Season's End, Seasons Start

 

So, the 2013 major league baseball season draws to a close the day before Halloween.  Now, those occasional Christmas commercials on TV won’t bother me as much.

With the Red Sox winning, Tim McCarver will take his profound insight into retirement.  Who will ever forget him criticizing Boston for holding the runner on with two outs in the bottom of the ninth and the Sox two runs ahead in game four?  I mean, that run didn’t matter, right?  Oops, the game ends with Red Sox pitcher Koji Uehara picking off pinch runner Kolten Wong.  What do you say to that, Tim?

Or how about the length of the games, the shortest one clocking in at 2:52.  That was game five, 3-1 Red Sox, with a total 13 hits and walks between both teams.  Just for fun, take a look at game seven of the 1960 World Series, Pirates over Yankees, 10-9.  One of the most exciting games in Series history, featuring 29 total hits and walks, took all of 2:36 to play, from first pitch to Bill Mazeroski hitting his walkoff homer.  Someone tell Bank of America or Fox Network (“Almost Human” premieres Sunday….)

           For me, the end of this season marks the start of the next two.  In a little over three months, catchers and pitchers report, and, a month after that, spring training will be in full swing.  By then, we should be in Florida, watching, waiting, hoping to see 12-inch softballs fly over the fence.  I shouldn’t be too much of a wreck by Opening Day.

A Short Visit

 

The Army of One, aka my daughter, arrived for a visit with dirty laundry, laptop, notebook, sundry journal articles and an appetite.  She was going to work on her senior thesis, have dinner with us and watch game four of the World Series.

I have two seats from Comiskey Park, a 40^th birthday gift from Michele, that come out for special occasions, like the White Sox playing in the World Series.  So, this was only a “couch” game, father sitting next to daughter asking mother about syntax and synonyms (e.g., for “participant”).  The game ended with a pickoff at first base, after which the PT Cruiser was loaded up and the visitor left.

A half-hour later came the back-at-school text message.  Otherwise, parents worry in a way they never did when their pride and joy slept in the second bedroom.  

I Hate Tim McCarver...and Umpires

 

Clare called and texted at least four times each during the Cardinals-Red Sox game last night.  Father and daughter talk baseball a lot.  There it t was close to eleven at night, and we were arguing whether a base runner going from third to home could be called out for obstruction.   

The conversations helped take my mind off the “announcing” of Tim McCarver.  How do you translate “fingernails on chalkboard” for a 21^st century audience?  Let’s see, among the more obvious McCarverisms were the Red Sox “teeming with team players” and “that’s what happens when a pitcher gets under it.”  What, does he throw a pop up?

In defense of McCarver, he wasn’t any worse than the umpires.  For starters, Dana DeMuth’s strike zone was a secret unto itself.  And the way the game ended, with Jim Joyce making an obstruction call on Sox third baseman Will Middlebrooks while he was lying flat on his stomach.  Joyce is the same ump who blew the call at first to cost Armando Galarraga a perfect game back in 2010.  Yes, to err is human, and so is replacing people with technology.  With a few more games like this, that day—or night—will be coming sooner than later.  From “men in blue” to cameras in blue.  I could live with that.   

One more thing on McCarver.  He and his broadcasting partner Joe Buck kept complimenting  starter Jake “I Talk a Great Game” Peavy for his four-inning performance.  Not only did Peavy leave his team in a two-run hole, he forced manager John Farrell to go to his pen far too early.  Way to go, Jake.  This may be why you’re not missed all that much on the South Side.  

In the Dentist's Chair

 

To pass the time, we made small talk while the Novocain kicked in.  My dentist is from Downstate, where folks tend to be part of Cardinal Nation.  Her father “lives and dies with the Cardinals,” which didn’t surprise me, “and the University of Illinois women’s volleyball team,” which did.

With that, I slipped into Branch Rickey mode and talked about holding big-league tryouts for softball and volleyball players.  Why the second?  Because of their size and speed.  What they might lack as hitters they could make up for on defense.  Now, here’s the thing.  After hearing me out, my dentist said, “I agree.”

And then the drilling started.  

From an Early Age

 

The New York Times reported today on a study about word recognition among very young children.  Given the right environment, they can connect words and things by eighteen months.

That would explain a lot about Clare sitting on my lap watching baseball on TV.  She picked up on “home run” and “hustle” for sure.  But “clown”?  Well, my father was always fond of the word to describe a certain kind of driver, and I doubt it skipped a generation.

!@**#!

Clare called yesterday on her way to the library.  “I’m pissed off,” she informed me.  (This is about as blue as the child gets around her father.)  Why?  “There’s no baseball until Wednesday.”

On a somewhat related note, the White Sox signed Jose Abreu, a Cuban prospect, last week.  Abreu has never had a single minor league at-bat, let alone in the majors, and won’t record one until he’s 27.  No matter.  Abreu still received a six-year, $68 million contract. 

And in all the baseball world, there wasn’t a single female player worth scouting.  But the ladies are still welcome to cheer.  They ought to boycott instead.

Let the Child Be

 

My mother had a definite idea of what I should be, which would explain the accounting class I took (and very quietly dropped) my junior year at DePaul.  My father, bless him, was free of any such conceits.  He just didn’t want his son to be a bum.  In that, I think I’ve succeeded.

Clare says she gets antsy if she’s not active, and I believe her.  Weightlifting, yoga and the gym are all part of her routine the way reading the paper is for me.  My daughter doesn’t much care whether or not her life goes examined.  But it has to be active.

I wonder what she would have done fifty years ago, a visiting nurse, maybe, or union organizer always on picket-line duty.  For that matter, I wonder about the girls in my accounting class.  Did they ever get antsy the way Clare does?   I’m not sure first-wave feminism saw women as power-hitting athletes.

Michele and I practiced what my mother did, if with a bit more subtlety.  Maybe you’d like to teach or go into the sciences.  What about law?  Each time the suggestion generated some initial interest, only to be followed by disappointment.  The mustard seed of a career kept falling on sandy soil.  At least with law, that was a good thing.  Seeing what my daughter thinks of umpires, I doubt she would have done well with judges.

At one point or another in my education, I picked up minors in Spanish, Russian history and 20^th century urbanism; go ahead, ask me what style that building is.  Clare has minors in sports psychology and, thanks to a new offering this fall, coaching.  The senior captain is already acting like a coach, and next year she may formally become an assistant, graduate school in sports’ management permitting.

All a parent can do at this point is step aside and let the child be.

Ten Years After Bartman: Who Cares?

 

Ten years ago, my nearly 12-year old and I watched the Cubs blow a chance at the World Series when Moises Alou jumped with all the poise of an Asian carp and Dusty Baker forgot that managers can visit the mound to settle their pitchers down after things go bad.  As White Sox fans, we loved it.

Yesterday was the tenth anniversary of fan Steve Bartman outmaneuvering Alou for a foul ball.  Clare took the train in from Elmhurst to pick up the PT Cruiser.  (Dad pays to fix the car, daughter drives it—what a deal.)  She talked about having to run a timed-mile in softball and seeing her hitting coach this week.  Never once did either of us mention Bartman.

I have a hunch most serious Cub fans didn’t either.  For them, what’s past is past, and Theo is the future.  That strikes me as a very healthy attitude.  Revisiting The Curse of 2003 is more important to sportswriters (and maybe a blogger or two) in need of a story idea.       

Andy Pafko

             

I used to freelance features to the Chicago Tribune when Clare was small.  This made for some interesting situations along the lines of, Shh, Honey, keep it down.  Daddy’s on the phone with Arthur Schlesinger.  And Captain Kangaroo (really).

There were also a couple of times I interviewed former Cub outfielder Andy Pafko.  Talk about your dream source.  Pafko was generous with his time, humble in talking about his career (17 years, 1796 hits, .285 average and four World Series) and concerned about the health of sportswriter Jerome Holtzman.  Ballplayers weren’t necessarily better before the era of free agency, they were just more human.

Pafko died last week at the age of 92.  The Trib managed an obituary of 738 words.  A few days earlier, it ran a1898-word profile of a fan whose chief talent is the ability to  inject “woo” (at the top of his lungs) into the lives of others, as in Ron “Woo” Santo “Woo.”

There but for the love of God go I, so give the man his 1898 words, but why did Andy Pafko merit so much less?  And why does the New York Times do a better job on the life of a Chicago athlete?  Yes, Pafko was playing left field for the Brooklyn Dodgers when Bobby Thomson hit “the shot heard ‘round the world.”  But he also played on the last Cubs’ team to reach the World Series (1945) and was named to the team’s all-century team.

            It’s just woo not woo right woo.

So Far Away

Clare went 4 for 5 in two scrimmages this weekend, with a double and a triple.  So far, October has been incredibly warm and pretty dry, like Florida in March.  Too bad it’s another five months away.

Then again, we could be back in Orlando before Fox TV is done with the baseball playoffs.  They broadcast the Tigers-Red Sox ALCS matchup last night, where Detroit pitching kept Boston hitless for 8-1/3 innings in a 1-0 game.  It only took three hours and fifty-six minutes to play.

             At the risk of beating a dead horse, how long would the game have taken in a commercial-free format?

Time Flies, Except for Baseball on TV

 

One of the biggest challenges of watching amateur sports is just that, watching.  Turn away for just a second and you miss it forever.

I learned that early on with Clare hitting.  But there are two upsides to watching games without instant replay.  First, it forces a fan to pay attention.  This has to be good for the brain; seeing the same play repeated seven times is not.  Eventually, a scientist will come up with the supporting data.

Pay attention or not, amateur games fly by.  (Of course, anything NCAA Division I doesn’t qualify as amateur.)  Clare will play two seven-inning games with a twenty-minute break in between, almost always in under three hours.  Ditto the football Bluejays.    

If only it were the same in professional sports.  Instead, the MLB playoffs constitute a form of time torture.  For example, the Tigers needed three hours and twenty-three minutes to beat the A’s 1-0.  Then you have the Cardinals defeating the Pirates 2-1 in a game that had eight hits total, with Pittsburgh hitless through seven innings; still, it took two hours and thirty-six minutes from start to finish.  And Monday night the Red Sox finished off the Rays 3-1, each team getting six hits.  That contest took away three hours and forty-nine minutes I’ll never get back.

Now come with me on a magic carpet ride to my first major-league ballgame on June 15, 1962.  The White Sox defeated the Angels 7-6, both teams combing for twenty-five hits and seven walks.  How long did it go, you ask?  Just two hours and fifty-one minutes.  Played today, we’re talking, what, five or six hours? 

Pick your villains for this state of affairs.  In the Boston-Tampa game, resident genius Joe Maddon used nine (!) pitchers for the Rays.  Trips to the mound are not to be confused with stepping out of the batter’s box after every pitch (Hello, Adam Dunn) or counting to a thousand before throwing a pitch (Hello, Gavin Floyd).  But as much as I’d like to send Maddon, Dunn, Floyd and their ilk to the showers, the real problem is TV.  Who knew the pitching change was intended for more commercials?

Back when I tried rooting for George Halas, NFL games ran in the neighborhood of 2-1/2 hours; now, they’re forty-five minutes to an hour longer.  Football fans will put up with the interruptions (point after touchdown, commercial, kick-off, commercial) because they’re addicted to the violence.  There isn’t the same payoff in baseball outside of the occasional hit-by-pitch.  So, here’s my modest solution to attract viewers: broadcast a World Series game commercial free.

Think of the publicity.  Assuming the umpires managed to keep batters from wandering out of the box, make pitchers pitch and enforce quick pitching changes, the game could probably be played in under 2-1/2 hours.  If the medium is the message, then the pace is the thing.  A commercial-free game would take on an excitement unseen for decades. 

All Commissioner Bud Selig has to do is twist the arms of some advertisers, and how hard can that be for a man who cancelled an entire World Series?

Shooting the Breeze

 

As a rule, I try not to eat in parking lots, but Saturday was homecoming for Elmhurst, so eat atop the asphalt we did.  If nothing else, Clare was pretty ecstatic because of the turnout, fourteen players, most with families.  Apparently, freshmen sitting with seniors at a football game in October bodes well for the spring.

Coach Mike put in an appearance before the game, and we talked.  He’s into his second year heading up the program.  Coach loves Clare if for no other reason than he recruited her when an assistant in 2009.  That, and she hits homeruns.

Coaches are fond of the story about the father of a high school senior who talks and talks, making demands, until the scholarship offer to his kid goes away, but I’m pretty much past worrying about Clare’s softball future.  So, I told Coach, “You know what I want for my daughter?  I don’t want her college career ending on Senior Day or at the CCIW tournament.  I want it to end at the NCAA tournament on a field somewhere in Iowa or Wisconsin.  That’s what I want.”

There wasn’t anything more to say.

Coach Love

The Cubs have an opening in the dugout now that Dale Sveum got the axe.  From what I can tell, they’re not looking for John Wayne or any other tall, silent types.  According to team president Theo Epstein, “There has to be tough love, but there has to be love before there’s tough love.”  Calling Dr. Oz.

The pros are different than high school and college, where the athlete is expected to fit into the program.  All parents can do is pray their kid doesn’t end up buried on the bench.  Clare had it easy in high school because Euks loved her bat from day one.  College was more of a challenge.  Coach Brown did things old-school: she made her girls earn playing time.  Starting the first day of practice, what they did as high school seniors mattered not at all.        

Clare had to prove herself, and did.  That’s how she ended up a freshman batting cleanup.  But sign someone to a $60 million contract, and it’s a whole new ballgame. 

Out of the Mouths of Babes...

Clare called yesterday to complain about how badly the underdog Pirates played against the Cardinals in their NLDS opener; Pittsburgh lost, 9-1.  This got me to thinking about the role of women in professional sports.  It’s a pretty/ugly story.

If it’s men’s sports, you can count on hearing (as in seeing) the good-looking sideline reporter a la Erin Andrews; if it’s women’s sports, nobody cares.  Locally, women report on and anchor Chicago sports all the time but don’t say much of anything.  Then again, neither does Mike Adamle.  Oh, and they look pretty on MLB Network.

The highest-profile job in pro sports is probably play-by-play.  No women call men’s games.  The knee-jerk reason for this seems to be, “They can’t call what they never played.”  In other words, Harry Caray got to announce basketball and football because he picked up a baseball at the age of six.  Right.

  I admit to having the above prejudice when it comes to football.  What does Erin Andrews know about the blitz or cover-two defense?  Chauvinism aside, I'll take Pam Ward and Beth Mowins over Brent Musburger any day to call a college game.  Ward and Mowins do a nice job on college softball, so I’m comfortable with them.  Which leads us back to baseball.

There are a ton of former softball players out there, many of whom have gone into sports’ journalism.  Do you mean to tell me they’d know less about baseball than, say, Jack Brickhouse or Chip Caray?  And from what I hear, Yankees’ radio announcer John Sterling can’t even tell the difference between a home run and a routine fly ball.

So, leave football to the guys, at least for now.  But, ladies, it’s time to storm baseball’s broadcast booth.  Do you hear me, Clare?

Abolish High School Sports--Dumb Idea of the Week Award

 A writer in this month’s The Atlantic thinks American schools would be better off abolishing sports.  “Imagine, for a moment, if Americans transferred our obsessive intensity about” high school sports “to high school academics.”  All right, let’s.

Michele and I have five college degrees between us.  It’s safe to say we raised our child in a learning-rich environment.  Guess what?  She still ended up a jock, smart, but a jock nonetheless.  There was this one time, either spring of sophomore or junior year high school, with an essay due on “Julius Caesar.”  I happened to look in and see my daughter, notebook at her side and a bat in her hands.  What are you doing?  “I’m breaking in my new bat.”  Oh.

The Atlantic story is playing on memories and stereotypes of high school—dumb jocks, jock cliques, jocks pounding goths into lockers, jocks as prom royalty….Once upon a time, I was susceptible to this kind of appeal; maybe I got pounded once or twice.  All I know is my daughter was (is) an athlete who defied most if not all such stereotypes.  Among other things, she graduated eighth out of a class of eight hundred.

The story cherry-picks information on the cost of athletics, schools that cut academics ahead of sports and enlightened schools that have abolished all or part of their athletic programs.  What a waste of space.  Nobody wants to send their kids to a school run by quarterbacks and cheerleaders.  But a school without sports?  Get real, and explain away the benefits of Title IX while you’re at it.

What really ticked me off is that this was an argument for the status quo masquerading as a bold call to change.  At the end of the day, the size of the school budget stays the same; only the names of the winners and losers change.  What about a more equitable system for funding American education, something other than the property tax?

           On that, the author had nothing to say.