaves for his hotel room somewhere nearby. There are people we need to be afraid of, generally groupies who want to find their way into the trailer and are thwarted off by Andy, my personal trainer turned security guard who now has his own trailer right next to mine (the team made Andy pay $750 to park for the month, which, of course, I'm paying since I'm the one who asked Andy to provide security for me. And, of course, I'm not really paying the $750, since New York is paying it, knowing I needed security (and knowing they're saving $$$$ since I bought my own trailer and didn't rent a house or suite at the Hilton for the month on their dime). Thus, New York is, in effect, paying Nashville for Andy to park in the parking lot. And since I, in effect, own the Hounds, New York is, in effect, paying me. Here's how the structure of payment looks:

I got lost again using () and []. I didn't use any {} and refuse to use <>. One day, maybe I'll use a full blog of . But that's way in the future, probably when Rey Marcos is playing in New York full time.

See how I got back on track? I'm a smarty pants.

Jimmy Scott continues...

Rey hangs with me and watches me eat. He watches me not talk to the press after games (some here think I'm a bad influence on him in that capacity). He watches me blog. No, his head doesn't rest on my shoulder as I type, but he's there, lurking, eyes always watching... Spooky, huh?

But he's a good kid. I've heard him speak on the phone with his parents in the Dominican. They allegedly invited me down for dinner sometime. Funny how I've played with so many guys from other countries and never, ever been invited to their homes. Maybe it's because I never invited them to mine. I'll ask Vanessa tonight when we talk on the phone, after Rey has left and headed back through the throng of groupies to his room, alone, the way I explained in my broken Spanish he should sleep. Hey, at 17 I would have done anything to have groupies want a piece of me. But I was a junior in high school with zits on my face and a fastball that was just being found. I didn't date (any relationship I had with a girl lasted no more than 2 weeks before she/they broke up with me on account of them not liking me anymore and, possibly, never liking me in the first place). Rey could have a "date" every night if he wanted. I'm teaching him not to. I was a father at 24 (while married, I was still a little young). I don't want Rey, with his lack of English and American life skills, to be a father at 17.

So now you know about my protege. He's hitting .419 with 2 HRs and 5 stolen bases. No errors. The plan is for him to play here and get called up in September. He'll probably be up sooner. So after I'm back in New York by May 1, I may have my protege with me before the summer is over. Maybe I'll have a chance to invite my first Dominican teammate over to my house for a nice dinner.

Saved!

2008-04-11T06:46:00.004-04:00

It finally happened. Last night, I recorded my first save in a Nashville Hounds uniform. I looked online and also saw that in my 20 years of professional baseball, this was my first save ever. I looked harder and saw that, in my 20 years of professional baseball, I have pitched out of the bullpen (regular season) a grand total of 6 times, none since 1994.

Fans will say, "Oh, he's certainly a great looking guy, maybe going bald, but he'll still be a real hottie when all we'll see on his head is skin."

You, as readers, will say, "What's the previous quote have to do with anything?"

I, as me, will say, "Helps my ego."

Back on point: Fans will also say, "He gets paid millions of dollars ($9 million guaranteed this year - I can't forget that), he should be able to do whatever they tell him."

Here's where you're right and wrong at the same time (I feel like I'm talking to my wife, the lovely Vanessa Scott). Yes, for the money they pay me, I should jump when they say "How high?" without asking any questions. Did that make sense? Let me rephrase for those of you playing the board game at home. For the wads of cash the team gives me to line my pockets made of gold, I should have the ability to pitch in the first, fifth or thirteenth innings, bunt a runner over to second base with less than two outs, or spit a macadamia nut casing up to six feet out of my mouth if they tell me to. Yes, fans, I should be able to do that.

But I can't. I'm a baseball player, and baseball players are screwy. A leadoff hitter has trouble hitting down at seventh in the order. The situations as a seventh place hitter are completely different from the situations leading off a game. Thus, the leadoff hitter freaks out and can't do it. The starting pitcher must pitch every fifth day. If you put him out there with three days rest, or six days, his mind is mud. He can't do it. The closer must come into a game with a small enough lead that he still gets the save, or the score tied. He can't come in with a 5-run lead and not give up 2 or 3. Likewise, he can't come into a game down by 10 and be expected to pitch a 1-2-3 inning. Our heads may be handsome, although in the intermediate stages of balding, but our minds are fragile, vulnerable, sensitive globs of goo. Don't ask us to do what we're not accustomed to doing. We'll fail 9 times out of 10.

So how am I adjusting to my new role as closer for a AAA minor league team when I've been a big league starting pitcher for the last 19 years? On the outside, I appear fully confident. I've said to friends (my mother's dog, Lando), family (my mother) and anyone else who's not a member of the press that "I'll do whatever it takes to help the team." I'm happy to have had the opportunity to spew the cliche out of my mouth. We all say it. We also say, "That's what we're paid to do," even though our minds are the aforementioned globs of goo when you ask us to do what we don't expect to be told to do. Like close games in AAA when you thought you'd be starting games in New York.

In other words, I'm trying to get my head around the fact that I'm being told (nobody ever asked, by the way) to pitch out of the bullpen this year. Yes, it's been almost a month since this stunning pronouncement by my favorite manager, Rick Churches. But you can't put a free man in solitary confinement and ask him to feel good about it after only 3 weeks.

I have needed help. My former shrink, Dr. Henry Cohegans, won't be my current shrink (hence the "former" attribute) because of the lawsuit he filed against me for breaking our confidentiality agreement. While we settled, he won't pick us up where we left off. So I've been searching for a replacement shrink. The big club gave me a list of local people (local to Nashville), but I need someone who can do it over the phone. I won't be in Nashville very long and don't want to develop a relationship with a new psychiatrist only to break it off after a short time. I'd think he or she would feel used.

Enter Dr. Carol Lindstrom-Oates. She's New Jersey-based and let me call her Dr. Lindstrom-Oates. A fine doctor of the mind, we had our first call yesterday:

Shrink - Tell me about yourself.
Me - I feel bad about the recession.
Shrink - It's a tough time in this economy.
Me - No, I mean my hair. It's receding.

She's a very serious doctor who's serious of doctoring. I told her of my problem dealing with my new "role" as a baseball player. Here's what she said:

Shrink - You mean they pay you all that money and you can't do it? What, are you nuts?

Dr. Carol Lindstrom-Oates is not my shrink anymore.

Meanwhile, I pitched a 1-2-3 9th last night. Maybe I simply cured myself.

Learning To Brawl

2008-04-10T06:01:00.003-04:00

"My" team, the Nashville Hounds (mine since my charity is part-owner now and also because I'm playing for them for the time being), has gotten off to a 1 and 6 start. We're not (including me) pitching well. We're not hitting well. We're not catching the ball well. It rained on Wednesday, which let us lose in 6 innings instead of the usual nine. That gave us more time to reflect on how to get better in all facets of the game of baseball.

My job here is to build up arm strength after last season's injury so that I can - to my surprise - be a relief pitcher with the big club in New York. In this role, which I've never done before, I need to be able to pitch two days in a row and at least 4 times a week. I've already pitched on the back-to-back timeframe, only I've pitched poorly overall. It's either my body that's still learning or my head.

For my teammates, the great majority are learning how to play the game. How to recognize a pitch as it pours out of a pitcher's hand. How to position one's self with runners on base. How to shorten a swing and protect the plate with two strikes. How to properly fight if a guy on the other team deserves to have his head pounded in.

That's right. Guys in the minor leagues also need to learn how to properly involve themselves in a baseball fight. I've put together a tutorial that I'll share with you that should properly show etiquette, style and strategy when fighting in baseball.

You've seen baseball fights before. Here's a boring one from a college game:

Not much happened here. This is, actually, the proper way for a baseball brawl to work. There's an inciting incident causing two opposing players "jaw" at each other, then both benches need to "empty" so that the two players don't end up alone in a steel cage death match.

The key to a baseball brawl is to not get hurt. Another important lesson is this: Don't make a fool of yourself, like this guy:

No, the one who should be embarrassed is not the pursuer. It's the one being pursued. Always remember: Both Benches Will Empty. Reinforcements are always - ALWAYS - on the way in a baseball brawl. There's no need to run away.

But what could the pitcher have done here? There's always the drop kick. Scroll up to 2:25 in the following example to see exactly how it's done:

For the kids reading this, until you get out of Little League, the proper way to battle on the field is on one leg:

As the aggressor in a fight, you can take a few lessons from the following video. Note the foresight on the batter as he takes care of the pitcher's first line of defense before going after the pitcher.

Unfortunately, his one error in judgement here was, for a brief moment, he was surrounded without the reinforcements, most probably because his teammates were so thrown off guard by the nontraditional attack on the catcher.

I hope this lesson brings joy into your homes and properly explained how to brawl on a baseball diamond. We return home tomorrow to play Iowa, not the entire state, just the Chicago AAA affiliate. We're hoping for a peaceful game.

The Ultimate Groupie

2008-04-09T06:02:00.007-04:00

I've only been married once. This doesn't mean I'm not married anymore. I got married on January 10, 1993 and remain wedded via holy matrimony to my spousal equivalent, Vanessa. We have the rings to prove it (not as big as my World Championship Series rings, but probably more valuable). There are lots of guys I have played with in the past, and on the current big league club, who have been divorced. Some guys have been divorced more than once; Jon Benson, for example, who's married to his third wife. I'm not judging him for being married three times. Nor am I making fun of him. I'm into the whole "people got to be free" thing, as long as nobody gets hurt. That's why I feel I have to say something about the woman who's apparently crawled out of a hole somewhere to say she has been Jon's mistress through all three marriages.

The woman is Nicole Verdetta. She's 40 and lonely and an example of the ultimate groupie. Many groupies are the one-night stand kind. They do it to say they did it. No strings attached. But there are other groupies, some like Nicole, who do it, I don't want to say to "entrap" a player, but as an investment. They'll do what the player wants in exchange for money, or material things like cars and apartments. Ms. Verdetta is this, plus more. You saw Fatal Attraction, right? That comes to mind about now.

Yes, I know her. Not well. Jon's been on the team since 2004 and I've seen her on the road, sometimes in our hotel lobby, sometimes at a restaurant with Jon. Yes, I've known Jon has been married to his current wife, Kathryn, since 2003. Like I said, I don't judge.

This is going to sound wrong of me, but I'm on Jon's side here. If Nicole has been his "girlfriend" since the 1990s, through his first, very brief marriage through his second marriage of a few years and through his current marriage of almost 5 years, she's known the deal. Jon marries, lives with his wife during the off season and with her halftime during the baseball season, and Nicole gets the occasional off season long weekend and most in-season road trips. Why she's decided to go public and, from what I heard, pose for Playboy just doesn't make sense. Maybe Jon tried to break up. Maybe she's crazy. Either way, it's not just Jon she's hurting.

We, Jon's teammates, know our deal in this: Keep our mouths shut. Maybe that's not what we should do in these cases (and Jon isn't the only guy we have to turn the other cheek toward who escorts a woman other than his wife to the hotel elevator). Maybe we should put a napkin over the phone and anonymously call the wife, "I saw your husband with another woman," then hang up. Maybe we should open an anonymous email account and send something to the wife. "Keep an eye on your husband." Maybe we should tell our wives, nudge nudge, wink wink, and let them do the dirty work. But who does that help? Us by removing our guilt?

I know of some marriages that were considered "open marriages." In these, both members of the couple were free to "date" others while the ballplayer was on the road. Suppose Jon had a deal with his wives: I marry you because I love you, but I see Nicole because she does something for me nobody else could ever do; only she's nuts so I won't marry her." (To avoid a lawsuit, let me state now Nicole Verdetta has never been accused by anyone of being "nuts." I'm sure she's a very nice, misunderstood lady.) If I had said something to his wife, it would just come back to me and Jon, very pissed, would explain how it was a) none of my business, and b) he has an arrangement so screw you!

It always comes back to the player. I've seen fights, been in arguments, when a wife or a player snitches on another player's off field recreation schedule. Vanessa once tattled on a former teammate and, man, I almost had my head beaten to a bloody pulp by the guy who she tattled on. I know better. Vanessa knows better. It's none of our business. It can't be.

Ms. Verdetta has come out and made these allegations. To Jon's credit, he hasn't denied anything. But think of the pressure he's under now. Reporters are on his back. His wife (and not just his first) must be pressuring him. Jon also has three kids. They can't be happy about this. Then there's the team. We've penciled Jon in for 12-14 wins this year. Will the stress of this public problem seep into his mind and ruin him? Will he freak out if he sees a teammate with a copy of Playboy in his locker or on the team plane?

From what I understand, Ms. Verdetta doesn't have a job. She says Jon's been paying her, basically, to be his "friend" for years. That means she has time to do publicity, promoting her Playboy layout and article, maybe get a reality show or a book deal. She wants something from Jon, didn't get it, and is now on the warpath. Most groupies aren't this vindictive. We don't know the whole story and maybe we never will. Like I said, it's none of our business.

But when it all goes public, I guess it becomes our business. Let's hope this story doesn't ruin Jon's business, in baseball, and he wins his games and the public relations battle that lies before him.

Explosions, Ejections & Majick

2008-04-08T06:00:00.005-04:00

I had some time today before having to make it to Brickyard Park here in Oklahoma City. So I took a cab to where the "Oklahoma City Bomber" did his thing on April 19, 1995, almost exactly 13 years ago. I saw all of the footage on TV when it happened, but since this is my first time to Oklahoma City, I wanted to see for myself what's there.

The Oklahoma City National Memorial & Museum is beautiful and terrible and heartbreaking and spectacular all at the same time. If you ever get down this way, or even if you don't, I recommend taking the tour and seeing for yourself what can happen when people go too far.

Which brings us to Monday night's game. Ninth inning, two men on, two men out and I'm pitching with a one-run lead. Then the crazy thing happened. I throw a 2-2 pitch and the batter makes contact (It was Marvin Majick, a pinch hitter). Before you know it, there are explosions. But it wasn't the war kind. It was fireworks. Somebody got a little switch happy and set off a full load of fireworks at the moment the ball met the bat. Needless to say, just about every soul in the ballpark was distracted. Our left fielder, Miguel Ramirez, would normally have caught what my dad, "Red" Scott, would call a "can of corn." Simple fly to left. The game should have been over.

But he missed the ball. You see, the sky was suddenly on fire.

Two runners scored by the time Miguel realized he'd missed the ball, the ball was in play, and he needed to throw the ball back to the infield. Well, his throw was far too late and we lost the game and I "blew" another save. Marvin Majick was a hero.

The story doesn't end there.

Our manager, Dusty Graves, went ballistic. You thought there were fireworks behind the outfield wall. You should have seen this. Dusty yelled and screamed. He pounded his fists. He got into the faces of ever umpire present. He kicked dirt. He lifted bases off the ground and threw them. It was a complete rampage.

We stood on the field, unsure if the game was over or not. Turns out it was. The umpires decided not to replay the final pitch, my final pitch; their decision made easier by Dusty's continuing craziness. Dusty was ejected, and a few of us wondered if it could be technically called an ejection since the game was already over.

When Dusty was "escorted" off the field by security, we followed him into the dugout and clubhouse. But just as I stepped into the on deck circle, one lone firework shot into the air. I turned to look. It was beautiful. I'd pitched poorly, our manager had humiliated himself, but looking at that one momentary glow in the air, I realized how unimportant this game can be sometimes. I thought for a moment of the victims of that terrible tragedy from 13 years ago in this city and promised myself I'd spread the word about the museum. Don't forget about the past. Those who died there deserve better.

Sock Puppet Night

2008-04-07T05:50:00.004-04:00

Sunday was Sock Puppet Night at Pepsi Field for my Nashville Hounds. Don't ask me who thought it up, just like don't ask me why we had a Sunday night game when we had to leave right after to get to Oklahoma City for a Monday night game. Thank God we could fly since it would have taken us 10 hours by bus. The AAA level isn't as bad as it used to be - better stadiums and clubhouses, slightly better pay (although I'm on my big league contract, so I'm fine), somewhat nicer hotels. But still, we arrived at our hotel outside of Oklahoma City a little after 4:30 AM on Monday. I can't sleep on planes. I try and try, but the pressure is too much for me. Ask me to throw a strike with 2 men on and 2 men out in the bottom of the 9th in front of 55,000 fans and I can do it without sweating. Ask me to fall asleep on an airplane at two in the morning and I suffer performance anxiety. I become more wired than a an old telephone company. Plus, the excitement from attending a Sock Puppet Night kind of carries over for a few days, don't you think?

Sock Puppet Night was sponsored by Champion, which makes tube socks. In an effort to get the city of Nashville to by more socks, I guess, Champion sponsored Secret Puppet Night for fans to come out, in the seventh inning stretch, onto the field and show off their sock puppets. Some people got pretty elaborate with their designs. The winner, a woman named Pam who turned her two hands into soft, cottony replicas of Byrne Cassa, who holds the team record for home runs in a season with 39, and Jose Tomas, who once struck out five men in one inning here (true story - happened in 1969). I thought it was a little unfair that Pan won, since in her day job she has her own business hot-gluing sparkly beads onto clothes. Sock puppets are in this woman's blood. I believe her prize was a year's supply of Champion tube socks. Lucky lady.

I did not pitch over the weekend. After throwing Thursday and Friday in my first relief back-to-back days, we decided to give me two days off. My ERA is a solid 36.00, which means I've gotten off to a slow start. Still, it's only two games for me. The team is 1 and 3. We're only 1 game out of first place, so I'm not going to lambaste myself for blowing my first save opportunity which, if I had been successful, would have put us in a three-way tie for first. If a player is suicidal 4 games into the season, he's in store for a very long year.

The pleasant surprise we had on Sunday was the arrival of Felipe Castro. He missed all of spring training because of his mother's being kidnapped and held for ransom in the jungles of Venezuela. She's still there. And Felipe's here on minor league assignment in the hopes he can use baseball as a diversion. There's nothing he can do to help his mom, he was told, so someone somewhere convinced him to come to the States and try to hit a ball really far. The plan is for him to play with us for a few games (as few as possible, the big club is 2 and 3 with little offense) to get the timing on his swing back. He pinch hit on Sunday night and struck out. His face was twisted in pain when he came back to the dugout. It was obvious that his body was in Nashville but his heart and mind are in Caracas.

Most of the guys here tried to keep their distance from Felipe. Not because they didn't like him, but they didn't know what to say. Felipe is a big star here in America and an even bigger star in Latin America. I'm sure some of the Spanish-speaking players didn't want their image of Felipe tarnished by getting to know him at this time in his life.

So, since I was in the dugout and not the bullpen, I made it my job to try to infuse Felipe with a love for sock puppets. I asked him about his childhood sock puppet collection. He just looked at me. I told him the story of Juanes, the Sock King, who used to bring all the little Latino boys and girls sock puppets if they did all of the chores for madre and padre. Did Juanes the Sock King ever pay a visit to Felipe's house? He just looked at me.

A clubhouse boy, for fifty bucks, was able to get his hands on Pam's prize winning sock puppets (literally - get it? since these are sock puppets?), brought them over to me. I slipped my calloused mitts into the Cassa and Tomas replicas (quite lifelike) and put on a sock puppet show for Felipe. No performance anxiety here. It was quite graphic, in a number of different ways. I especially liked the part where Cassa and Tomas got married in a Venezuelan oil factory.

Felipe got a kick out of my show and gave me $5. I thanked him and told him I'd give the money to Pam, who did such a good job with set design.

He sat by himself, eyes closed, on the flight to Oklahoma City. I can only hope he did so with a little bit of hope in his heart, hope that he'll be okay and his mother will be found. That's all any of us can ask for.

Rowdy Rally In Nashville

2008-04-04T06:26:00.006-04:00

I'm starting to really like my 2007 Rockwood Signature Ultra Lite 8293SS trailer(http://www.alsmotorhomes.com/show.php?id=186). It's white, 29 feet long, has two sinks in the bathroom, and in the perfect setting for me, the Pepsi Field parking lot. My commute to the stadium is about 5 minutes by foot. They say most car accidents occur within 2 miles of somebody's home. I can avoid all of that as long as I don't trip.

Our Thursday game was a bummer, since we got pounded, but the fans apparently had a great time. After the game, I showered and dressed and hung out for a few minutes talking to Mario Gutierrez, a Venezuelan who, at 26, is just about too old to get a chance to make it into the big leagues. At least that's what conventional wisdom, and he, said. I told him I was almost 40 and I was in the minors. Stop complaining. My point was to keep trying and throw conventional wisdom out the window. If you can pitch, you can pitch. Age shouldn't matter.

I left the locker room hoping I'd given him hope, although I know the baseball business. What I gave him was probably false hope.

Leaving the stadium, I saw a handful of fans who were looking at me. These weren't young kids. The most youthful was probably in his fifties. They approached me and starting giving me a Nashville Hounds history lesson. They'd been in Nashville all their lives and had followed the team, and its players, the entire time. They wanted to make sure that I understood their passion and didn't quickly turn around and sell the team to the wrong person as soon as Charlie Walker died. I told them not to worry. The plan was to hold onto it for a while. Or they could buy it on the spot for $20 million. They laughed and said Social Security doesn't pay enough.

I thought we were done, so I said goodbye and began the long 5-minute trek "home." The parking lot was full. Not with cars, but with other people who had brought their trailers. There were some like mine. There were RVs. There were station wagons with hitches and pop-up tent houses built into their trailers. There were pickup trucks with little houses in the beds. Then it hit me. This was a rally. A rally, not for the Hounds, but for me.

This was pretty cool. Somebody counted and said there were forty some-odd trailer type vehicles in the parking lots. There were about 200 people participating, everyone cooking tailgate style. There was a guy who played banjo, another the fiddle (Nashville is the country music capital of the world in case you didn't know [I didn't]). After an hour or so, they joined forces, met up with a harmonica player, and did some bluegrass standards (I'd never heard the songs, so they were new releases to me).

When I thought they'd be done, it got rowdier. People were drinking, more trailers drove in, smoke rose from grills... By 9:00, I'd be given 27 chocolate cakes. I like chocolate cake, but that's a lot for me to eat in sitting. The freezer in my Ultra Lite's kitchen is about as big as a catcher's mitt, so I had to start giving the cakes away.

I wanted to go to bed by 9:30. The party seemed to be just starting. It got a little louder, a little rowdier. It got a little younger. The mix started to turn a little sour.

At around 10:15, the first gunshot went off. By the time the police arrived 5 minutes later, about 10 shots had been fired. Whoever had the gun, or guns, was hidden well. Most people were either under their vehicles, hugging the blacktop of the parking lot, or in their trailers under the covers. It's eerie when the sounds you hear go so quickly from music and laughter to gunshots to police radios breaking through the silence.

No arrests were made, although it took the cops about 90 minutes to have every trailer, but mine, vacate the parking lot. Then they asked me for my permit to park where I was. I lied and said the team had it in their office. They told me I'd need to show it to them the next day or have to find another place to park.

By around 1AM I was in bed. To my calculations, I'd lost out on 3 1/2 hours of sleep. Not good because I had to be in the locker room this morning at 8 AM for a rehab session with the team's trainer, Russell Katz.

Woke up this morning and my head was numb; hangover numb, and I hadn't even had anything alcoholic to drink. I made it in to see Russell and thought through my haze if it was worth staying in a trailer anymore. I was getting visitors all the time, problems were arising, my sleep pattern was off. Before I knew it, it was 10:30. I'd been asleep on the trainer's table for over 2 hours. Yes, I thought, something had to be done. I had to stop this before it ruined my focus.

You could tell my focus was off when I came into the game today in the 9th, trying to protect a 2-run lead. By giving up 5 runs in my second appearance of the season, I helped us lose by three.

There was no party after the game. Just a police escort to my trailer. They'd seen the permit (it really was in the team's office) and told me it was okay to stay in the parking lot, but I needed security. It flew in late Friday night in the shape of a 300 pound African-American blues singer who can also put you through the hardest workout of your life: Andy Gambell, my former personal trainer, who would now be my personal security guard.

Don't worry. He's got his own trailer. Mine may have two sinks, but he needs four to be happy. And now I'm happy too. It's hard to be homesick when your security guard is singing the blues all night long.

Fallout On Opening Day

2008-04-03T11:32:00.003-04:00

My post yesterday caused quite a stir, just like billionaire Charlie Walker expected. What's interesting to me is how so many news outlets came to the Pepsi Field parking lot to interview me here at my trailer. Don't they know I'm not talking to them? It's kind of hard to say, "No comment" when you're not speaking, so my shoulder-shrugging probably looks pretty stupid on camera.

Even more important is Charlie was there today to throw out the first pitch. Of course, the stadium was sold out, including standing room areas, and was packed for Charlie's arrival on the field. I didn't know 13,000 fans could make so much noise. I could tell Charlie appreciated the long ovations. I've only met him twice (yesterday and today when I caught his pitch, which was a little High & Tight), but he seems like a good man who just happened to be able to turn himself into a multi-billionaire. I wish him well and pray he feels comfortable during these last few months he's got. I told him that, when we do end up selling the team, all of the proceeds will go toward pancreatic cancer research. The twinkle in his eye made me believe that had been his hope all along.

Which brings me to the Jimmy & Vanessa Scott Foundation's sudden ownership of the AAA Nashville Hounds. I received calls from my super agent Jack Perry, Howard Phillips, the head of the players' union, Elliott Pollock, the commissioner, and my mother, three of the four telling me that there are rules forbidding active National Baseball League players from owning a franchise (Mom wants to make sure the pillow she sent was firm enough. It is.). I asked them each to look further into whether or not those rules count if the franchise is a minor league one. I can tell teams of lawyers are currently going through the basic agreement now, searching for definitive ways to halt this sale. It's all in a good cause and Jack says a lawyer told him that the sale will probably go through in the end because Charlie didn't sell the team to us, it was a gift, and also he gave it to a charitable organization, not me as an individual. As long as I'll be able to prove that I'm not on the team's payroll and not active in its management structure (I already resigned as Chairman), we should be fine. The point is to use the team as an investment to raise money for charity and one day in the future (Charlie said to wait five years; he'd know) sell it to someone or some organization that will keep it in Nashville as an asset to the local community.

I'm taking a long breath. Bear with me.

Jimmy Scott continues...

All of this brings me to the reason I'm in Nashville and not visiting Atlanta with the big club: The Hounds had its opening day game today. We got clobbered 10 to 1. I pitched a scoreless 7th inning (our manager, Dusty Graves, used 8 pitchers). There was some life in my arm, which, as I mentioned the other day, had been feeling "dead." My pitches were a little flat. My breaking ball didn't really break. A couple foul balls traveled about 500 feet as a result. But, since they were foul, I'm not supposed to be worried. Right?

Dusty told me he'll get me in tomorrow's game too, which will be my first back-to-back days of game action. I'm a little surprised because I thought they'd wait another 10 days or so before trying it out, especially after my dead arm. But since I'm pretty much completely healthy (a little head cold, thus the "pretty much" line), they want to push me a little. That and I hear our closer in NY, Billy Weston, has got some soreness again in a couple of his pitching fingers. I think they'd like me up in New York sooner rather than later, just in case.

Just in case. Sounds ominous, doesn't it?

Charlie And The Baseball Factory

2008-04-02T05:48:00.006-04:00

Joan Delaney and the NY Veterans franchise do not own the Nashville Hounds. Their relationship is one of affiliation. The Vets signed a deal to have the Hounds be their AAA minor league affiliate through 2010. At that point, both parties may sign a new deal with each other or move along to greener pastures.

The owner of the Hounds is billionaire Charles Walker, CEO of 3D Corp., which manages the wealth of investors and the assets of a slew of other companies. "Charlie" is 77 years old and considered by Forbes to be the richest man in the world.

The richest man in the world knocked on the door of my trailer this morning.

It was early for most people, around 7:15 AM. I'd been playing National Baseball League 2008 on my X-Box (Some people listen to NPR first thing, or the Morning Zoo. I play X-Box.) when I heard the knock. My first inclination was to ignore it. Since I've parked this trailer in the parking lot of the Hounds' Pepsi Field, I've had an incredible number of visitors. I don't mind. Without Vanessa or the girls and with my homesickness, these visitations help keep my mind busy. I don't let anyone inside, however, just in case (plus, I'm a pig). I set up some lawn chairs and sit and talk. Nashville "folk" have good manners and seem to know when it's time to go, so stalkers have not been a problem so far. But a couple times, I'll admit, I've let the knocks go unheeded. Sometimes I just need a break. I think I'm a loner deep down too, something I don't realize until I'm alone, which hasn't been often since my injury one year ago yesterday (Yes, somebody brought over a cake to celebrate. Chocolate.). When I heard this morning's knock, I considered the early hour and my X-Box abilities. The knock came a second time and I felt it was one that should be answered.

There was Charlie. I can call him Charlie because that's what he asked me to call him. He can call me whatever he wants because he's a billionaire and, quite frankly, those people can do whatever they want. He called me Jimmy.

The door of my trailer faces Pepsi Field. I like that view better than of the parking lot, which is just a big slab of blacktop. Charlie and I sat in two lawn chairs and began to chat. He was drinking a cup of Dunkin' Donuts coffee. I declined his offer since I don't drink coffee and try to watch my caffeine intake (besides four small pieces of that chocolate cake yesterday). We looked out at the $128 million stadium he'd had built two years before.

Charlie - You like it?
Me - Yes.
Charlie - You want it?
Me - To have?
Charlie - I'm selling all of my worldly possessions.

This was immediately strange. Charlie looked like a 77 year old businessman, dressed in a very nice, but not overpriced, dark blue suit and red tie with swirly baseballs on it. His shoes were very shiny and looked overpriced, but I don't know shoes well and didn't think asking would be appropriate. His hair, what's left of it, was gray and combed; his teeth close to white. No, he didn't seem crazy and he didn't appear to be a Maharishi dressed for a costume party.

Me - Why are you selling everything? And what makes you think I can afford this baseball stadium?
Charlie - I've got pancreatic cancer. They gave me between two and six months to live. I don't want to die owning anything except the clothes on my back.

I was immediately shaken up. He looked as healthy as one can look who's 77 with only a little bit of gray hair. And I hadn't heard about his cancer. He told me only a handful of people knew. And he said he knew the world would find out after he came to me.

Charlie - You're getting a scoop.
Me - I'm not really happy about it.
Charlie - Neither am I.

He knew I was only going to be on his Hounds for a month at the most. I'm the most well known "Hound" he'd ever had play for him. Because he's owned the team for 40 years (The Vets have been an affiliate for two), he thought this last month would be the most special of his tenure with the club.

Charlie - The Hounds were my first big investment.
Me - What did you pay?
Charlie - $16,000. They're worth about $16 million today.
Me - I'm no math major, but you've at least doubled your investment.
Charlie - I think I've tripled it.

I laughed. Imagine the richest man in the world sitting on one of your lawn chairs, sipping coffee and shooting the breeze with you, unannounced, at 25 minutes after 7 in the morning. It was pretty cool.

He told me he has trusts and investments and properties worth something like $62 billion. "It fluctuates from time to time," he said. My next question was based upon me, since in my world, everything must revolve around me.

Me - Why are you giving me this scoop?
Charlie - I'm giving you my team.
Me - (jaw dropping open, thousands of thoughts running through my head, most cancelling each other out except the small craving for chocolate cake)
Charlie - I'm giving it to your charity. You can sell it or run it. It's up to you.
Me - (physically pushing my jaw closed and swallowing)
Charlie - How much money have you and your wife raised in your career?
Me - (after some stammering) Around $21 million.
Charlie - Where does it go?
Me - A handful of places, but mostly for cancer, autism and Alzheimer's research. We started allocating proceeds to Lyme disease research two years ago after Vanessa got it.
Charlie - What's the biggest single donation you've ever received?
Me - Adidas gave us $1 million after we won the Series in 2000.
Charlie - I'm going to at least triple it.

I'm no math whiz, but giving the Jimmy & Vanessa Scott Foundation a minor league baseball team worth at least $16 million is practically quadrupling the biggest donation we'd ever received.

Me - What do we do with it?
Charlie - Keep it. That's my recommendation. Just you playing here for a month has increased the value of it by about a million dollars. It's a brand new stadium. You've got some good people running the organization. Keep it for five years and I can almost guarantee you'll sell it for $35 million.
Me - Pretty cool.
Charlie - I know.
Me - What happens now? Do we get into your glass elevator and fly into the sky. "Look Grandpa, I can see my trailer!"

Charlie Walker has one of the greatest laughs I'll ever remember. Even knowing he's going to be dead before the summer ends, before his Hounds complete their season, he still laughed loud and strong.

He stood up, finished his coffee and handed me a folder full of papers. "This is the key to the car," he said metaphorically. I suggested he mail them to Vanessa. Knowing me, I'd spill chocolate cake crumbs all over them. Then we shook hands. "It's your team now, Jimmy." He looked at me, a deep, longing type of look. I could sense, just for that moment, a bit of remorse. Not because he didn't like me or was unhappy with his actions - I could tell he'd planned this out and thought this through completely - but because he wished he had his youth again. He wished he could have a catch with his dad again. He wished he could hold his sons one more time (they died together in a plane crash in the 1970s). He wished it all wasn't going to end in two to five months.

Then it hit me. Tomorrow's opening day.

Me - Charlie. It's my team? I own it?
Charlie - Your foundation owns it, but you're listed as Chairman, which means you run it.
Me - Then I can make decisions for it.
Charlie - Certainly.
Me - I want you to throw out the first pitch.

He smiled. I know he's not a sentimental guy; could tell just by sitting with him for twenty minutes. You don't become a billionaire 62 times over by crying every time you make a deal. He nodded and got into his limo. "Sure thing, Jimmy." And then they drove away.

Tomorrow's opening day for my Nashville Hounds. Charlie Walker is throwing out the first pitch. I'll catch it. This will be Charlie's last pitch. I'm happy to say I met the man. He's made me feel like a better one.

Opening Day Evening

2008-04-01T05:48:00.004-04:00

So the home club opened up with a victory yesterday against the Florida Keys. Good pitching by Kai Goto, going 6 innings and only giving up those 2 runs. The bullpen got nicked up a bit, but a 5 to 4 victory is still a victory.

I didn't see the game live, obviously, since I'm in Nashville. I didn't see it on TV as it happened either. You see, I was busy entertaining. Word got out pretty quickly that I'm living in a trailer in the Pepsi Field parking lot. Before you know it, about 35 Nashville Hounds fans were in the parking lot with me, hoping we could have one giant (for an off day) tailgate. So that's what we did.

The people here in Nashville, from the small sample I met yesterday, are great. Not one person made fun of my crying due to homesickness. One woman said she'd knit a quilt for me. Another guy said he'd get some pals to serve as my personal security detail. He had a shotgun hanging on the inside of his pickup, so I nodded and tried to move away politely. My trailer is waterproof. It's not bulletproof. My mistake.

By the time the game in Florida was over, the tailgate was just starting to wind down. It grew over the hours to become sort of a rally for the Hounds' upcoming season. A news truck was there (I did not do an interview but they did get me on camera eating a very messy White Castle cheeseburger). Somehow, I found myself near the end on the roof of my Rockwood Signature Ultralite, screaming about how the Hounds are going "all the way" and "won't take prisoners" and how the season would be a "dogfight" (since we're Hounds) and other phrases that would require quotations if I listed them as well. Bottom line: The Hounds are going to sell some tickets this April. They'll hopefully have a winning year and give this town something to write home about! (Yes, this is their home. I know that.)

Around 8:15 I "retired" into my Ultralite. A handful of fans remained in the parking lot for another hour or two, but I was replaying the game on NBL.com. I have a 17" computer screen so I got a good view of how we won. Billy Weston looked good closing it out. I don't think we'll need to worry about his fingers. I think he's been soaking them in pickle brine to solve the blistering. Very old school, but whatever works...

Tuesday is workout day here with my Nashville Hounds squad. I haven't thrown since last Thursday, but that's on purpose. Near the end of spring training I was getting a dead arm. No real pain. Just a lifelessness. Hard to explain. It's like when you wake up from a dream and you can't get your eyes to open. My arm just couldn't overcome a certain sluggishness. So I took four days (got a doctor's note) off from baseball activity. I have been able to run and I found a local YMCA where I can swim. I'll probably do so this afternoon. The last thing I want is to lose all of the muscle and flexibility I've built up over the last four months of intense workouts.

My team-paid personal trainer, Andy, called yesterday to give me a verbal pump-up. He's not here with me because the team doesn't want to pay him during the season. I guess that's why. My contract is kind of vague as to whether or not they'd pay for him all year to work out with me. For that, I blame my super agent, Jack Perry, who I've invited to a slumber party in my trailer home. So far, he's respectfully declined. I'll let you know if he makes it down here. We can have another party. I'm sure he'll pay for the beer.

Detours

2008-03-31T06:15:00.003-04:00

Just like I'm taking a detour between injury and playing again for the big boys in New York by going to Nashville, I took a detour over the weekend between Florida and Nashville by going home to New Jersey. The plan had been for me to fly straight to Nashville, but plans change. I flew home with Vanessa and the girls on Friday and spent three nights back in my own bed. I don't expect to be home again until May.

I got to Nashville Monday afternoon and checked in with the club at their new stadium (Pepsi Field). Very nice place, much nicer than I ever played in when I was a minor leaguer. Then again, I'm a minor leaguer now (again) so I guess I'll get my chance now.

It was hard to get here from the airport because of road construction. It should normally be a straight shot of about 20 minutes, but it took about an hour. I drove myself (I'm renting a big Ford pickup truck, more on that later) and, because of the load I was pulling (more on that later), I had some problems getting up to speed. But I got here in one piece in time to sign in and check out my locker, which is considerably smaller than I'm used to. I was going to cry, but realized it's only a locker. I held back.

Seriously, I was going to cry. Getting here, I realized I haven't been this homesick since summer camp when I was 10 years old. Sometimes, you don't know how badly you don't want to be somewhere until you get there. I've been trying to put the best spin possible on playing a month in Nashville, and outwardly I seem well adjusted. On the inside, I'm a mess. That's why I went home instead of coming straight here. I was putting off the inevitable as long as possible.

But, I'm still a big boy. I have to suck it up. I would have made a horrible soldier, which makes me respect our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan that much more. I'd probably cry every day over there. Not because of fear. Because I'd miss my wife and darling teenage daughters (who were out when I left NJ so never said goodbye to me). Funny to hear this from a guy who routinely spends 50% of the time away from his family during the 6-month baseball season. Maybe I'm just getting old; either that or soft in my old age. (I turn 40 in less than 2 weeks.)

My living arrangements are set. No hotel. No basement of somebody's house. No rented home. Well, actually, I am renting a home, but it's not a house with a foundation. It's a mobile home. Specifically, it's a 2007 Rockwood Signature Ultra Lite 8293SS (http://www.alsmotorhomes.com/show.php?id=186). It's white, 29 feet long, and has two sinks in the bathroom. Because I'm rich, I arranged to have it and a new black Ford F-150 (http://www.fordvehicles.com/trucks/f150/) waiting for me at the airport. After a five minute lesson on how to drive the Ford and pull the Rockwood, I was off. I parked in a perfect spot: the parking lot of Pepsi Field.

I had someone install cable TV and wifi in the trailer. One of the clubhouse boys (they're actually boys for this team - like 16/17 years old vs. early to mid-twenties for NY) did my food shopping at a Whole Foods. He liked his $50 tip. (Vanessa told me not to overtip as a means of overcompensating for my homesickness. Don't tell her I gave the guy at the airport who gave me the driving tutorial $100.)

Our season starts here on Thursday against New Orleans. I've been anointed the temporary closer for the Nashville squad, and with continued finger pain for Billy Weston in NY, been also told to get my mind around possibly closing games for the Vets when I get called up. And to think I thought I'd be in their starting rotation today for their opening day in Florida. Instead, I take a strange way (to me) back to NY by coming here and pitching out of the bullpen, closing games.

My GM, Alvin Kirby, told me I could spend the opening series with the Veterans in Miami if I wanted and get here in time to be ready for Thursday's game, but I found myself surprisingly decline the offer. I needed to get to Nashville eventually. I need to sleep in this new bed. I need to get used to being here so I can throw a baseball like I need to do. (I've cried three times since starting this post. I'm like an old lady.) I need to get my head in shape, because I've realized it's a ways behind my body.

You can watch my games on the web if you want by purchasing a monthly subscription for $6.95. I know the team, and the league, is hoping to "move" a few thousand extra subscriptions because I'll be down here. I wish I could get a piece of that $6.95. I just tipped the cable guy $75 and hugged him for a little longer than he probably liked. If I don't run out of money before the season starts, I'll probably get arrested for not letting go of a hotdog vendor.

In Stitches

2008-03-28T06:38:00.003-04:00

It took 11 stitches to close the injury to my forehead. The doctor performing the procedure told me it looked like the cut was either caused by glass or scissors - very clean but kind of deep. He led me to believe my cut was worse than I had believed, if you can believe that. Vanessa took me home and I couldn't sleep. Horrible night of pain, headache, nightmares...

Meanwhile, I understand the team put Corey Belle on the restricted list first thing this morning. He can't come anywhere near the team and will not be paid. I'm sure he's going to get cut, but my kind of cut will still be worse than his. He'll easily get picked up by another team. I'll have this scar for the rest of my life.

Alvin suffered a broken nose. He was in the complex today with a big white splint-type thing on his face. His eyes were starting to get blackened. He didn't talk to reporters or, as a matter of fact, any of us. He's had a tough go this spring, with the sexual assault charges, the hearing that's scheduled to take place in a few weeks, the public ending of his marriage, and now the Corey Belle fiasco. I hope for his sake it doesn't get any worse.

As for Rick, he was here at 7AM this morning, arm in a sling. He's got a dislocated shoulder and a bunch of cuts and abrasions. Nothing terribly bad, but still, who expected one of his own players to attack him like that?

A few others - Lyman Gaye, Willie Cordero - came in today with cuts, black eyes, etc. Nobody had to take the day off. But this Corey Belle thing was a major distraction. First, he's probably going to hit 40 home runs this year for somebody, we're pretty sure not us now. And when something of this magnitude happens to a team, it's takes a little while to get over it. Getting into a fight is a traumatic event for someone. A freakin' all-out brawl offers ten times the trauma. That it happened twice... well, multiply the second number by a whole lot more.

We're still unsure if Rick or Alvin are going to press charges. The police were here today and questioned everyone. I told them I wasn't going to be responsible for sending a teammate to jail. He does need some pretty serious anger management classes, however. I mentioned to the cops that I was going to officially give Corey the silent treatment "for some time." They didn't know what to make of that, so they moved on. You could kind of tell these guys thought it was pretty cool to be talking to all of us on the team. They were very professional, but you could still sense they were a little in awe.

I didn't do any drills or working out today. My head still hurt and I had no energy. I hung around and chatted and ate a bit. The team breaks camp after a final game tomorrow. The timing is good. We're ready to get out of here.

Vanessa, Alyssa & Grace fly home today. The girls can't wait to go back to their "own" school. Vanessa's looking forward to sleeping in our own bed again too. Her only trepidation is Connie, the stalking neighbor, who keeps calling Vanessa's cell. Vanessa's probably going to get another one. She'll have two and be like some of the guys here who have one cell for their wives and the other for their girlfriends. Only Vanessa will have one for Connie and the other for the rest of the world.

I take off for Nashville on Sunday. My living arrangements are just about set, but I don't want to reveal them until I'm confident that I'll actually do it. My first game with our AAA squad will take place on Thursday. I haven't pitched in the minor leagues since 1988. Can't say I've missed it, but I'll try to make the best of it. That's all we can do when we have no control. I only hope Corey Belle turns his situation into something positive as well.

A Farewell To Arms

2008-03-27T05:35:00.004-04:00

It's been a somewhat tumultuous spring training for me personally, but until the Corey Belle/Lyman Gaye incident the other day, the rest of the team has been fairly sedate. That the Belle/Gaye incident is all anyone will remember from this spring is good in that we didn't have any major injuries (even Lyman escaped his car accident in one piece) and had a winning record (we're 18 and 10 with 3 games left). It's bad because, well, that means everybody's going to remember the day Corey Belle and Lyman Gaye, teammates, got into a fight.

As you all know by now, the fight escalated a bit yesterday. (I say "a bit" sarcastically.)

At this point in spring training, doing drills is a thing of the past. Players are still working on some things, but mostly we're all about starting the season. We've been down here since Valentine's Day and it's time to go home. At least that's what I think. Only I'm not going home, I'm going to Nashville to start my season. My arm strength is improving and I'm hoping to spend only a couple of weeks there instead of a month. I think Rick and Alvin are set on the latter, but I'm going to try to convince them otherwise.

Which leads me to yesterday's simulated game. Wait, before that... Before yesterday even started, the team announced a 10-game suspension for Corey Belle to start the season. Personally, I was hoping for about three times that, just to make a point, because 10 games will be reduced to 4 or 5 after Corey appeals. But it's still something, and I credit manager Rick Churches and GM Alvin Kirby with willing to risk losing our best hitter for the first two weeks of the season.

Turns out they were risking a little bit more.

Back to the fake - sorry - simulated game. I didn't want to travel 2 hours by bus to Daytona to play the Commons, so I found myself on a back field with Willie Cordero, Diego Munoz, Steve Pond and a handful of minor leaguers, pitchers who were about to be sent to their own camp. We were going to get some work in and face mostly minor leaguers. Lyman Gaye was part of the offensive squad so he could get 8 to 10 ABs and work on his timing.

Rick didn't make the trip to Daytona either. He wanted to get a good look at Willie and me and a couple of other guys coming off injury and trying to make an impact as soon as possible. Alvin, as always, was floating around the complex too.

I guess it was the fifth inning. I was on the mound and Lyman was at the plate. Funny to me, since Lyman was the guy at the plate last April when I blew out my elbow. That made this a good test for me. Could I overcome my demons? Could I overcome my recent past? Would I have a bad, superstitious feeling and be unable to perform?

The questions have yet to be answered.

I toed the rubber and looked down at Lyman as he dug into the box. The ball was hidden in my glove and I began my motion. But then something caught my eye and ears. It was Corey Belle, in streetclothes (not fatigues like a few places reported), jawing away. Apparently, he'd gotten the memo about his suspension and wanted to speak about it. He was yelling, "The Belle tolls, mother******! The Belle tolls, mother******!" I was sort of a Hemingway buff in college and pleasantly (under the circumstances) surprised at Corey's literary reference. (Later I was told he'd heard it from a rap song by Lil' J. I have a call into Lil' J's reps for comment.)

Normally, a pitcher can work through this kind of distraction. I've pitched while 50,000 fans (not mine) have booed me. I've pitched while drunken fans brawl in the loge level. I've pitched while The Kissing Thief has run onto the field to make out with a good looking shortstop. But simulated games are different. No matter how hard anyone tries to make them appear real, they're not. So I didn't have my regular intensity. I didn't have the focus I usually have on the mound. That's why, when Corey came barrelling onto the sidelines, I stopped and didn't throw my pitch to Lyman. Instead, I watched.

Corey went straight for Rick. "You ballheaded me, man! You turned it off!" Rick, who had been sitting in a foldout chair in front of the dugout, stood up, not in any threatening manner, just like one would stand when guests came over for brie and crackers. Corey didn't stop. He walked right into Rick. Rick told him to back away. Corey said nothing (finally) and attacked. He threw a punch at Rick's face, made contact, and followed up by starting to strangle (not choke) him. Rick was down on his knees in less than a second (remember these are two very big men, one who hit 40+ HRs last year and one who did 15 years ago).

Corey was now involved in his second fight in three days with a member of his team. The worst part about this one is he was beating up, and apparently trying to kill, his boss. Not a smart move.

By now, Lyman had joined the two-man fray. He made a running tackle of Corey, who didn't release Rick from his grip. The three men rolled. I started to hear the sound of staggered, struggling breathing. Sweat and spit were shooting into the air. A little red, the red of blood, was joining the colors of the men as they battled.

The pile grew. Everyone was trying to get at Corey, who was determined - it seemed - to either kill or send a very pointed message to his field manager.

I had not become involved in the melee. While I've been in my share of on field fights (usually involving some hard playground-type shoving and calling one another's mother nasty names), I've never been in one while rehabbing from an injury. I won't say that wasn't on my mind. I've seen guys get injured during fights and I've seen guys get re-injured during fights. While my first reaction was to join in, my other, somehow mature reaction was to hold off.

To my credit, Willie Cordero, coming off shoulder surgery, was trying to stay out of it as well. I could see him through the bodies, sitting in his chair in the dugout, watching the action like it was the WWE. Steel cage match.

Complex security made it to the scene rather quickly. Two guys in shorts, polo shirts and sunglasses (that's Florida spring training security for ya) jumped in, soon joined by another couple of guys. They succeeded in pulling people away and holding onto Corey (while on the ground).

Rick was up now. So was Lyman. Our on duty trainer was looking at Rick's neck, which was bleeding, and his upper lip, which was bleeding. His uniform was torn and muddy (we had rain last night). Lyman took a knee so he could catch his breath. From where I stood, still on the mound, he was unharmed.

Corey was escorted away after a couple of minutes. Still upset, still yelling stuff, it felt safe to say we weren't going to see Corey again for a long time.

The game was called before I got to throw my pitch. Rick needed some medical attention and everyone else had had their workout. So we retired to the clubhouse, which is a five-minute stroll away.

We were a pretty quiet bunch, even the minor leaguers who must have been in total awe about what they'd just seen. Rick was taken to the training room in the clubhouse and most of us either hit the showers or sat in front of our lockers feeling kind of weird. That was no baseball fight. That was assault and battery and, to most of us, attempted murder. This was the kind of thing that guys get arrested for; that guys go to jail for. There were 20+ witnesses. Corey didn't have a chance.

I showered and just stood under the water. I hadn't lifted one finger for the day (besides my personal morning workout, which doesn't count here) and was exhausted. The hissing of multiple shower heads in action, the heat of the water on my semi-balding skull, it was just what I needed. It was like yoga. Relaxing.

"MOTHERFU****!"

I knew the voice. My stupor was jolted back into the real world. My reaction was to run, not away, but toward the voice. Three or four other guys, also showering, did the same thing. (In retrospect, it must have looked kind of funny to see four wet, grown (one with a good lather on his head) athletic men slipping and sliding around the locker room naked.) We had to find Corey before he found Rick. This was bad.

It got worse.

By the time we got into the training room, Corey was already there. He was in Alvin's face though, not Rick's. Before we could get in between them, Corey attacked. He shoved his forearm into Alvin's face (broke his nose) and pushed him into a cabinet, which shook. You could hear the stuff inside falling about, some glass breaking, some metal objects clanging together.

I was the first one on Corey this time. I grabbed his jaw and pulled upward. Some other guys went for his midsection. We all fell together onto the cold tile floor, Alvin included. I was now at the bottom of the pile. My grip was gone and I was at this point trying to protect what a jock strap was invented for (never fight in the nude, you're not as effective as if you'd been wearing, oh, let's say a suit of armor). Bodies shifted violently. Voices roared. I felt like I was in the middle of the kitchen while a tornado was striking the house. Scared the hell out of me.

And then, suddenly, all of the bodies were off. I layed (or lied?) on the tile, hands covering "down there," legs trying to remember the fetal position I recall I liked so much in my mother's womb. Somebody threw a towel onto me. The action had moved into the locker room, only it was just voices now, Corey's voice and Alvin's voice and Rick's voice and a number of other ones, all yelling insults, screaming some terrible things. The noise moved further away from me and I got up.

The trainer's room was a complete shambles. I had to watch my step as I left. Medical supplies were everywhere. A table was on its side. Chairs were upended.

In the locker room, I could tell things had improved. Corey was definitely gone now, literally and figuratively. His voice carried away quickly and was finally muted for good. Really for good this time.

I wiped the sweat off my brow with the towel and went to my locker and put on some underwear. "You got sometheen on your head, man" Willie Cordero said. He was walking by, a pretty large welt growing under his eye.

I wiped some more sweat and looked for a mirror. Then I saw The Cut. "Oh boy," I said, but not in those words. It wasn't a Cut. It was a Wound. The kind you need to go to the hospital for. Actually it was a Gash (not a Wound) on my forehead. I wasn't sweating, I was bleeding. I looked at the towel in my hand, I guess for the first time. It was stained red with blood. My blood.

I returned to the trainer's room, now being repaired by two clubhouse boys (each in their early-twenties), and found some gauze. I slapped it on my forehead, went to my locker, threw on some clothes, and drove home. I had had enough. I was tired. And I wanted some extra special attention. Vanessa would give it to me. She'd ask what happened and drive me to the doctor and hold my hand and tell me how brave I was. And I'd hold her hand back and be glad that she felt that way about me. Then I'd go home with her and sleep. I wanted to get Corey Belle out of my head once and for all. The Belle tolled today. It tolled for him.

You Gotta Have Faith

2008-03-26T06:00:00.005-04:00

I mentioned yesterday how our first baseman, Cal Franklin, was a very religious man (and very big too). Every ballclub I've played for has had its contingent of "faithful" players who get together on planes or buses or hotel room suites and discuss the bible. There are other players who aren't as religious as that who still go to church on Sundays. And there are those few who somehow can't speak a full sentence without bringing up the Father, Son & Holy Ghost. Cal is one of these guys.

He wasn't yesterday.

I find it interesting - no facetiousness intended here - that a man as religious as Cal could still harbor such an intense violent streak. No, he hasn't killed anyone. But the power he found yesterday when it came to subduing Corey Belle (once J.D. Bryant ripped Corey off of Lyman Gaye's esophagus) was the spontaneous kind; the kind someone finds within one's self when it counts.

I brought this up to Cal. My question, I guess, was did this ability to be a part of violence mean he wasn't as close to God as he thought?

The first thing Cal did was smile and tell me - not ask - that he knew I was asking to write about it. While true, I was also truly curious. I'm not a God-fearin' fella (pretend I said that with a cowboy accent) and only attend church (I'm an ordained Methodist person) three or four times a year. The faith Cal gets from God I either don't have or get from another source, i.e. my family.

"Think of our game," Cal said. "It's not a game for the passive. While not football, baseball still is full of violence; a violence I fully participate in." He was sitting at his locker, peeling the skin off of an orange. I pretended not to react when little flying drops of citrus struck me in my cornea. "I hit 34 home runs last year," Cal continued. "That's 34 incredible, short bursts of violence. I play first base, right? How many times do you guys throw the ball over to me in a game and I have to slap a tag on the runner? How man times have I collided with a catcher at home plate? Or a second baseman or right fielder or fans in the stands racing after fly balls?"

He looked at me. He does that. I had the feeling he wanted me to literally guess the number of times, even though he really didn't. But he just looks back at you sometimes after speaking and you expect more. But he's done talking, so it's awkward.

"Two thousand fourteen," I finally said.

"Huh?" He shoved a piece of orange in his mouth.

"Nothing. Go on."

"So when I bear hugged Belle Tower yesterday (one of Corey's nicknames) and wrestled him to the ground, I was playing first base. I was a ballplayer. Some guys say you can't separate God out of a man, but I add that you can't ever take a ballplayer off the field."

I nodded. He sounded like he had a good feel for this stuff. I asked him how and he told me he's been thinking a lot about this subject lately. He's about to work on a book that follows him and the presence of Jesus as they play through the season. "Kind of like what you're doing there on the web, but mine isn't in real time." I asked him if he was writing the book himself and he said no. He's about to decide between two beat writers who cover the team all year. He wouldn't tell me who. I asked him if they have to worry about conflict of interest, as they need to cover the team from an objective perspective yet if they're working for him, how can they, who is on the Cal Franklin payroll, criticize him in their columns as the season progresses?

Cal shoved half of the orange in his throat. He drooled a bit. (It was a big orange.) "There's no conflict when you go with the Lord," Cal said.

Yeah, but will his beat writer "employee" be going with the Lord or earning a few extra bucks?

Cal shrugged as if to say it wasn't his problem, nor was it His problem. "Faith," he said. "Live it, learn from it, let it justify who you are."

A clubhouse boy (this one 24) came buy and swept up the orange peels and chewed up (but unswallowed) pieces of orange on the floor in front of Cal's locker. I could tell Cal would spend all day talking to me, but I needed to go out and long toss. Since coming down to Florida, I haven't experienced any pain in my elbow. It seems to be coming along perfectly. I nodded to Cal and started walking away.

"Hey," he said. "How do you know your elbow won't blow out in ten minutes when you start doing the exact thing that blew it out in the first place?"

I told him hard work.

"That's where you and I diverge," he said. "You credit your work ethic. I credit it to faith. You've got it. You just label it in a different way."

Faith. Maybe. Work ethic. Maybe. As long as I'm healthy, I'll take anything I can get.

Say Cheese

2008-03-25T05:58:00.003-04:00

Today was team picture day. By now, you've heard some of what happened. I'll fill you in on the details as I know them and try to fight my natural urge to edit.

Once upon a time...

There lived a baseball player named Corey Belle. Corey was what they call a five-tool player coming out of high school. He could hit for average, hit for power, run like the wind, throw a bullet from left field to the catcher on the fly, and catch anything that drifted his way. Yes, Corey was "the future of baseball," as his high school coach in whatever town in Kentucky Corey came from said.

But there was a dark side too. On a baseball field, Corey could do anything, wish anything, and it would happen. Off the field, well, the opposite. Trouble found him more often than not, starting with sexual assault charges filed against him his senior year of high school (charges subsequently dropped). While in the minors, he routinely broke curfews, got into two bar fights, one "brawl" (not sure the difference between a fight and a brawl, unless we're talking the number of contestants competing to pulverize one another), and was arrested three times. Again, no indictments. He played great baseball through this, and at the age of 20 was in the big leagues.

Fast forward to eight years later, January 22, 2008. Corey is in Kansas City with some good friends. The parking lot of an after-hours club they're at becomes the scene of gunshots and mayhem. A woman running away gets hit by a car. She lives but suffers a number of broken bones, including her back. Prognosis is not good that she'll ever walk again.

Corey's car is stopped by police and a recently fired gun is discovered inside on the floor. Corey and his friends are arrested and charged with three or four different illegalities. This is Corey's third arrest in two years.

Fast forward again to yesterday. Team picture day. Corey is late, but makes it just in time. Lots of folks (meaning guys on the team) are pi*sed off at him. It's not his first tardy appearance at spring training. But, he hit .321 last year with 41 home runs and 129 RBIs. He's allowed (doesn't mean I agree with it).

I'm standing in the second row, next to Lyman Gaye. Lyman, as we know, is coming off a bad car crash last week, a crash caused by his fiance allegedly beating the hell out of him while she drove. Some temper. Two days in a hospital, another couple to recover at his bungalow, and now Lyman's back trying to get ready for opening day next Monday. The last thing he wants is another distraction.

He gets one. It's called Corey Belle.

"Hey, Mr. Photographer Man, how's 'bout you snap some close-ups of Lyman's purse wounds." Laugh laugh. Ha ha. Corey, even though late, thinks he's funny.

A couple guys snicker lightly, but not hard. Lyman, traded to us in December from, coincidentally, Kansas City, is still trying to find his feet with his new team. He seems like a good guy who's another soul misunderstood by every GM he's ever played for. He's usually good for 20-25 home runs, 90+ RBIs, 20 stolen bases and solid defense in right field, so I'm not sure yet why he keeps getting traded. Maybe it's his choice in women.

Lyman doesn't react to Corey's line. I try to use my peripheral vision in as clandestine a fashion as possible. Lyman appears to be looking straight ahead.

Guys like Corey, in my experience, don't like a non-reaction. They offer stimulus and expect it in return. For example, break the law/get arrested.

Moving on.

The camera man starts snapping away.

"Hey, Mr. Photographer Man, did you catch Lyman's dress?" It's Corey again, speaking out from his perch in the back row.

This time, Lyman flinches. But he keeps his cool. He's trying to at least. I whisper something supportive, like "Corey's a *************, isn't he?" No reaction. That's fine. He probably didn't hear me. The anger was probably too close to boil-over stage.

Very close.

We're almost done. "Photographer Man" takes a few more shots, tells us, jokingly, to say cheese.

Corey: "You say want Lyman to get down on his knees?"

That's it. In less than half a heartbeat, Lyman is no longer standing next to me. He's barrelling through teammates, knocking them over the chairs they're standing on, trying to get to Corey. And then Lyman's got his hands around Corey's throat, Corey's throwing punches and making contact with not just Lyman, but the other guys trying to break it up. Photographer Man is snapping pictures as fast as he can, along with some beat reporters who are hanging around. One of them is holding up his phone, taking video of the event.

Gums Murphy, our 80 year old coach emeritus, is in the pile by now, trying to break it up. Corey's elbow knocks Gums in the forehead. He's down. It takes J.D. Bryant, all 257 pounds of him (that's how he can play both baseball and football), to literally rip Corey off of Lyman. Cal Franklin, normally a religious man (a very large one), holds Corey back and begins to rip into him like it's nobody's business. Corey says something. Before you know it, he and Cal are rolling around on the ground, chairs falling on top of them, punches being thrown, spit flying through the air.

One kick ends it. Our field manager, the one whose job is to keep sh*t like this from ever happening, who claims he would've been a star punter for 13 to 14 teams over 20 years in the NFL if he hadn't chosen baseball as his profession, lays one furious, passionate, perfectly timed kick right on Corey's head. BOOM! Corey's done for the day. Eyes closed. Unconscious but breathing harder than a dog after a two-mile run.

Cal gets off and continues to berate the knocked out Corey with words I've never heard a religious man (a very large one) use. He kicks a chair and walks away, trying to cool off.

I look around at the damage. You'd have thought a tornado had just cut a swath in our little picture taking area. Chairs are on their sides. Shoes have been separated from feet. Torn clothing lays about (or is it lies?).

A couple of golf carts are on the scene by now. Two trainers and a stray minor leaguer or two help lift a woozy Corey Belle off of the ground. He's looking at us, looking at Rick. But he's not angry anymore. He's sorry. A little late, but he knows he made a mistake. He is sat down into the cart and it drives away.

Lyman, for his part, is sitting on a chair and joking around (better than choking around). He's got a cut above his eye that's been reopened (origin: his angry, pulverizing fiance) and a new one on his cheek. He's also got little scrapes and cuts on his neck. He talks about Corey's need for a manicure. The guy can afford it, that's for sure.

Rick pulls a chair over and starts to talk to Lyman. And, like kids, we all gather 'round and listen. Even Cal is back, sitting on the grass. Rick tells us about a fight he got into in '87 with Jose Varmes. Jose broke two fingers and three knuckles and missed three months of the season. Rick won that fight the same way he stopped this one: A perfectly placed kick to a spot no man enjoys, even if he's wearing protective plastic.

If Lyman wanted to be our teammate, to get to know us, today was his initiation. He's got a lot of fans on this team now. Like I said, he's a good guy. When we look back in October, maybe this will be the moment that changed everything for him. Maybe this was the moment he came to feel like one of us.

As for Rick, he did a good job today. He ended a fight, and he ended it in a way that showed who's boss. At the same time, he took down the school bully. Good for him.

Corey, well, he was driven the the hospital for tests. The thought is he probably has a concussion and will miss at least a few days. Chances are good the guy will be suspended by the team for a while. This is Rick's chance to really show who's boss. Suspend the guy for 30 games or something, make a statement. It'll show how Rick doesn't care as much about Corey's 40+ home runs as he cares about keeping the team together. Rick ended the fight, but has a chance to now make the deciding blow.

This is Rick's first big time opportunity as a manager to make the team his own. You know what? I'm rooting for him.

Let's hope we all live happily ever after.

The State of Things

2008-03-24T06:11:00.004-04:00

One week to opening day. Kind of exciting if you're me, very exciting if you're a fan. You, as a fan, should be excited because the team looks like it could possibly be the best team we've put on a field since 2000, coincidentally the last time we won a World Championship Series. Only a few questions marks:

1. Lyman Gaye's health - His auto accident last week was more scary than painful. If you think it looked rough on TV, double that if you were there. Strange how my family and I drove past his up-ended car last week on our way to Disney World and had no idea he was inside. He was back with the team over the weekend, but still stiff and sore. The coaching staff is looking at trying to get him into 1 or 2 spring training games by the end of the week. His fiance, who was driving the car, will not be around. Lyman filed a restraining order against her on Friday. Apparently, she was the cause of his injuries, not the accident.

2. Felipe Castro's presence - His mother is still in captivity somewhere in Venezuela. He has not reported to camp, but is expected this week. Rumors are flying around as to his physical shape. When I spoke with him in February, he admitted he wasn't close to being game-ready. I guess we'll know in the coming days.

3. Jimmy Scott's elbow - This is my elbow. Feels good. I still haven't pitched two days in a row. Everyone keeps telling me the bullpen, where I will work from this year, is the perfect place for me at this point in my career. I'll be in more games, be more active with the team... My head isn't there yet, however, which leads me to...

Me. If you're me and the new season is coming, here are some updates:

1. My lawsuit - Team psychologist, Dr. Henry Cohegans, and I settled his lawsuit very quietly last week. As he likes, the terms are under a confidentiality agreement. He also will no longer work with me. So I'm looking for another head-shrinker to help me fine-tune the rough edges of my psyche.

2. My Media Status - I've held pretty firm to my pledge not to speak on the record with the media. A few of my off-the-record comments have been printed, and attributed to me, which makes me pretty upset. I will say that the beat reporters around here have been very professional. These guys work their tails off and are, in nearly every case, people I can trust. Still, a few have tried to "do me in," as a teammate said to me a ways back. When I broke the story of Felipe being named captain and then was told I was off my rocker (meaning the story was untrue), I really had it out with the source who gave me the misinformation. As a result, I learned my lesson. I'm out of the scoop business. Unless I know it's true.

3. Connie - She finally - FINALLY - flew home on Saturday. There were a few days we thought she'd latch onto another family down here, but that was all wishful thinking. She was back to her parasitic ways by last Wednesday and Vanessa had to gently (over three days) negotiate with the woman to leave us along and fly back home. Tough situation. You want the woman out of your life, but she is your neighbor and she is a little off-center. In the movies, she'd come back and do something violent to us (maybe take me hostage and force Vanessa to save me). Just as my lawsuit with Dr. Cohegans was settled, I asked (free of charge) him if we had to worry about Connie. He said probably not. But he also said you never know. Truly helpful information. Somebody tell me if I just broke another confidentiality agreement with the man.

4. Nashville - The team is researching places for me to stay near the ballpark. It appears I will be in extended spring training for about 10 days then report to Nashville for the start of their season during the second week of April. The goal is once I can pitch 4 times a week (broken up as 2 days in a row, one day off, and 2 days in a row again), they'll call me up to New York. Meanwhile, I've thrown around the idea of living with a host family, preferably in their basement, instead of a hotel. The food might be better. And maybe they'll have a 12 year old kid who idolizes me and will make my ego soar to new heights. Or I'll just live in a trailer in the parking lot. You never know.

Pools

2008-03-21T06:17:00.002-04:00

Most of the team has put in their picks for the NCAA tournament pool, the general consensus being Duke is going to be this year's ultimate champion. I took North Carolina as my pick. Don't ask me why. I follow college basketball as much as I follow the plotlines of Desperate Housewives. I like the state, so I chose their team. Pretty simple philosophy.

I went swimming yesterday. For an hour, I worked various muscle groups to develop strength and endurance. Swimming is a great cardiovascular workout. Plus, it's hard to get all sweaty if you're already wet.

On the drive back to the Fort Pierce complex from the YMCA complex (really just one building), I got a call from my super agent, Jack Perry, asking how I was feeling about what went down the other night, what with Rick announcing to the press before telling me I was ticketed for a full season in the bullpen. I told him I had mixed feelings. It's not worth rehashing my relationship with my manager. It is what it is and I don't see us becoming blood brothers in the near future. And I'm not sure if I care to pitch out of the bullpen all year. It's just not something I've ever done. But the pundits (I want to be a pundit one day) think this makes the team stronger and will work out better for me personally. Dominant 7th and 8th inning guys are more important now than ever, and pulling down some very nice contracts. I saw Tommy Smythe got 4 years and $28 million from Baltimore in the off season to fill that role for them. Last year, Tommy threw 74 innings and appeared in 76 games. I'm used to appearing in 30-35 games and throwing 220+ innings. I can't decide which is more important to a team, the number of games a pitcher pitches in or the number of innings he gives you. There are roto guys who have their theories, but I'm not a roto guy and I'm not a coach, so I'll just sit on my hands, chew some macadamias and spit out my own thoughts.

I entered the clubhouse and saw about half the team milling around. None of them had pants on, apparently making fun of me for my rant in Rick's office the other night as I wore only my underwear. I pretended not to notice until I reached my locker and saw a pile about 7 feet high of pants blocking my view of my deodorant. There were jeans and slacks and overalls, some new, some dusty, some dirty. Most were the size of an elephant, so somebody here raided the closest men's big & tall store stockroom. I didn't want to touch them, so I gave Teddy, one of our "clubhouse boys" (he's 20) $50 to clean up the area. I then asked for donations from around the team to help refund my Teddy tip. None given.

Meanwhile, Johnny Mathis, our talkative young backup catcher, was walking around collecting papers from everyone. I asked Johnny what he was doing. He said a few guys put together a pool about me. The boxes were based upon games and innings pitched for the year. He said I couldn't enter because of "conflict of interest." I told him that wasn't fair. He said I had to take it up with pool management. Who's the manager, I asked. Johnny smiled and told me.

My manager, Rick Churches.

As an FYI, Rick bet that I'd appear in 77 games and pitch 89 innings.

If that's not motivation, I'm not sure what is.

Looking For The Same Page

2008-03-20T05:58:00.003-04:00

We're not on the same page. The "we" in this case is me and the management of the New York Veterans. It seems that just as we start getting into a good groove, just as we begin to get along, or learn how to co-exist on the same earth together, something else happens. Admittedly, I've been the cause of the "something else" more than once. But this time, I had nothing to do with it.

Over the last few days, I've started hearing little pieces of gossip about me. Baseball gossip, which is different from personal "did you hear Jimmy's going to buy a toupee" gossip. Generally, the baseball gossip is more serious (nope, I have not purchased a toupee, just a larger hat). The gossip I've been hearing is that GM Alvin and manager Rick have spoken with each other about my possibly returning to the team sooner, but in the bullpen. Not necessarily a bad thing. Whatever brings me back to the team the quickest, I'll do (how's that for a tired cliche?).

But it gets better.

Rick has a weekly show on WTEM - Sports Radio ("The Team!"). He spoke before last night's game with Jock & Jerry about various aspects of the team, including my status. I wasn't listening because I'm in Florida and The Team! is in New York, plus I don't know Rick's personal schedule. I think he gets paid $100,000 or so to do this every-Wednesday afternoon gig. On the show, Rick made a sort of announcement about me that he hadn't yet talked to me about. Not a good thing.

More on that in a moment.

We played Cleveland last night, one of the small handful of night games on our spring training schedule. Closer Billy Weston's middle finger was still stiff, so they tell me around the 4th inning that they'll bring me in in his scheduled spot in the 6th inning (they put the veteran relievers who've made the team in the game earlier so they don't have to stick around until the end of the game) "just to get some light work in." Fine, not a big deal. I'd rather pitch in a real game than on a back field to a few young minor leaguers who can still grow hair on their scalps.

Only Rick didn't bring me in for the 6th. Or the 7th. Or the 8th. I'm sitting around for an hour waiting to be told to warm up. No communication at all. Quite frankly, I wanted to be home by the end of the game. I got here early in the morning, worked out hard for a few hours, watched video for a while, and expected to be in bed by 10 pm. Instead, at 9:15 I was told to finally run out to the bullpen to warm up. I was going in for the 9th.

I shook my head and ran out. Began to throw to Johnny Mathis, who looks like will be our opening day backup catcher. Man, Johnny can talk. Nice kid. Loves to talk though. But who am I to criticize?

So I'm warming up with Johnny, he's chattering away, and the fans start gathering close to the bullpen area, which isn't really a pen, it's a strip of grass with mound and plate near the right field line. The fans start yelling things, like how am I going to get to 300 wins if I'm a reliever or if I'd get as many saves as victories and stuff like that. One guy told me I was ugly and going bald. I reminded him that I was rich too, so I had a leg up on him. Shut his mouth right away.

The 9th inning starts. We're ahead by 1 run. I'm not pretending, like I did a few days ago, that this is the World Championship Series. I'm pretending this is spring training and I just want to get my pitches to work so I can build up arm strength and be back in the rotation by May 1. I don't get the chance. First pitch fastball = ground ball out. Next batter (anyone know #97 on Cleveland?) hits my second pitch a mile high straight up. Johnny loses it in the lights but makes a last-second basket catch. 3 pitches, 2 outs. I throw a ball one to the next guy, but on my next pitch he grounds the ball to me. I toss to first and my day is over. 5 pitches, game over.

Only my day wasn't over.

While I haven't spoken to reporters in a couple of months now, they still speak to me. A hundred of them (not really) crowded around my locker after the game. "Did you hear, Jimmy?" "What did Rick tell you, Jimmy?" Blah, blah, blah. I told them Rick didn't tell me anything, so I have nothing to say to them. As I'm wondering if I broke my vow not to speak to the press by speaking to them, another one says that Rick, on The Team! before the game, said I was going to pitch strictly out of the bullpen this year. Plus, I'd still start the season in Nashville, but build myself to the point where I could pitch on back-to-back days, maybe three in a row if possible.

I smiled. Nodded. This was news to me. I've been under the assumption, since this is what they'd told me, that I was going to Nashville to pitch every fifth day. I'd only be in Nashville on game days and be back in the rotation by May 1. Apparently, they changed their minds.

Without telling me.

I went into Rick's office, furious. I didn't care that his door was shut, or that the entire New York media crew was watching, or that I didn't have any pants on. I was furious to care.

Rick seemed to be waiting for me. He was in the office with Alvin, bench coach Chazz Waters and pitching coach Bobby Spencer. Seemed like they were all waiting for me. So I started gently. "Jes*s fu*cking Chri*st, Rick! You don't make a fu*king announcement like this to the g*ddam* fuc*ing media without tell me first, you f*cking ignoramus!"

Rick hadn't just been waiting for me to come in. He'd also been waiting to apologize. Seems he made a mistake by telling the media about his new plan before telling me. And Alvin and Chazz were in there explaining the media world to Rick, interesting since Rick was part of the media up until last October. But new jobs, new perspectives sometimes blind us to what's right. What Rick did was wrong. And Alvin and Chazz were there (before me) to let him know this.

Bobby was the first to jump in. He stood up and said, "Jimmy, you want to go get some pants?"

"No! I don't need any fu*king g*ddam* pants!" I was still a little upset. (FYI - I did have on underwear. Don't want you to get the impression that I'm... oh forget it.) Bobby sat down.

"Jimmy," Alvin said, "we're sorry you heard it this way."

"Heard what?" I said. "Tell me what I'm hearing, then tell me if it's true."

Bobby popped up out of his chair again. "I think you'll make a great 8th inning guy. You hit 91 on the gun tonight. Did you know that? Your pitches are moving all over the place, then ending up in the strike zone. At this point in your body's physical career, you'll be better off pitching four or five innings a week over 7 days rather than five and a third every 5th." Then he sat down.

"Rick," I said, "why are you so quiet?"

"Because I don't want to upset you any more than I already have."

This was strange. Rick has been a giant tumor growing inside of me since he took this job. Now he's suddenly apologetic? Now he's being sensitive with me? Now he cares about my feelings?

"To tell you the truth," Rick said, looking at Alvin and then back at me, "we thought you were washed up. We thought you were dead weight pulling down lots of money and mouthing off at every opportunity to save your job."

"We knew you were working hard," Alvin said.

"No you didn't," I said.

"Yes we did. We just didn't think you were getting any results."

All they had to do was watch, I told them. Instead, we went to arbitration over my contract, over my health and their misconception about it, over their desire to send me out to pasture to chew on grass all day. They should have known I'm not an outfielder.

"You're getting results now," Chazz said. He smiled. Chazz was my manager here for six years, back when I was winning 20 games a season, the team was winning back-to-back world championships, and he was manager of the year three times. He knows me better than anyone in this organization. "If you want to keep making a sh*tload of money and playing ball, you'll see that this will extend your career longer than you could have imagined."

"That's my problem," I said. "I imagined I'd play this year, pitch at the beginning of games, win 10 or 15, and be done with a little over 300 for my career and another championship for us."

"You're a part of this team," Rick said. "And maybe not for just one year."

Again with the sensitivity.

They then told me I'd be in Nashville for between 2 weeks and a month. But I'd have to be with the team the whole time, the Nashville team. No trips to New York on days I didn't pitch. They wanted me to get to the point where I could throw an inning three days in a row.

"You can do it," Bobby Spencer said, once again standing up. "Your body, as it stands (I was standing, as a matter of fact), is built better for this than what you wanted, or expected." Once again, he sat down.

My head was spinning. I walked out and didn't commit to anything. I just walked out. Still not wearing pants.

The media pounced the moment I re-entered the locker room. Was I mad? Was I prepared to pitch from the pen? Could I adjust to this new situation? Where was I going to live in Nashville?

The last question got to me. I didn't know. I didn't know about anything. I thought I'd be home with Vanessa, with my girls. I wanted that. I expected that. Then a weird thing happened. I got a giant lump in my throat knowing I'd be living by myself for a month. A 10-day roadtrip, that's one thing. 30 days away, that's another. The only thing I knew as I blew off the media at my locker and pulled on a pair of jeans was that I was going to miss my family more this year than ever. And even worse, what if Bobby and Chazz were right? What if I was better off in this new situation? What if the pull of success, of winning, made me change my mind and want to keep playing for another 2, 3 or 4 years? That hasn't my family plan ever since the injury. But suppose I wanted to change it? Suppose my future success altered my present perspective?

I drove home to tell Vanessa so she wouldn't hear the news from the media first. I suddenly had a lot to say, but no idea what needed to be said. The lump in my throat grew larger as I pulled out of the players' parking lot and turned on the radio. The local sports station was on. Apparently, I was headed for the bullpen.

Spring Break In One Day

2008-03-19T05:54:00.003-04:00

We had our traditional one day off in March yesterday (after a horrible start, we're now 13 and 7; meaningless unless your team lost 93 games last year). I decided to follow the schedule and do nothing. No workouts. No baseball. No sparring verbally with teammates or management. It was going to be a day of solitude, just me and my X-Box.

Was...

I was awakened at 7 am by Vanessa rumbling around the room. I asked her what her deal was (in those exact words, which she loved [I'm being sarcastic]). She reminded me - REMINDED ME - that we were pulling Alyssa and Grace out of school for the day and driving up to Disney World in Orlando. Right away. So move.

So long solitude, hello crowds.

I must admit, although you can probably tell, I didn't want to go. I didn't want to go so badly I'd forgotten we had planned this ten days ago when I got into an argument with the girls, who were mad I'd forced them down here to Florida only to never see them. I'm a jerk. I'll admit that too.

We got out of the house quickly. Not to beat the crowds. To beat Connie, Vanessa's stalker friend who won't leave. We pulled out of our rented driveway in our rental car, drove down our rented streets, past the rent-a-cop providing semi-insufficient security at the guardhouse, and sped away. In the rearview mirror, I could see a woman in a miniskirt and heels racing after us, arms waving, breakfast danishes falling to the sidewalk. Right before I turned the corner, I saw her make a beeline for the guardhouse. I was happy we'd told him we were going south and flying to Miami for the day. I hoped that would throw her off our scent.

We hopped on the highway and drove north, all four of us relieved that it was just the four of us in our spacious team-paid rental car and the fifth Beatle had been left behind. I was so happy, I let Alyssa sing about it, which she did. Horribly. She's taking up harmonica too, by the way. 'Nuff said.

We had breakfast at a waffle house, the girls begging me to park in back, out of view of the road. They "premonissed" (not sure if that's a word, but it sounds good) that Connie would pick up our trail soon enough. Both Vanessa and I, because we're mature parents, told them they were being silly. I made an extra effort to hide, I mean, park the car behind a dumpster just the same.

Food eaten and digesting, we were off again, driving toward the world's greatest theme park. In traffic. There was an accident up ahead which slowed us down for an hour. Sports car on its roof, resting between highway and median. Nice car. Recognizable. Two ambulances, four fire trucks and five state trooper vehicles cut the four-lanes into one. I couldn't see anything specific, so we continued onward. "Maybe we should switch cars with the one on its roof," Alyssa said. "That way Connie'll think we're in a hospital."

"No," Vanessa said in her "Now your imagination is running away with you" voice.

"Yeah," I said in my "Not a bad idea, Alyssa" voice.

We arrived in the Walt Disney World parking lot after paying $25 for the privilege, hopped a monorail and were off to the Magic Kingdom. I've been coming down to Florida for 20 years and think Vanessa and I had only brought the girls here once, when they were little kiddies. I could see in their fifteen year old eyes an excitement fifteen year olds are generally too cool to show. I didn't say anything and let them feel, thinking to myself, 'You are mature, Mr. Scott.' My outward, physical smile lasted as long as it took to read this sentence.

"Sh*t," I said. "Sh*t," Vanessa and the girls said simultaneously.

There, in front of us, was J.D. Bryant, our gifted and talented new third baseman, along with his wife Karen, gifted and talented anchor of ABC's Morning Comments, the top-rated show amongst the white female demographic of 27-43 year olds. They had their three kids with them, names unremembered. J.D. and Karen, when together, are wonderful people in small doses. About 30 seconds worth. Then it's best to move along. They bicker as a couple. They don't fight. They bicker. Little quips. Little shrugs. Little eye rolls. But these "littles" add up to a consistency that will drive you nuts.

"We should spend the day together!" Karen said! (worth two exclamation points). She's a very chipper gal, especially in the mornings when TV cameras are pointed her way.

Vanessa, who'd been saddled with a stalking friend for the last 9 days, thanked Karen for the offer (Karen is very liberal in her political views; Vanessa, if possible, would be part of a vast right-wing conspiracy if anyone let her.) But she (Vanessa) said we were meeting our friend Connie in Cinderella's castle in 20 minutes. But thank you.

At that point, J.D. and Karen were besieged by a group of autograph seekers, who thankfully didn't recognize me in my sunglasses, Hawaiian shirt and straw cowboy hat (yes, I word pants). We waved and skipped away, happy to have now avoided Connie, the Bryants, and groups of autograph seekers.

The next few hours were fun. We had a nice lunch. We saw Kai Goto and his family, but they kept moving (Kai looking a little harried), so an exchange of waves was enough. They were followed by about 30 Japanese photographers. Looked like fun.

We saw Paul Hudson and his kids. Raina, his wife, is suing him for divorce (and many millions of dollars [American]). I know as many details as the NY Post will publish, which is to say I know as much as you. He looked happy to be out and about and with his kids. But even as he hugged Vanessa, I could see a few stray onlookers, who were probably hoping to make a few bucks, taking pictures with cameras or cell phones. The guy can't even catch a break on a day at the theme park with his kids.

We had just left him when it happened.

Quietly, under her breath, Grace said the one word none of us wanted to hear. "Connie." We looked up. There she was, Connie, being driving on a Disney World golf cart by a security attendant. We couldn't run or hide. It was too late. She was coming straight for us.

"Go,"Vanessa said. "I'll deal with this."

We told her we wouldn't leave her. It wasn't fair to her. Seriously, Vanessa aged about 10 years in the ten seconds it took Connie to thank the golf cart driver, turn, and smile.

"I didn't think I'd ever find you!" Connie said!! (If you'd heard her voice, you might've added another exclamation mark.)

"Neither did we," I said. "Know what I'm saying?"

She did, but pretended she didn't. I wished the security guy would come back, armed, so he could escort this woman off the premises at gunpoint. But no security guy. No guns. No golf carts. Just Connie, smiling her sad smile. If she had given us some space, maybe I would have allowed myself to feel bad for her. Then I thought -

"It's not our fault your unhappy," Vanessa said. (Which I was thinking. It was kismet!!!!) "You've got to let us go."

"What do you mean?" Connie said, although she knew.

Vanessa tried to use her manners. "Go home, Connie," she said. "Go home now and talk to your family. You can't be with us anymore."

"Hello again!!!!" It was Karen Quinn, J.D. and the kids. Had they snuck up on us too?

"Dude," J.D. said to me. "Comere." (He was saying, "Come here," but he combines words a lot.)

Vanessa nodded. She was probably going to try to have Connie stalk Karen now instead. Not a bad idea. Meanwhile, J.D.'s three boys were oogling Alyssa and Grace, who were paying attention to text messages on their phones. I made a mental note (that I'd quickly forget) to remind my fifteen year old daughters that boys look at them a lot, so kicking these boys in the cajones is a viable option.

"Diju hear 'bout Lyman?" J.D. said to me. I shook my head. "Bad car crashnstuff. He'sinna hospital." (He said, "Bad car crash and stuff. He's in a hospital.")

J.D. didn't know any details beyond that. But we both wondered what would happen to our starting right fielder, a man the team expected 25 home runs, 90 RBIs and 20 stolen bases from starting in two weeks.

"You're kidding!!!!!" Karen and Connie were getting along. Vanessa had an evil look in her eye. "You've GOT to tell me about this!!!!!" Karen was enraptured by something Connie had alluded to. Vanessa took this as our cue.

My nuclear family of four left the Bryants with Connie, who was now allegedly going to dinner with them in Treasure Island. Don't ask me how Connie had traveled to Disney World or how she was getting back. I didn't know and didn't want to ask.

We decided to go before Connie decided to latch onto us again. We passed Kai and his family and the 30 Japanese photographers. He looked exhausted. The season hasn't even begun and the guy's held more press conferences than I have had in my career. Talk about an unwanted burden.

We hopped the monorail to the $25 parking lot, constantly looking behind us. No Connie. We got off the monorail, ran down the stairs, turned and ran back up, hopping another monorail and getting off at Epcot. We let two pass before jumping onto another and circling the entire park (I purposely left my hat at one stop and sunglasses at another to confuse the woman), arriving back at the rip-off parking lot. We split up then as we deboarded. The three girls (Vanessa included) ran to the car. I stood and watched other monorails come and go. No Connie.

The squeal of a set of rental car breaks told me I had but seconds to spare. I threw myself into our car, Secret Service style, and let Vanessa speed off at up to 7 mph. We all sat very low, pretending we were in our 80s (lots of those people in Florida at this, and pretty much any time of year). We reached the exit followed by a myriad of different cars. We hoped Connie wasn't in any of them.

After parking three restaurants down from where we ate dinner, I took a taxi back to the car while my familial companions hid behind an Exxon restroom across the street. I picked them up, returned our rental car (complaining it was "too roomy") and got something a little...different from what Connie expected. The rent-a-cop at the guard house of our rental home complex swore he hadn't seen Connie and swore he wouldn't let her in or tell her he'd seen us. I gave him a $50 bill and told him I'd find him and kill him if Connie bothered us for the rest of the night. I dropped everyone off at the house and parked my new rented big black Hummer down the street, hoping to keep this woman completely off our trail.

No lights that night. We were all in bed by 8:30. When the doorbell rang around ten o'clock, Vanessa and I both pretended we were asleep. As I wondered how I'd find and kill the security guard, Vanessa and I both knew that somehow this woman had to go.

Reel Games

2008-03-18T05:48:00.003-04:00

I've been watching a lot of video of myself from when I was pitching with Chicago. Not that I feel like I can pitch with that velocity ever again, but I did have a very fluid pitching motion. It was so loose. Somewhere along the way, I developed this herky jerky style near the end of my windup that gave me incredible results but I think caused too much stress on my elbow. Thus, BOOM! No more elbow. I'm hoping watching old "home movies" will help bring me back to the days when I didn't need to worry so much about getting hurt.

I've pitched in two live games now. That puts me ahead of schedule. The problem is I've only pitched an inning in each. My arm strength is pretty much there. My head is on the way. I'll admit it, I get concerned that my elbow will act up and either explode again or cause me just enough pain to turn me into a scared, ineffective pitcher.

Those guys exist, and have existed my whole career, the guys who get hurt and can't come back all the way because they remember the pain too well and don't want to go through it all again. It's an unfair analogy to our military, but one guy once told me coming back from a major injury had to feel like going back to Iraq or Vietnam for another tour of duty. You never know when something's going to come out of the shadows or up from the sand and end it all for you.

As for me, I started meditation last week. Since Dr. Cohegans is suing me, he won't help me with my head, so I bought some new age music CDs and sit with the headphones on in the whirlpool, eyes closed (to block out the Cartoon Channel on the TV hanging from the wall). I try to put myself in a game, mentally, then throw to batters with the soft, gentle motion of my youth that I've memorized from the films. I throw again and again until I feel natural, until the motion is like breathing, involuntary.

I guess it's working. In my two "real" innings, I've faced six batters and gotten six outs. It was strange pitching the ninth inning yesterday. Normal closer Billy Weston had a stiff middle finger on his pitching hand and couldn't throw, so they juggled things and put me there. I pretended it was Game 7 of the World Championship Series and we had a one-run lead. It was fun. Three up, three down. Hit 89 on the gun once too.

The plan is for me to not throw at all today, then long toss again on Wednesday. Maybe I can get into another game Thursday or Friday and extend myself a little. Slowly, I'll get up to 3, then 4, then 5, 6 and hopefully 7 innings. By the first week in May, I should be in the rotation.

Until then, I'll stay behind in Florida for a week before heading to Nashville. Since I'll be on schedule to pitch every fifth day, I'll be a commuter, meaning I'll fly into Nashville (or wherever we're going to play) the night before I pitch and fly home the next morning. That way, I get to stay with the big club and still see my family (there's no way I'll be able to convince the girls to stay with me in Nashville for a month, even though it would probably be a positive influence on Alyssa's guitar playing).

I've come a long way since December, when I began to rehab in earnest. I'm proud of the hard work I put in and pleasantly surprised at how my body responded. I can sense, maybe through my meditation, that surprisingly good things are coming my way, and the team's way too. The season starts in two weeks. The countdown has begun.

At Week's End, The Weekend

2008-03-17T09:48:00.003-04:00

You're probably wondering if Vanessa's "friend" Connie is her real name. Yes, it is. Long ago, when we first met, I asked Connie if she cared if I used her real name. She said no, everything about her is an open book. "You can look it up," she said. I've never Googled her, but maybe I should, because she's a little frightening.

Connie paid us a surprise visit last Sunday (the 9th). She said she would still until the end of the weekend, which to us meant that afternoon. She rephrased later and said, "until week's end," which to us was yesterday. It's Monday. She's still here.

She's not staying with us. Vanessa has a rule that beginning February 14th, we do not have guests stay at our home until the end of baseball season. This rule has been in effect ever since I was with Chicago and we had that remarkable run back in 1993. My first ring, Chicago's first in 80-something years... Unforgettable.

We lived outside of Chicago then, in Lake Forest. The relatives, the old friends, the acquaintances... they all came out of the woodwork that year, asking for tickets, a place to stay, signed memorabilia - you name it. I think the night before Game 7 we had 10 people staying over in addition to Vanessa, the girls and me. Not a comfortable situation when you're scheduled to pitch that night in 35 degree weather, the biggest game possibly ever in my life, and I'm home that morning wondering if Cousin Todd was smoking in my backyard and flicking his butts onto my lawn (he was).

Since then, nobody stays over. They can sleep in a tent at a nearby campground, or in an RV somewhere (not in our driveway), or in a hotel. Connie stayed in a hotel this week. All week. She's there now, but probably enroute as I type this. She would have liked to stay over. It's easy to tell someone wants to spend the night when you have to literally push that person out your door at 11pm (Vanessa claims she gave a friendly shove - I was already in bed).

Not sure when she's going home, but Vanessa is exhausted. Two weeks of spring training left before the season starts. We'll be back in New Jersey soon enough, and Connie lives just three houses down. Vanessa gets enough of her when we're home. I'm just happy I have a reason to leave the house alone every day. But Vanessa is stuck. Got a charity thing? Connie can help. Need to go food shopping? Connie will push the cart. Need to slit your wrists? Connie will be ready with rags to clean the blood off the floor.

Yeah, sick stuff. So, does Connie know I'm writing this stuff about her? Here's the weird thing: Yes. She does. She reads this blog every day. She comes over and quotes lines to Vanessa. Vanessa, who only scans this a couple times a week at the most (looking to see what I've said about her), thinks Connie likes the attention. So am I helping or hurting? Should I commit to a news blackout of Connie? Not sure what that would prove. She'd probably keep reading, waiting to see her name in print. I can write about her more often. No, she'd enjoy that too. I asked Vanessa. "What should I do?" She just held out her wrists and said she had no idea. I was pushed aside suddenly, as Connie came bounding out from another room, rags in her hands, ready to wipe up my wife's sacrificial blood.

Action and Reaction

2008-03-14T05:54:00.002-04:00

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.

My First (Threatened) Lawsuit, And Then...

2008-03-13T11:57:00.004-04:00

Vanessa told me it was bound to happen sometime, if only because of the notoriety this blog has received. I was officially given an ultimatum yesterday from team psychologist, Dr. Henry Cohegans: Never mention his name or allude to any conversations we've had or will have ever again or else he'll sue me, based upon my breaking the terms of a confidentiality agreement I signed with him once I started writing this. I have one word for him:

Sorry.

Still, I contacted my lawyer, recommended years ago by Jack Perry, my super agent (I bought him a cape for his birthday. No card, no note, no nothing. Rude.). This lawyer, who asked that he not be identified publicly for his own p.r. purposes, told me that technically I didn't break the agreement. However, he believes I did break the "spirit" of the agreement in the manner that I alluded to our discussions (see March 11, February 22 and February 14 posts to judge for yourself). While this lawyer, probably the finest in the world (like I'd know), is probably correct, I decided to call Dr. Cohegans on my own to try to nip this in the bud before it became bigger than it had to be.

Dr. Cohegans:
Me: Hi, It's -
Dr. Cohegans:
Me: Wow, you're snippy when you're upset. Want to talk about it?
Dr. Cohegans:
Me: That was a low blow. But I'm bigger than that, so I'd like to offer an apology.
Dr. Cohegans:
Me: It is too worth something. What if I promised to make you look hyper-intelligent when I-
Dr. Cohegans:
Me: It is too possible. All I need to-
Dr. Cohegans:
Me: Fine. My lawyer said we should revise the agreement.
Dr. Cohegans:
Me: I just thought it'd be cheaper if we -
Dr. Cohegans:
Me: No, I've never been to law school. Have you?
Dr. Cohegans:
Me: Yeah, but how many classes-
Dr. Cohegans:
Me: Did you pass the bar?
Dr. Cohegans:
Me: So you're real smart. Have you ever thrown a fastball 98 miles an hour?
Dr. Cohegans:
Me: I'm just saying there's one thing I can do better than-

It went on like that for about 10 minutes.

Vanessa told me, before I made the call, that I'd only make things worse. But I like to go to bed at night knowing I did everything I could to improve a situation, be it rehabbing from my injury or getting along better with team management or finding a way to make my girls like me. So I thought, hey, a few minutes on the horn with good ol' Doc Cohegans couldn't do any harm, right?

The official suit was filed this morning. Apparently, the doctor was unhappy with my tact on the phone yesterday. My lawyer, still unnamed (now he wants me to sign a confidentiality agreement too - I'll need a lawyer to read it over first), told me I was, in loose terms, an idiot for trying to solve the problem over the phone.

Fine, Vanessa was right. It's not the first time.

Thus, I am being sued. I've never been sued before. I can take it off of my To Do list now.

How does it feel? Well, he's asking for a lot of money since he's saying I'm hurting his private practice and his professional status with the team, which will thus hurt his pocketbook as well. Terms won't be disclosed here, but I'm sure they'll leak out somewhere, like TMZ, since somebody will have nothing else to do. Let's just say he's looking for more than $100.

If you asked Vanessa how this experience feels, you'll get a much more emotional answer. She was quite emotional with me. That doesn't mean she cried. But her voice was raised a few decibels and aimed in my direction. Hey, she's a great kid and has been correct many times when it comes to what I say and how I express it. In this case... She's probably right again.

I asked my anonymous lawyer if we could counter sue. He asked what we would sue him for. I couldn't think of anything. He told me to let him do the lawyering. So that's what he's doing.

Remember when Bill Clinton was being sued all the time while president, and he set up a legal defense fund? I want me one of those. Maybe it should be run by a fan. You can call it The Jimmy Scott Legal Defense Fund. I like the sound of that when I speak it loud. Of course, I spoke it a little too loudly, which led to Vanessa marching into the room and using her decibel-grinding tone with me. So maybe we should hold off on The Jimmy Scott Legal Defense Fund. Then again, I can't control what a few fans do. Nudge, nudge, wink, wink.

Next steps? I want to call the doctor again. I've been "strongly advised to the fullest extent of the word 'strongly'" not to even mention his name to our cat. We don't have a cat, so I'm good there. I think I'll just let this issue fester in my brain for a bit before figuring out my next steps.

Vanessa, of course, would say there's nothing for me to figure. That's why we're paying the lawyer. To which I respond: That's why we need The Jimmy Scott Legal Defense Fund!

I've never slept on the couch in this marriage, but tonight may be the first time. How will it feel? You can bet I'll let you know after I'm through.

Connie

2008-03-12T06:11:00.003-04:00

Can a person you know be a stalker? What if they do it in the wide open, right in front of you, by ringing your doorbell and invited themselves in? Is that still stalking? Or just aggressive friendship?

Vanessa has a "friend" from up the street who is the clingy (not the rapper) type. She moved in last fall and instantly became Vanessa's best friend. Not sure how it happened. She has a son who goes to Alyssa and Grace's high school, but he's apparently very quiet. I've never met him. She has a husband, whom I've also never met, who is literally a brain surgeon. His hours are wacky - why would anyone schedule a surgery for 9:00 at night? But he's apparently one of the top brain surgeons on the east coast. I take it Connie doesn't see him very much, nor does she have much to do with her 16 year old son. She doesn't have a full-time job. So, she latches onto Vanessa as often as possible.

I think Vanessa liked it at first. Who wouldn't? Here's a total stranger - allegedly the non-murdering kind - who thinks the world of you and wants to be around you because you're fun and intelligent and someone who commands respect. See, that's what's so great about Vanessa. She's a respectable woman. She has a certain self-confidence that I lack, and that's an attractive feature. I think Connie's attracted to that as well.

Once Connie's foot was in the door, she kept it there. She became Vanessa's BFF, which is difficult for Vanessa since she's so busy with the kids, charitable stuff, me and my career... She's always got something to do. We assume Connie has very little to do. So she's over at our house all the time. All the time. When Vanessa mentioned going on a quick vacation during the kids' winter break (we considered Italy since we're not Italian), Connie booked tickets for her family, first class, to Rome and found hotels, restaurants, hot spots. She put together the whole trip and booked it in hours. We didn't go to Italy because of some commitments I had. Connie never went either. Vanessa was upset. She had wanted the break.

When I proposed to the family that we all go to Florida for spring training, Vanessa, who I thought would fight me tooth and nail, said yes almost before I finished reading from my notes. She helped get the girls to see things my way (they're still pissed off they had to come down here for 6 weeks, but they'll survive). We've been down for almost a month and have had neighbor peace.

Until Sunday. We're renting a home in a gated community. If somebody is going to visit us, they need to clear it with a security guard. Believe me when I say we've turned down lots of visitors this year, mainly media members trying to get me to talk. The only way somebody is going to get to our house is if they live in the community or are police.

Then the doorbell rang.

It was about 8AM. On Sundays I don't get up until 8:30. The kids were asleep. Vanessa was in the shower. I peeked out the window. It wasn't the cops at our door. It was Connie, platter of breakfast danishes in her hands, looking up RIGHT AT ME. It was like she knew I was going to check her out before leaving my own bedroom. But she saw me. Eye contact. I was caught.

I stuck my head into the bathroom and told Vanessa. The water was shut off immediately, but then the movement stopped. After a few seconds, we heard the doorbell ring again. I asked Vanessa what we should do. She didn't say anything for a moment. Perhaps she was thinking of a quick getaway. But she'd be leaving her family behind. She's too good for that.

"Let her in," was all she said.

I left the bedroom, walked down the hallway and passed a sleepy-eyed Grace. "Mom's psycho friend is here." Grace closed her bedroom door fairly hard.

"Hi, Jimmy!"

Connie stood at the bottom of the steps, holding her danish platter.

"Don't tell me you went all the way to Denmark to get those," I said.

She laughed, told me I was "humorous in nature," and found our kitchen.

I don't own a bathrobe and never entertain guests dressed in the clothes I slept in. But it was Connie, and I was tired and had to leave at 9:30 for the ballpark. She got to see how a real semi-balding baseball player dresses when he sleeps. I met her in the kitchen and sat down. "Visiting?" I said.

Connie spoke of how she'd booked a room at a Marriott less than 500 yards away. She said she'd gotten into our community by sweet talking the guard with fresh pastries. But she had a scrape on her calf and a scuff mark on her shoe. She'd also been sweating recently. It wasn't that hot or humid yet. I would have bet a million bucks that she'd scaled the wall. I checked the danishes to make sure they weren't covered in dirt. If I hopped a ten foot wall carrying a platter of breakfast stuff, I'd spill more than my share of donuts (which I like much better than danishes).

She told me she was down alone for the weekend to "get a sense" of Florida living. Since it was Sunday, I asked if that meant she was flying home sometime that afternoon. "No, I'll be here until the week ends." Six days and counting.

After ten minutes of stimulating discussion (I have no recollection of the subject matter. The woman is to a brain what cigarette smoke is to a set of lungs.), Vanessa came into the kitchen, very well dressed.

"I'm late for church," she said to Connie, "but you're welcome to come."

Connie's eyes lit up. She was like a kid seeing the gifts under the tree on New Year's Day. "Of course!" she said.

Vanessa and I made quick eye contact. It was pained. You see, Vanessa hadn't been to church since we'd gotten down here. My bet is she'd just been upstairs trying to find one in the phone book before making her announcement. She was taking one for the team. A grenade was in the kitchen, and she was throwing her body on it. She was giving herself up for the safety of her family.

They were gone within minutes.

I sat there in the rented kitchen, took a bite out of a danish without looking, and gave a silent prayer for my wife, a good woman. A solid woman. Somebody who was about to have a fairly rotten day.

And then I spit something out of my mouth. Dirt. My danish was covered in dirt.

The Kids Are Alright

2008-03-11T06:29:00.004-04:00

My relationship with my two daughters tends to rotate between time bomb explosiveness and potential death-spreading wildfire. It's rarely easy, like instant oatmeal. And usually, it's all my fault.

Case in point: I convinced Alyssa and Grace to come down with me to Florida, along with Vanessa, for this last spring training. My "pitch" to them was this would be my last spring training and I wanted us all to spend it together. I'd be home every day by 3:00 and we'd have oodles of family time. I also mentioned how I'd miss them, but this didn't make the headline in their craniums. Being away from home, being away from their friends - that was the headline they remembered. We're almost a month into spring training now. I've been home by 3:00 twice.

I take much of the blame. My rehab and workouts (and this) have taken up considerably more time than I had thought. Vanessa and I still have charitable events that we attend (like a clinic for the Boys & Girls Club this past Sunday morning). And sometimes I just find myself driving around, hitting the road to let off some steam. The pressure this spring training is more intense than I've felt in almost 20 years. Battling the in-house competition, battling my own insecurities, battling with Rick and Alvin, and battling with my girls - if life becomes a constant battle, you need to take a breather sometimes. And that sometimes sometimes takes place around 3:00, when I said I'd be home but instead am taking the on ramp to 95 South with Van Halen's "Panama" blasting from my rental car speakers.

We attempted to have a family dinner last night. Here's an excerpt:

Me: How was your day?

Nobody answers; the "nobody" meaning my two girls. I already knew Vanessa's day was less than tolerable.

Me: Two daughters, specifically Alyssa and Grace, my offspring, how was your day?
Alyssa: Fine.
Grace: You are a wise ass.

It's hard to swallow a large stalk of broccoli when your 15 year old daughter just called you a "wise ass."

Me: Where did you hear that word?
Grace: It's two words.
Alyssa: Pretty much everybody we know.
Grace: You're also a blowhard.
Alyssa: A big mouth.
Grace: Pompous and selfish.

It's hard not to choke on a cheddar cheese sauce chaser when your kids, with incredible conviction, just repeated the same insults you've been hearing about yourself for the past 15 years.

Vanessa: How was your day, dear?
Me: I really like this broccoli.

Vanessa's upset, but not with me. Her stalker "friend" Connie paid a surprise visit this afternoon and said she'd be staying at a Marriott about 500 yards away from the gated (thank God) community we're temporarily living in. How long will Connie be here? She didn't give Vanessa a specific date, but I think she'll be here as long as it takes. As long as it takes to do what? is the question churning through my wife's head. But that problem is for another day. Right now, I was dealing with a couple of teenage malcontents.

Me: The important thing is we're having a nice family dinner.

At this point, both girls left the table. Nobody asked to be excused. When I made this point, Vanessa told me I hadn't made that point in about 9 years. I lack in consistency at times, was her point.

I sprung into action by calling Dr. Henry Cohegans, our team psychologist. For years, I thought he was our team psychiatrist. But I've been wrong for years. He's a psychologist. There's a difference. I'll figure that out at some other time.

Let me remind you of the confidentiality agreement I signed with Dr. Cohegans over the winter. He was explicit in stating he wanted to be no part of this blog and he did not want to ever be quoted by me, either directly or paraphrased. By signing my agreement to this, I have honored the doctor's wishes.

I can, however, include my side of the conversations. Not once have I asked my readers to keep what they read confidential. That's really hard on the worldwide web.

Dr. Cohegans -
Me: Not so good. It's my girls.
Dr. Cohegans -
Me: Get them on the phone? There are two of them? Does that mean I have to pay for all three of us?
Dr. Cohegans -

The good doctor waited 10 very expensive minutes (paid for by the team, so I don't know why I become so obsessed with what he charges) while I pounded on bedroom doors and gently coaxed my two young loved ones to share a phone line with a stranger. They did this and made me leave the room.

Dr. Cohegans -
Alyssa - He promised us he'd be here and he never is.
Grace - He played golf two Sundays ago after telling us we had to be home for a special 'Sunday dinner.' He didn't get home until we'd already gone to bed.
Alyssa - He thinks his stupid blog is more important than us.
Me - I do not.
Dr. Cohegans -
Grace - Dad!
Alyssa - Hey!

I hung up, forgetting that eavesdropping is supposed to be done in secret from the ones you are eavesdropping on.

Half an hour later, the phone rang. It was Dr. Cohegans.

Me - They hate me.
Dr. Cohegans -
Me - Why do I say that? You heard what they said. And you didn't hear what they said at dinner.
Dr. Cohegans -
Me - What about respect for your elders?
Dr. Cohegans -
Me - Yes Rick and Alvin are older than me. What's that got to do with - Oh. I see.
Dr. Cohegans -
Me - No, I just wiped my eye. I'd been having trouble seeing out of it for a few minutes.
Dr. Cohegans -
Me - Because humor masks my true insecurities. I've used that word twice tonight and sound very intelligent.
Dr. Cohegans -
Me - Fine. Should I go apologize to them both now? I'd hug them but they'd run away and call me a molester.
Dr. Cohegans -
Me - Because humor masks their true insecurities.

I hung up and pounded on doors for 10 minutes. (Vanessa was out with Connie, trying to keep the woman away from a very private family issue. FYI - Keep this between us.) I eventually coaxed the girls out when I told them I was about to be arrested for disturbing the peace.

First thing I did was sit the two of them down and explain my situation. No, wait. I apologized first, then explained, which made me feel like I was justifying myself for being a jerk over the last few weeks. If I had explained first and then apologized, I would have been able to make it seem like I was apologizing as a favor to them, thus keeping me, the father-figure (and actual father) in power during this exchange.

But I apologized first, making me appear weak and vulnerable. I'm sure I was slouching too. Not attractive traits in a man. I was happy Vanessa was out with her stalker friend.

Grace - It's not fair that you kidnapped us and forced us down to Florida.
Me - But it's the sunshine state.
Alyssa - It rains every day at 4:00.
Me - Very humid here. Oh, and I prefer the word abduct to kidnap. Sounds like I was more organized.
Grace - Your friend Felipe wouldn't think that was very funny.

Grace was right. Felipe Castro's mother remains held in captivity while I try to justify to my daughters why I'm not spending enough time with them.

Me - Let's do this. Starting tomorrow, we make sure we do something together every day. Even if that means I have to make breakfast for you.
Alyssa - I only eat a yogurt.
Me - I'll pasteurize the dairy.
Grace - I skip breakfast.
Me - I'll force some bacon down your throat.

I think one of them smiled about this time. Which made me really smile. Kids are all the same. They just want to be loved. And even if they know they are, they want to hear it once in a while. Or be shown it. I know I need to do a better job with my kids. They're both terrific and smart and pretty like their mom. Maybe this was the beginning of a new relationship between them and me. Maybe this was a life-changing time for us all.

But first, I had to figure out how to tell them we were out of instant oatmeal.

A Quick One...

2008-03-10T15:34:00.002-04:00

Yes, that was me on the mound yesterday in the 9th inning against Boston. It was my day to throw and I kind of weasled my way into throwing one inning of a "real" game; or at least as real as a spring training exhibition game can get. Felt good. No pain. We'll see how I rebound over the next day or two. My goal is to build up over the next couple of weeks so when I start the season in Nashville, I'll be able to be a mainstay in that rotation. The team goal is still for me to be in the New York rotation by May 1. I'm hoping.

Lower body workout today. Ran 8 simulated miles (meaning on a machine) and swam the equivalent of 1 mile. Andy just started me on the swimming about a week ago. It's more stamina exercise.

The team has won 5 in a row. Too bad nothing counts so far.

10 Seconds of Relief

2008-03-07T05:52:00.005-05:00

Here's something interesting that came as a result of the controversy started by my inaccurate posting from the other day: I got to speak with Felipe Castro yesterday. As you know, Felipe's mother was kidnapped in Venezuela last December. He hasn't shown up at camp here in Fort Pierce yet. When I wrongly stated on Wednesday that he had been named team captain, Felipe got wind of my blog, found it, and started to read. He called me Friday morning.

With his permission, I'm posting parts of our conversation.

Me: Sorry for making you look the way you did.
Felipe: You looked a lot worse than me.
Me: Because I'm losing my hair, right? I look really bad, don't I?
Felipe: Yes.

I moped for a moment here. Then I sucked it up and tried to steer the conversation back to him.

Me: How did your mother get kidnapped?
Felipe: On December 16th, I was in Puerto Rico for a special softball game to raise money for Willie Cordero's charity. Around 3:00, I got a call from someone saying I should look out for my mother better than I was doing. That was not right, in my mind. So I called her house and she wasn't there. She's always home on Sundays. I left the game and called the police.
Me: What happened?
Felipe: I arrived home that night. The police were already at my mother's house. Her front door was on the street, partially burned. They'd blown it up. Part of the front room had been on fire too. The police said they could tell she had struggled hard because of broken glass and a cross broken into pieces near the kitchen. A slipper was also found. They think she was taken with a bare foot.
Me: When did the kidnappers contact you?
Felipe: Two weeks later. For two weeks, there was nothing. No word from the police. No ransom demand, no nothing, from the group that had her. Then on New Year's Eve, I got an email that showed my mother, wearing only one slipper, being held somewhere. She was alive. I was so happy! Then she spoke and said some terrible things.
Me: What'd she say?
Felipe: How I've been a terrible son... I have so much money and never use it for the people of my country. How I'm a disgrace to Venezuela.
Me: That's not how she feels.
Felipe: I know that now. Then, just to hear her voice was incredible, but to hear what she's saying, after nothing for two weeks... My heart was breaking.
Me: Then what?
Felipe: A man with a black drape over his head told me to give a ransom, uh, pay a ransom and I'd get her back.
Me: How much?
Felipe: I can't say.
Me: Did you do it?
Felipe: I can't say.
Me: Well, she's still being held so I'll pretend you didn't.
Felipe: Good. I talked to her on the phone on January 20. We had about 10 seconds to speak. She sounded very good, if 10 seconds means anything. She called me her Poppy. Which meant a lot to me. That proved she didn't mean the things she'd said on that video.
Me: Did you feel relief talking to her?
Felipe: Yes, for 10 seconds.

I was at a loss here. I felt like a tourist, or a gossip columnist. That wasn't my intention, even though Felipe had called me. Was this how real reporters felt? If it was, I felt a need never to become one.

Felipe: I haven't spoken or heard from my mother since. The people who have her reached out two weeks ago and asked for money again. Less than the first time. I was just about to fly to Florida for spring training and they do that, so I don't come up.
Me: Are you actively involved in the search?
Felipe: I try. I go to the police every day and ask for a report. Sometimes they have something. Most times they don't. I sit in my mother's house quite a bit and look at her door. I'm going to turn it into a table. When she comes back, we'll have our first meal at that table.
Me: Are you working out or in baseball shape?
Felipe: Ehh. I'd be lying if I said my body was ready. My mind is nowhere near ready.
Me: So coming up right now isn't an option?
Felipe: Not for me.

I can't imagine what he's going through. He thought it was interesting that my father, "Red" Scott, had offered to switch places with Felipe's mother during the winter since he hates the cold weather up north. Felipe said it wouldn't work. "I already asked if I could take her place and they said no."

I thanked him for his call and told him we all hoped for the best. He asked me to make a point of thanking the guys on the team for their phone calls and emails. He also said that, even if what I wrote the other day was true, that he'd been appointed captain, he wouldn't have accepted. "I'm not captain material," he said.

He's not. He's better than that. Pray for his mother and pray for that family. Let's hope this ends peacefully.

Recants and Recusals

2008-03-06T05:39:00.005-05:00

I posted yesterday about how the team, and more specifically, manager Rick Churches and GM Alvin Kirby, had appointed as captain Felipe Lopez, a man who has been on the team for only 1 disappointing season and has yet to appear (not his fault) in camp. Then I spent my remaining space giving my opinions on why this was done and why it probably wasn't a good idea.

Newsflash: I was wrong about the whole thing. Felipe was never named captain.

I received calls up the wazoo yesterday from people asking for my source. The team was inundated with calls and emails asking for details. Rick and Alvin received many bloodthirsty headlines filled with criticism of the decision.

The team officially denied everything. Rick and Alvin denied everything. Why? My story was untrue.

It's not that I was playing an early April Fool's joke. Rather, I think a prank was played on me. And "prank" is a kind word. More likely, I was purposely given misleading information to make me look bad.

It worked.

My super agent, Jack Perry, is also Felipe's agent. About 10 minutes after I clicked on Publish Post, I got a call from his #1 assistant, Sherry. (I once said to her, "If you married Jack, you know your name would be Sherry Perry?" I thought it was funnier than she did.) Sherry (last name Pollock) said Jack wanted to know what I was doing. I told her I was about to go pee. Why? She said no, not that. Why was I posting something made up and, frankly, unflattering about a teammate who's currently undergoing the most trying time of his life? I told her because it was true. She said she'd call later.

Jack himself called me an hour later. "It's not true. Take it back." He spoke with Felipe, who had no idea that this storm was brewing because he hadn't spoken with Rick or Alvin in weeks. (Thus refuting Rick's statement yesterday that Felipe would be here by March 15th whether they rescue his mother or not.) Felipe also said - and I give him credit here - that he never would accept the position as captain when there are so many other guys on the team who deserved it. He used me as an example. The guilt oozed out of my pores.

Let the wild rumpus start.

The press, and rightfully so, are writing about how they always (not always, but they won't say that) get a secondary source to confirm a story before they write something. This is going to begin a whole new round of blogosphere criticisms, how readers should trust professional journalists before trusting people like, uh, me.

Rick called me into his office first thing this morning and threatened to fine me $50,000 if I ever write another "inflammatory, untrue account" of "team dynamics." His statement was pretty broad. When asked to elaborate, he told me he had real work to do. He left me standing in his office while he took his bat and glove out to practice field #3 to shag balls.

The main question: Who/what was my source? The other main question: Why did I publish this story? The third question: Is it really that big of a deal?

Since the press deluged me with questions and accusations at my locker, none of which I would answer since we don't speak on the record, I will answer the main question the way they'd approve of if I was one of them: I won't reveal my source. I don't have to. I can tell you this person avoided me today. I will tell you this person has a lot of questions to answer from me. Was I set up? I don't know yet. I'm going to try to find out. Why would I possibly be set up? I have some thoughts, but they're all paranoid. I'll sleep on it and work on my theories tomorrow.

I published the story because I thought it was true. Yes, I told Rick and Alvin a couple of weeks ago that I'd wait for them to make major team announcements before I posted anything, unless the announcement was about me. I broke my promise, but not on purpose. I figured everyone would have jumped on it right away. Nobody did because the story wasn't true. I was given misinformation; I was the only one given this misinformation. I was wrong to have published it. I am very embarrassed and very sorry.

I take it back.

Now, is this all a big deal? Not in the scheme of the whole world. It's a non-story when compared to who our next president is going to be or how many of our soldiers were hurt or killed in Iraq already this month. From a worldly perspective, it's not a big deal at all. I saw, however, that it is being treated like a big deal. Katie Couric did a whole thing about this last night on the CBS Evening News With Walter Cronkite. The NY Times had something on their front page - not the sports section - about how this story was symptomatic of the problem with "amateur journalism" and "the ego of the masses." Or, in my case, a "massive ego." Just take my embarrassment quotient and multiply it by ten. Summing this part up, it's not a big deal compared to the real world, but you'd never know it.

From a team and personal perspective, yes, it's a pretty big deal. I've already told you how embarrassing this is. But even more important, I was misled by someone who I never would have thought would have misled me like this; someone I've known for a long time. That's more than disappointing. I will have a conversation with this person. Just need to find him (or her) first.

Teamwise, I created dissension when there didn't need to be any. I wrote how a number of guys who've been with the team for a long time would be mad that Felipe was made captain. This was very, very true. There was some serious Felipe Bashing going on inside this locker room yesterday late. None of it needed to happen. Not one word needed to be said against this innocent man; my teammate. The reactions were based on an untruth. I owe a huge apology to Felipe. I owe a big one to my team as well. I'm sure they feel quite guilty today. They're embarrassed too. That part is all my fault and doesn't help us win a championship. It just distracts them from their - our - goal. Sorry.

Where do I go from here? Nowhere. I admit my mistake. I apologize for it. I won't make any excuses for what I wrote or why I wrote it. I can whine about how I was probably set up (I probably was), but without proof or reason, what's the point? Setup or not, I hurt Felipe and I hurt my team. I hope that's something I never do again.

Here's something that I think is very important: I am not going to stop writing this blog. My face is getting sore from the amount of blushing I've been doing since yesterday, yet that won't stop me from doing this. I'd be more embarrassed, my "massive ego" would take a bigger hit, if I did stop. I'd rather swallow my pride and apologize than stomp on it and quit. No, I'm in this for the long haul, taking my bumps and bruises as I go. I hope you stay along for the ride.

Absent Captain

2008-03-05T13:00:00.005-05:00

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.

18 Holes of Darkness

2008-03-04T05:56:00.004-05:00

On Sunday, Mrs. Joan Delaney celebrated the one year anniversary of her majority ownership of the team and regional sports network, NYS. I think her purchase price was in the $800 million range, of which she accounted for about 60% on her own. She comes from political stock; my dad says he would have voted for Mrs. Delaney's father's Massachusetts senate campaign back in the 1960s, but he wasn't the type to vote back then. Not sure if he is today, for that matter.

The group of investors she put together to fund the remaining 40% ranged from the Hip Hop star KC9 (we see him the most during the season) to her husband, Anthony DiMaeo, a Queens-based real estate developer. Mr. DiMaeo is a fixture here this spring, constantly bringing clients around the various practice fields to meet with various players, take a hack in the cage, or just absorb the scene around our Fort Pierce complex. A couple of the guys have complained about the quality of Mr. DiMaeo's clientele, like how things wind up missing from the locker room after one of his "backstage" tours. But he's an owner. What's ours is kind of his, to a degree, so there's not a lot we can do without causing a major uproar.

On Sunday, Mrs. Delaney took the team for a golf outing. While it sounds nice, another minor uproar flared up since the outing took place after a noon game in which we were clobbered 16 to 2. (We're 1 and 5 right now, if you're keeping track, even though the games don't count.) Most of the guys wanted to spend the rest of the afternoon with their families, or away from each other. But, as I said before, she's an owner. The majority owner. There was a little pressure on us to go.

There are 60 players in camp this spring. Because some can't walk or move, 47 of us went on the outing. It was at a place called the Brystal Springs Golf Club in St. Lucie, about half an hour away. We weren't able to tee off until 4:30. The name of the game was Rush. From when a team teed off, they had one hour to play all 18 holes. Not the way most of our resident golfers liked to play, but it was the only way to finish before dark. A couple guys grumbled that we should have played next Sunday, after daylight savings time starts. But I assume Mrs. Delaney had to be somewhere else then.

My team consisted of Mrs. Delaney, GM Alvin Kirby, manager Rick Churches, and me. I'm a horrible golfer and even worse around authority figures. And since I've had nothing but trouble with two of these three authority figures since November, I found the composition of our team somewhat interesting.

Mrs. Delaney is a great golfer. She told us how she was one of the top female amateur golfers in the country while growing up. Her hole-in-one on the fifth hole reminded us of this fact.

I am a terrible golfer. Like bowling, the game of golf fools around negatively with some of the muscles I use for baseball, so I rarely play and, when I do, don't take it seriously.

Before our group teed off - we were the last of 15 groups to go (Mr. DiMaeo brought 2 groups of his own to our "team" outing and KC9 had a group) - I told my team that I stink. I specifically asked them, "Are you going to take this seriously?" They shook their heads. No, was the consensus. There were just out to have a good time.

By the second hole, I could tell they were lying. Rick was swearing up and down the green. Alvin did the opposite and wouldn't speak at all. Mrs. Delaney was doing well, so she agreed to be the designated driver of the cart. I fell into an early hole (pun intended) and was 17 strokes behind Mrs. Delaney by the fifth.

It was around the eighth hole that things bubbled over a bit. Rick missed a birdie and threw his club at the ball, sitting about half an inch from the cup. I laughed. Because I suck, didn't care that I sucked, and didn't care about the score, I had that ability. "Shut the f**k up, Jimmy," Rick said. Mrs. Delaney told him to hush. She's got a pretty salty mouth of her own, but she could tell the acid in Rick's stomach was reaching his tongue.

Alvin, who as a general manager needs to keep his emotions in check at all times, fell apart at the tenth hole. A simple three-inch put veered a hair to the left. Alvin took his putter and snapped it in two over his knee after that.

A second hole-in-one by Mrs. Delaney on the thirteenth cemented her victory, with 5 holes to go. The sun was setting and I'd more than given up twelve holes before. By now, I was more spectator than player, swinging wildly, missing balls, and cheating when possible. Rick went berserk at one point, running after a ball I'd thrown about 25 yards and bringing it back to me. He said I either play by the rules or get off his team. There was a double-meaning there that I chose to ignore. I swung my club like a baseball bat and hit the ball into a sand trap. If it wasn't almost night, I would have made a castle or two, but we were now battling the fading light as well as each other. There wasn't time to play in the sand.

On the 18th hole, I sent Rick and Alvin into a tantrum and muted frenzy, respectively, by coming closest to the hole with a hole in one of my own. Mrs. Delaney told me of a "kinship" she felt with me, the way I'd come back from adversity to succeed. There was a double-meaning there that I chose to embrace. "Thank you," I said. "You inspire me." The whites of Rick's eyes literally turned red and the top of his skull blew off from a cranial steam explosion, just like a cartoon. If it wasn't so dark, I'd have taken a picture.

We had a team dinner to follow. Like with the golf game, significant others weren't invited, so there was quite a bit of quiet discontent. Our Sunday had become a complete washout, what with workouts, the baseball game, and this team outing. But many of us are millionaires; we'll be able to afford plenty of time with our families once we're done with our baseball careers. Mrs. Delaney, who's close to a billionaire, mentioned to me during our game that some people in life need to remember where they came from, while others need to know where they are. As I stood next to Rick, who was playing a game of Rush with a shot of something strong at the bar, I repeated Mrs. Delaney's words. He looked at me and told me to go to hell.

There was no double meaning there. I chose to ignore him anyway.

Remembering A Best Friend

2008-03-03T06:11:00.004-05:00

I've gone back to doing something I haven't done in years - carrying a baseball with me wherever I go. I stopped when I began to feel stupid. People would see me and think I was looking for attention. Or they'd ask me to sign it and hand it over. One guy at a sushi joint in LA even tried to steal it from me. But now I'm allegedly more mature. I remembered how holding the ball all the time helped me (except when driving). It created a feeling of "oneness." Not sure if I'm explaining myself well. Let me reboot.

There are days, not just during spring training, when players go through a "dead arm" period. There's no injury. It's mainly fatigue. Your body hasn't caught up with all of the things you want to do, so it rebels. You lift your arm and it feels like it's 500 pounds. This can screw up your legs, your mechanics, your head... It's best, during this period, to slow down, take a few days, and recharge.

I used to never get dead arms because of how I always held a ball. I'd take it everywhere with me, to workouts, to meals, to meetings, even to bed. For years I did this. And for years a baseball was like a second skin. It felt as natural in my hand as hair felt on my head. Now that I am in the full out process (and hopefully drawn out process) of going through male pattern baldness, hair on my head is no longer necessarily the most natural feeling. (ed. note: I took a break at this point to spend 20 minutes in front of a mirror, trying to push my scalp forward. Of course, all that did was wrinkle my forehead and nose and shift the impending baldness to the back of my neck. I looked like an insecure bulldog.) Uh, trying to get back on track. Hmm. Okay, I figured it out. Basically, I didn't get dead arms because of how a baseball felt in my hand. Something about how the muscles in the hand and forearm were always being used; something about my grip being employed so often the arm was pretty much in shape 365 days out of the year. And since I wasn't throwing much in the off season, the muscles were kept strong without the stress of an additional 4000 pitches.

Then I stopped. And guess what? The dead arms began.

I never missed a scheduled game in my whole career until last year, when I missed 34 of my possible 35 starts. Was this because I'd stopped with the year-round baseball exercise? Had all of my muscles atrophied enough that they never came back, allowing my UCL to fray and eventually snap?

I've thought about this a lot over the last month or so. No doctors have told me there's any medical evidence to support my theory. Yet, they also said that going back to holding the ball all the time couldn't hurt me. In fact, since I didn't really hold one at all from last April to this December, it would probably help my mind become familiar once again with my best friend, especially since I have a new elbow that wasn't introduced until recently.

The lesson for all of you out there? If something works for you, don't stop. Don't let your mother or your spousal equivalent or your pals convince you you're bananas. Who cares if people think you're a little quirky? Keep it up.

For me, it's nice to know I still have a healthy relationship with a piece of cowhide, some tightly wrapped string, and a handful of stitches. (FYI - don't try licking a baseball. There's no chocolate center.) Like any best friend, it has answered my call and been there for me when I needed him the most.

Here We Go Again

2008-02-29T06:09:00.004-05:00

You probably saw in the notes section of your paper today that Mike Murphy, who was signed to a 4-year deal 3 years ago and has pitched in 27 games (he was projected to have started 90+) suffered another setback yesterday. After showering, Mike used his hair dryer (I wish I still had the need for one) on high. Apparently, he was talking to someone and lost track of time. By holding the dryer with his right (pitching) arm cocked in place for too long, as if he was holding a gun, his hand and elbow stiffened up on him. Apparently, they had to pry the still-running dryer (couldn't anybody find the off switch?) out of his hand with, no joke, a pair of pliers and a screwdriver. His hand turned out to have a minor cramp, but his elbow - connected to his arm which is connected to his two-time surgically repaired shoulder - suffered severe swelling. After an MRI came back, it was announced that Mike had torn his UCL and would miss the entire season.

I feel horrible for the guy, who wanted to live up to his $56 million contract in the worst way. He'll never throw another pitch for us. It's a shame.

Mike is an example of all that has gone wrong for this team since we last won a championship in 2000. Terrible injuries (his, mine), age (me again), male pattern baldness (not valid for this discussion, but me again), underperforming superstars (I won't raise my hand for fear of damaging a shoulder), rookies out of their league, poor management... Across the board, we have made mistake after mistake while suffering from more than our fair share of bad luck.

I could tell the mood around here wasn't that of a winning, optimistic atmosphere after the latest Mike Murphy injury. Even our new high-ceiling guys - Kai Goto, Lyman Gaye - showed concern. This is part superstition, yes. But when superstition crawls into your psyche, it's damn hard to shed it and play as well as you're capable of playing.

There's not a lot a person can do to combat superstition. Manager, and my new buddy in detente, Rick Churches, has since banned hair dryers from the clubhouse, which will probably negatively affect GE stock for the next 12 months.

But there's superstition and there's also just bad, or in Mike's case, dumb luck. The worst injury of this sort that I know of happened to Yancy Breckman about ten years ago. That off season, he was dating a deaf girl and desperate to take things (you know what I mean) as far as they could go in the relationship. He tried to teach himself sign language and, in a bout of enthusiasm, poked himself in his right eye, damaging his cornea. The (then) lifetime .300 hitter didn't ever play a full season again and never hit higher than .220.

If manager back then, I wonder if Rick would have banned fingers from the clubhouse.

As for me, I'm scheduled to throw off a mound tomorrow for the first time. Nothing crazy. I'm not throwing all of my pitches yet. But my core and lower body feel great; honestly, better than they've felt in years. I've pulled back from three-a-day workouts to two-a-days. Our strength & conditioning coach Will Twain wants me to think full season now. He's concerned that I'll be exhausted in August.

We're 0 and 2 so far this spring, which doesn't mean anything. However, our owner, Mrs. Joan Delaney, is scheduled to be here this weekend. I just hope she's careful on her plane. We don't want her to strain her back getting up out of her seat.

Rick would probably ban air travel from the clubhouse for the rest of the season.

The Cosa Nostra Sit-Down

2008-02-28T05:43:00.005-05:00

Since I beat the team through arbitration in my grievance with them on Monday, I had zero contact with anyone in management since - until today. I read the things Alvin said in the paper, which wasn't much since he was just coming back from his, what turned out to be, self-imposed suspension after the allegations against him of sexual assault. Reporters beat him down with questions about that (to which he could only answer a scant few) before someone brought up our grievance proceeding. I give him credit for using his sense of optimism. "If the worst news for me this year is Jimmy Scott playing for this team at half of who he used to be, I'll be having a pretty good year."

It was nice to hear him say something like that. Neither he nor Rick Churches have supported me very much since last season ended. I think part of that had to do with the way last season ended, with the controversy around (former) manager Larry Picketts and his criticism of the organization (peppered with some unprintable language - unprintable in any language). Spring training always brings hope for a new season. Maybe Alvin caught of whiff of hope and felt like spreading some goodwill toward his men.

Rick's another story. His first year at the helm here, and first year out of the broadcast booth in the last 18, Rick is trying to be part Marine drill sergeant and part teddy bear with everyone down here. His approach varies depending upon the situation, and I laud him for being flexible. The only person he hasn't been flexible with is...me.

I don't really know why.

Last week, in a rare moment of us being in the same room together for longer than it takes to sneeze, I asked him if he was upset that my father replaced him in the TV booth and now he had two different Scotts in two different forums available to skewer him when he makes a mistake. I meant it as a joke. My father, "Red" Scott, doesn't criticize from the TV booth. Like Alvin in spring training, "Red," when on the air, finds a piece of good in almost every event pertaining to a baseball game. There's virtually nothing Rick can do to face the wrath of "Red" Scott. And it's not my place here to openly Monday Morning Quarterback his every move.

He didn't think my joke was funny.

So when I beat the team on Monday, nothing from him. Nothing Tuesday or Wednesday. A couple of unnamed teammates (they have names, we all do, but I am just choosing here not to release them to the public without accepting monetary bribes first) told me, peppered with Larry Picketts-style bad language, that I should do something to fix this standoff. Rick's Marine drill sergeant act was wearing thin and they would soon take their frustration out on me (unless I offered them monetary bribes first).

So I called super agent Jack Perry and asked him to set up a meeting, an old fashioned, mob-style, Cosa Nostra sit-down, between Rick, Alvin and me at Morton's, a steakhouse in Ft. Pierce not far from our complex. No agent present. No assistant GMs jockeying for a seat closest to Alvin. No cameras or reporters.

They had one objection. They claimed I'm a reporter. What the f*ck, I said to Jack. I'm no more reporter than they are Marines. "Then stop blogging," Jack said. I conceded the point for the sake of team unity. They could invite one reporter to attend. But he had to be objective, I said. I'm sure they laughed at that one. An objective baseball columnist is as common as a four leaf clover in Baghdad. They chose Steve Guttman from the New York Independent.

I like Steve as a person. He's written some nice things about me in the past. In the more recent past, he hasn't. But his agenda is readership. Not skewership.

As I'm not talking to the media, I told Steve when we all sat down that everything I said was off the record. Immediately, Rick and Alvin objected. They said I couldn't post anything they said then. Our sit-down had become a standoff.

Steve suggested he call his editor, Mark Patton, who has covered the NY sports scene for almost 40 years. "Mark's seen everything," Steve said. "Let him reconcile this."

After arguing whose cell phone to use (nobody wanted to pay for the long-distance call), Steve said he'd use his. He put it on speaker and talked. Mark laughed for about 90 seconds before he told us how ridiculous we all were. Rick intervened and said we called for advice, not an intervention. Mark apologized through what sounded like a wide smile and said I should allow Steve to print my comments, as long as he slanted the comments in terms of a conversation he heard, not a direct interview with me. That kind of made sense, although I knew Mark's allegiance was to his paper and Steve before it was to me and my "cause." His suggestion was as slanted as his viewpoint. I quick-called super agent Jack Perry for his counsel and he told me to just do it and to stop calling him so he could do some work. I disagreed with everyone but knew I was outmanned and had been outflanked. I realized I should have thought about the issue before agreeing to having a reporter present. But, as Vanessa, my lovely and occasionally encouraging wife, knows I'm not one to think things through before acting. Case in point: This blog.

Steve took out a recorder and put it on the table. I told him to turn it off. Notes only. My voice would not be recorded. "Stealing your soul, Jimmy?" Rick said. I smiled and said no. I just didn't want him to get his fat hands on it to play for the world in a press conference the next day. Steve pulled it away and began writing furiously.

Alvin asked if we could start. I agreed and called over the waiter. It was time to order. Rick complained he hadn't had time to look at the menu. I told him we were at Morton's. They served steak. Order a f*cking steak. Steve wrote furiously, breaking the tip off of his pen and looking for a sharpener. Alvin patted Rick on the shoulder and told him to settle down. I asked for the NY sirloin, medium rare, and a water.

We all ordered, Steve got a new pen, and had our privacy back (we were in a meeting room, not the general dining room which was filled with early birds having dinner at 2:30 in the afternoon). The words began to fly from Alvin.

Alvin's a good man. Allegations aside, I know when it comes to baseball and our team, he wants us to win. He's willing to deal with the 25 personalities on a ballclub, as well as the personalities of the coaching staff, the front office staff, ownership, and the other 29 GMs trying to beat him. It's a tough job that I would never want to attempt, even for a day.

He spoke eloquently about the problems we've had with each other, going back to November. He addressed some miscommunication between his staff and my agent. He addressed their frustration at my "duplicitous" nature - allegedly agreeing to retire, then not, then turning toward this public forum and turning away from traditional media. He explained that, at the time, they believed their tact of using a second opinion from a doctor who never even examined me to force me to retire was the right move, even though, yes, it came back to embarrass the team. And he apologized for Rick's stubbornness throughout the entire affair.

In my rebuttal, I explained I was upset the moment they approached me about not invoking my personal option to play this year, about pushing their "youth movement" stance that led to them signing 3 free agents older than 33. I said that if any party had been "duplicitous," it had been them; that their "miscommunication" with my super agent was what led them to believe I was "duplicitous," and since he admitted to a "miscommunication" with Jack, in turn, Alvin should also admit that I had not been "duplicitous" at all.

"We're getting caught up in tiny details," Alvin said. "Let's move on."

"Sure," I said. "As long as you stop bringing up tiny details."

He didn't say anything. I turned to Rick, my new field manager, the man at the table who, going forward, really held the power. I had my roster spot. I was going to play this year. Alvin was committed to my being on the team at some point. But Rick - he was the one who either would or would not put me in the game. And he knew this. That's why he was sitting up straighter than anyone else, wearing the smirk he bought in the off season to show off to me.

"You hate me," I said to him, hoping to jump start a dialog.

Rick said nothing. Steve stopped taking notes and watched. Then, there was this exchange:

Alvin: Rick doesn't hate you.
Me: Yes he does.
Alvin: No he doesn't.
Waiter: How is everything?
Rick: Get the f*ck out of here.
Me: See? He's not a happy man when I'm around. Alvin, you'll have to leave an extra-large tip because of Rick's outburst. He's already cost you a loss in my arbitration. If he keeps this up all year, the team won't be able to afford to pay for its dry cleaning bill.
Rick: I don't hate you.

It was strange. At that moment, I could tell that he didn't hate me. At that moment, maybe he didn't. But moments pass, replaced by new ones. I stayed on my toes in case a bad moment was around the corner.

Rick: I despise you. I loathe you. I can't stand you. But I don't hate you.
Me: You getting this, Steve? He can repeat it if you need him to.
Steve: I get the gist.
Me: We just don't want you to misquote him.
Steve: As long as you don't.
Me: I'm wired. We're cool.

It was right about here that Rick flipped out. The moment had definitely passed.

Rick jumped up from the table and approached me very quickly, yelling about how I probably was wired and the whole tape recorder discussion half an hour before was a sham, how everything about me was a sham, how my whole career had been a scam.

I commented on the rhythm of his rhyme scheme while Alvin stood between us. Then I said I wasn't wired. He be better off if he didn't listen to conversations other people wee having.

Alvin told me it was okay to climb out of the fetal position I had coiled into under the table. We all sat back down and tried to have a civilized conversation.

Rick: Don't undermine me. That's all I ask.
Me: Why would I do that?
Rick: Because you hate me back.
Me: You realize you just admitted that you hated me.
Rick: I do now.

The moment really had passed.

Me: No, I don't want to undermine you.
Alvin: No breaking news before we release a statement. No comments on personnel without running it through me. No criticisms of anyone sitting at the table.
Me: Should I ask Congress to revoke the entire first amendment?
Rick: Don't be a wise ass all the time.
Me: Don't try to control something you have no control over.
Rick: You have no idea the pressure a manager is under.
Me: I don't.
Rick: Just cut me some slack.
Me: Promise you won't try to hit me?
Rick: No.
Me: You have to leave your paranoia at your bungalow before coming to the ballpark each day. I'm not out to get you. I'm not out to get Alvin, or Steve, or anyone else. I want to get healthy, play baseball, and have a little control over my life.
Rick: You're talking from both sides. You complain that we're too controlling then you claim you want control.
Me: Yes. I'm a control freak. I'm due back at the circus in ten minutes, so let's wrap this up.

One of my problems is my nervous energy. If I don't have a baseball in my hand, I don't deal with the my internal goings-on too well. I sound like a wise ass. Unlikable. Unfriendly. Deep down, or not so deep, I know I'm just as insecure as Rick. I've just won more games than him, that's all.

I apologized then. A flat out, straight-from-the-heart, truly sincere apology. No sarcasm. No witty remarks. I said I was sorry. I told Rick that he did have a high-pressure job. And even though neither one of us, obviously, believed either one of us should be in the shoes we stand in, we should each step back and try to start fresh. I promised to be objective in my comments about team management. No, I wouldn't submit my posts to Alvin's office for editing. But I'd do a responsible job of self-editing. I wouldn't break news unless it applied to me, because, frankly, the team had a pretty lousy track record of late when it came to making announcements about me. I said I'd be more open with them about my rehab progress, but they had to be more open with me (through super agent Jack Perry, of course) about their feelings.

Then the strangest thing happened. Rick offered to shake my hand. I never thought I'd see it. This man, who admitted to hating me, reached out to me. At that moment, he was a better man than me. I shook it, knowing that moments pass into the next. Tomorrow, he may change his mind again. Maybe even sooner. But I promise it won't be because of me. For now on, if somebody's going to hate me, I'm going to have nothing to do with it.

Back To School

2008-02-27T06:23:00.003-05:00

Our first game against a team other than ourselves is this afternoon. We play the Riptide, who are trying to make all 3 of their fans call them The Tide. The game is in West Palm Beach, about an hour's drive from Ft. Pierce, and most of the regulars will stay behind with most of the coaches. It's not worth it yet to do the bus thing - the whole travel thing - when timing is still off, muscles are still being acclimated, and minds are still soft from an off season of Wii.

I'd be staying behind anyway, since I'm not as far along as many of my teammates. I've been throwing off of flat ground for a couple of weeks now and will throw a bullpen session to live batters (it's hard to find dead ones who can swing away) over the weekend.

Coming off of a major injury like mine takes a lot of patience and lots of hard work. I admittedly didn't rehab as hard as I should have right after my surgery last April 5th. If I had, there would have been a decent chance that I could have gone north with the team and been able to pitch that first week of the season. Instead, the plan is for me to be available by May 1 to contribute to the team.

So it's been me and Mike Murphy, who had a second shoulder surgery last June (he might be back by September, although no one is sure since he only threw 3 innings last year and 37 in 2006), kind of tossing the ball to each other like babies and listening to Bobby Spencer, our pitching coach, who's trying to teach us new ways to throw that will relieve stress on our surgically repaired parts.

How does it feel to re-learn how to pitch? It's weird. If you're right handed, take a baseball in your left hand, go into your motion, and see how it feels to throw your fastball. Awkward, huh? When I throw lefty, I throw like a girl (no offense, you dames). Throwing with my newer motion on my natural right side is kind of like me throwing like a lefty girl. Not as awkward, but just awkward enough to feel a little weird. Bobby says with repetition, I should get a good feel soon. He also says I should be able to reclaim a few miles an hour on my fastball, which was topping off around 88 right before my UCL and me got into that very public, and violent, argument. If I could get into the low 90s, and still have the movement I used to have, I could be pretty good. Maybe 2008 wouldn't have to be my last year...

That's what goes through your head during this process. You keep looking forward to the future because the present is so tough and, let's face it, boring. That means I have to not only re-learn how to pitch, I have to re-learn the old "Take it one day at a time, one game at a time, one inning at a time" line of thinking. That's a different kind of discipline. Being that most big leaguers are just big babies, and big babies want everything NOW, it's very difficult to teach us patience. But I'm working hard on that part of my game as well.

The rest of the coaching staff is doing the same with not only the other players coming off injury or off season "procedures," i.e. cleaning out a knee, but with the guys who are trying to improve off of last season, which on our team is most everyone.

It is a strange sight to see Chazz Waters back in camp. I know - and he knows, and the press knows, and you know - he wasn't Rick's first choice to be bench coach, but he's got a pedigree here. Two World Championship Series rings with us (1996, 2000) is nothing to sniff at (I don't know what that phrase means). And since we haven't been very competitive since left in 2002, maybe a little of his past will rub off on some of the guys here. And Rick, who can probably learn a thing or two from Chazz, especially since this is Rick's first camp as a manager.

Gums Murphy, our resident octogenarian who managed us for two "glorious" (his word) weeks at the end of last season (the team went 2 and 11 under his helm), is teaching bunting to anyone who will listen. He's also got lots of stories about the days when players took trains between cities and the farthest west anyone would go was St. Louis. Very different from today. But so is Gums.

By the way, Willie Fernandez, who we all remember as our third baseman who caught the last out of the 2000 Series team, is here as our new infield and third base coach. Willie's in great shape and could probably still hit a few home runs off the bench if he had wanted. But for him, coaching is less stressful on his knees. I haven't had five surgeries on mine, so I can't make too much fun of him for hanging up his spikes and waving other guys around third base to score. I can still make a little fun of him. It's more fun that way.

Home game tomorrow against the Sky that will be broadcast on NYS. That will be my dad's first game on the air for us. Listen in and see what he says about me. I'll be in the dugout watching the action. Who knows, maybe I'll learn a thing or two as well.

Zookeepers

2008-02-26T06:18:00.003-05:00

They got me. I promised, back in January, that I wouldn't speak with the media this season. I pretty much didn't even when Diane Sawyer came to our home a week later and have been able to keep that promise to myself since.

Until this morning.

I was in the clubhouse this morning around 7:15. One of our trainers, Bing Levine, was working on my elbow, kneading it like bread dough, when I got a call on my cell phone. As I was one-handed, and it was very early, I picked up, assuming it was Vanessa. Instead, it was "Ted from Accounting" who wanted to go over my last paycheck to make sure they took out the right amount of FICA.

"Ted" had a deep, professional kind of voice. And he kept asking personal questions that had nothing to do with FICA, like if I spent my money wisely, did I use it to pay for the logo at the top of this page, would I consider donating some to his "charity for reformed former virgins."

It was around then that I realized "Ted" was either a crazy fan who somehow got my number, some other blogger or a person trying out his snarkiness. I was close. It was a Z-100 radio phone scam. After he revealed himself, I offered an embarrassed laugh and asked where they got my number. The DJ guy (I don't listen to the station) said he couldn't reveal his sources. Ha ha.

He asked me if I realized he was a member of the media and I'd broken my "sacred vow" to never speak with the media again. I responded that it was a season-long vow with an option to renew and I didn't consider a Morning Zoo disc jockey to be the media. "You're more like the cousin nobody wants around but has to put up with because you exist."

He then asked me if I'd appear on their show every week, since they weren't really The Media. I said no. They couldn't afford me. Then I told them it was time to wrap it up. I was having arm transplant surgery in an hour and the cadaver had just arrived. Right before I hung up, I heard one of the other Zookeepers mention it must have been a gorilla cadaver. Another hearty ha ha.

So they got me. They scammed me. I was punk'd. I was on Candid Camera (phone).

Bing asked who had called and I looked at him while he wrapped a steaming hot towel around my multi-million dollar elbow. "Just my cousin. I'm not talking to him anymore."

"Must've been a bad call," Bing said.

"He works in a zoo," I replied. "I hope they never let him out."

And The Winner Is...

2008-02-25T06:07:00.004-05:00

Me. Just got word that the arbitrator, Benezir Sutton, ruled in favor of me in my grievance against the team. I don't owe them the $500,000 fine for writing this blog ("conduct detrimental to the team, its stakeholders and fans") for the month of November (plus an additional $100,000 per month for December, January and February). And I can now participate 100% in all drills with the team, since they can't force me to retire and they can't force me to sit on the sidelines so they can collect on the insurance.

The team, of course, said they would try to work something out anyway with the insurance company, but that makes no sense to me since I'll be playing baseball this season. Not sure what they expect the men in suits to do for them. But Nick Curtis, Assistant GM, has been running the team for the last two weeks and he said that to the press. Maybe it was the wrong thing to say, because not two hours after we get word of our victory, we heard that the team reinstated GM Alvin Kirby. The sexual assault charges against him are pending, but these things take months, sometimes a year or two, to get resolved. I guess the team thought there's no harm in letting somebody who's qualified work for them rather than sit on his ass and watch cartoons all day.

So, in effect, the team made two transactions today: 1) Jimmy Scott (me in the third person) is back (and not being forced to sit on my ass and watch cartoons all day) and 2) Alvin Kirby is back. I've requested a slumber party to celebrate, but I don't think Alvin would be interested in hanging out with me right now. Although I do think a pillow fight may have been a better way for us to work out our differences than going to a full arbitration panel.

With that behind me, I feel like a weight has been lifted off of my shoulders. That burden is gone. I can just concentrate on playing baseball now and am truly excited.

Now if I could just get over this cold I caught from one of our clubhouse guys. Then I wouldn't have to worry about sneezing on all of the hands that I want to shake and be able to hold my head up high as a winner.

Motivationally Speaking

2008-02-22T05:43:00.005-05:00

Our new esteemed manager Rick Churches spoke to the full team yesterday. With nearly every man on the roster now reported to camp, this was Rick's first opportunity to get everybody in one room to hear him philosophize.

I'll give him one thing - the man can speak. There's a reason why he was in our TV booth for the last eight years (replaced by my father, "Red" Scott). It's his voice. He's got a golden throat. If Obama needs a VP who has similar oratory skills as himself, he should turn to Rick Churches.

These speeches are generally closed-off from the media. The purpose from Day 1 down here is Team. We win as a team, we lose as a team, etc. You've heard it before. Having this one team meeting, with just us, helps the spiritual bond between players and each other, as well as players and management. Imagine if every discussion between you and your significant other was held in front of a gaggle of reporters, all wearing identical khakis and collared polo shirts, each asking you to hurry up so they could meet a deadline or update their blog. It's important to have some private time so we can be ourselves, so we can feel inspired or motivated by our leader and reflect personally or with each other without 3rd party interference.

As you know, Rick chose yesterday's team forum to be a public affair. I'm not certain why he went this route, although I have my opinions which I'll share with you now. Well, it's not really opinions, with an s. I have one opinion - the man knows he has a fabulous voice and wants others to share in its fabulousness whenever it's put to good use. That said, the inspiration and motivation we, or at least I, was supposed to feel did not happen.

Blah. That's how I felt when he was done. (53 minutes! He lost me at mile marker 10.) Yes, he and I are on different personal wavelengths. There's been more than a little animosity between the two of us this off season. But I didn't go in there to criticize him. I went in there to be impressed. I wanted to be moved. I wasn't.

As he spoke, I thought back to last year's speech that former manager Larry Picketts (he of the YouTube tirade now viewed over 850,000 times) gave. I wasn't moved then. So I thought back some more. 2004-2006 was all Larry. Nope. I didn't feel anything. 2003 with Vance Dunn? Nothing. Our most recent championship was in 2002, Gum Wilson's last year on the job, allegedly, before coming back to be Rick's bench coach this season at GM Alvin Kirby's behest (does that mean the bench is a hot seat?). Gum definitely didn't inspire with his words. Not of much use for them, he led by letting us play. He could push buttons like any of today's best videogame fiends. He motivated us by letting us win. His spring training state of the union addresses? Terrible. Five minutes and out. I felt nothing.

As I drove to my afternoon session with Andy, my personal trainer, I wondered if it's not the speaker that has the problem; maybe the problem lies with me. Not one to admit anything could in any way be wrong with me, I quickly dialed Dr. Henry Cochegans, team psychiatrist (or is he a psychologist? Not sure the difference and always forget to ask.) to have a quick cellular session.

Luckily, Dr. Cochegans could speak with me for a few moments. After he reminded me of the non-disclosure agreement I signed, what you see below is just my input in the conversation. The NDA does not allow me to quote Dr. Cochegans in this forum. "For my own protection," he always says. Oops.

Dr. Cochegans:
Me: Getting stronger each day, in both mind, body and spirit.
Dr. Cochegans:
Me: Okay. Yes, I am aware "both" signifies two and I spoke of three characteristics. You going to analyze or criticize today?
Dr. Cohegans:
Me: Sorry I snapped at you. You probably get that all the time from the other guys on the team who speak to you, huh? What do they say? Be specific. Do they talk about me? They all hate me, right?
Dr. Cohegans:
Me: I'm not paranoid. I'm paranormal.
Dr. Cohegans: (Ed. note: I couldn't hear what he said here. I hit a bad cell area.)
Me: I need to talk about my lack of inspiration when I hear my managers speak.
Dr. Cohegans:
Me: You're saying it shouldn't matter what they say? It only matters how I feel inside?
Dr. Cohegans:
Me: Are you reading from a pamphlet or something? It takes me five minutes to tell you what I want to talk about and you give me your diagnosis in one sentence without letting me whine.
Dr. Cohegans:
Me: Okay. I'll listen to my heart, my soul, and find it within myself to succeed. I'll be an individual. Sounds like I never should have quit Boy Scouts.
Dr. Cohegans:
Me: Whatever.

I don't need to elaborate any further because, as Dr. Cohegans said, it's self-explanatory. Part of my problems with Rick have been because of me. I'm looking for something from him, as a manager, as a man, that he can't, or doesn't need to give. I need to look at myself and solve whatever riddles my subconscious is querying me about. No more relying on others to make me feel something. It's up to me to feel it on my own.

I talked to Andy, my very large personal trainer, about the previous paragraph (I practically recited it to him, word for word), and he said I was already motivating myself.

Andy: Why are you here?
Me: On earth? I guess all humans -

He turned the treadmill I was running on from high hill to Everest mountain.

Andy: No, dummy, why are you in this gymnasium working out? Why are you asking Dr. whatever his name is -
Me: Cohegans. It's really not that hard to say after some practice.
Andy: May I finish?
Me: (sulking and sweating a lot, my few hairs matted onto my scalp like wet string on the underside of a garbage can lid)
Andy: We've been doing two-a-days and three-a-days for months. I rarely have to raise my voice and egg you on. You're plenty motivated.
Me: (breathing very hard, unable to speak)
Andy: I always like these parts of our sessions. You can't get the last word in.

When I got back to the house Vanessa, the kids and I are renting down here, I told Vanessa all about my mentally (and physically) stimulating day. I told her how much Rick likes to hear himself talk, how I haven't really paid attention to what anyone in authority has said to me for at least 6 years, and how I will never scale Mt. Everest without the aid of a helicopter.

She smiled and told me we should celebrate by taking tomorrow afternoon off and going with the kids to Disney World. I told her I couldn't. I'm down here to work, even when practice is over, even on weekends, even when I'm about to drop from exhaustion. I'm down here to work. She smiled some more and told me she liked my answer. To her, it was inspiring. "Sounds to me like you should've been the one giving the speech to the team today."

I gave her a kiss and a long, tight hug. It felt good to hear her say that. And it felt even better to be able to respond without the glare of the media standing three feet away, khakis and polo shirts ready to pounce. Sometimes, the best motivation happens in the privacy of our own homes, in our own minds, in our own time.