by Guy Franks
Star pitcher Steve Basset sat next to his beautiful girlfriend a few tables over. There was camaraderie in the minors but like any institution that thrived on internal competition there were also rivalries and envy. And Steve Basset, a handsome stud with a gorgeous girlfriend, who also happened to be a hot prospect that everyone agreed was ticketed for the big leagues, was a natural target for such emotions. That’s not to say that any of the Kingsmen pitchers wished him ill-will. On the contrary, they’d be the first to cheer and pat him on the back at his promotion to the bigs. But did each one harbor a secret desire to be Steve Basset with the live arm and big contract and beautiful girlfriend? Of course they did, and some more than others.
“They’re engaged,” added Luis with a sip of his beer. Luis Santiago, or “Tiago” as some of the players called him, had been first starter in the rotation last year until Basset came on board. Now he was number two. Luis grew up in Rancho Cucamonga where he attended Catholic schools and excelled in sports. His grandparents had emigrated from Mexico but the family did not consider themselves Mexican but rather Spanish. His father in particular had drilled into his son’s head that they, the Santiagos, were descended from a noble Spanish line and not tainted with Indian blood. It was no surprise that Luis had inherited from his father a rather Ricardo Montalban-like haughtiness to go along with his handsome features.
“I saw the rock. When they get engaged?” asked Chuck.
“Spring training,” replied Luis. “They didn’t want to tell anyone until he got assigned. Her name’s Gwen Cymbel. She was Miss Clemson a couple years ago and works as an intern for some law firm in Hartford.”
“No shit,” said Phil. “How do you know all that?”
“I went over and introduced myself.”
“Where was Basset?’
“At the bar.
Chuck and Phil looked at one another. Luis was known as the team’s Casanova. He was a playboy who sported a new girlfriend every week. Even at away games, in nightclubs, he could pick out a girl, go up and talk to her, and within minutes be out the door on the way to her place. They’d seen him do it.
“You didn’t hit on her?” asked Chuck incredulously.
“No, not really. I could have.”
“Bullshit,” said Phil. “I mean, I’ve seen you work, man. You’re an artist. But she’s out of your league, dude. Seriously.”
“Bet me.”
“Bet you? What? Bet you won’t hit on her? I’d never make that bet.”
“No, I bet you I can have her.”
“You’re kidding.”
“Nope. Bet you a hundred bucks.”
“Bet you a hundred bucks that you can steal her away from Basset?”
“Didn’t say ‘steal.’ I said I could have her. Go to bed with her. One hundred bucks.”
“Tiago,” interjected Chuck, half-laughing, “it ain’t gonna happen and I ain’t makin’ that bet.”
“I’m talking to Phil. One hundred buck says I get her in bed before the all-star break.”
Phil was no longer taking this as a joke and studied the label on his beer bottle weighing his chances. Evidently he thought them pretty good because he smiled back at Luis.
“You’re not taking this guy serious, are you?” said Chuck to Phil.
“Maybe.”
“Shit, Phil, come off it. What’s a bet like that gonna prove? It’ll just cause problems. Someone’s gonna get punched in the nose… Count me out.”
“You’re out. We just need you to witness the bet.”
Chuck looked to his wife on the dance floor, trying to ignore them. “Whatever,” he said indifferently.
“Okay,” said Phil as he turned to Luis. “How you going to prove it?”
“What do you want?”
“How about the rock on her finger?”
“That’d be tough. How about the locket she’s wearing. It’s gold with two hearts intertwined. Basset gave it to her.”
They all looked across the rows of tables to see the locket around her neck. Even Chuck glanced over to see it. Steve Basset, sitting next to his beautiful fiancé, noticed them looking over and waved with a friendly smile. They smiled back.
“Deal,” replied Phil. “One hundred bucks says you won’t fuck her before the all-star break, and if you do you have to hand me that locket as proof. Chuck, you’re my witness.”
“Sure,” replied Chuck, failing in his attempt to stay out of it.
“Then it’s a bet.”
“It’s a bet,” agreed Luis, raising his beer bottle. The two clicked their beer bottles together to seal the wager.
Dane Hamilton sat by himself rubbing his chin in thought and listening to his transistor radio. He carried it around with him the way some people carried a pack of cigarettes, and he listened to it regularly, even when he was shagging flies during batting practice. His preference was news-talk radio. At the moment he was listening to a news report covering the U.S. raid on Libya. Two days before, fighter jets had bombed army installations and Gaddafi’s home but reports indicated that Gaddafi had gotten out in time. Too bad, he thought. That would have been one less nutcase in the world. News talk radio was filled with pundits from the left and right giving their reaction and assessment. Dane found their comments to be predictable: the left condemned it as a naked act of aggression while the right praised it as an act of self-defense. Which was true, he wondered.
One of the pundits complained about the “U.S. acting like the world’s policeman.” So what, he thought. He had no illusions about mankind. The world needed a cop. Mankind did not particularly delight Dane but he did not set himself above the fray. He ranked himself with the barbarous multitudes. Again, what was true he wondered—the human race that showed great charity and produced beautiful works of art or the human race that showed great cruelty and perpetrated acts of terrorism and genocide on itself? Evidently both were true. But one had to admit it, the attack was a bold act and he rather admired it.
Loud voices caught his attention and he pulled out his earplug to listen. Off to his left, three people were arguing amongst themselves. They were far enough away from the main crowd not be seen or heard but Dane could clearly see and hear them. One of them he recognized as the owner Rex Lyon, while the woman arguing with him he guessed to be his daughter. Another man appeared to be trying to mediate the dispute. The argument was over the band. She wanted the band shut down and sent home. Rex demanded they keep playing—it was his party, not hers, and she had no right to give orders. This went on for another minute until the woman ordered the other man to “send the band home!” The man put his head down and headed towards the bandstand. With that, she turned her back on her father and walked briskly back up to the house with Rex, all red-faced, blustering obscenities close behind.
Even in the best of families, thought Dane, smiling to himself. His family was messed up with the best of them. For ten years he had sat witness to his parents’ loveless marriage. Then one day he had come home from school to find his dad dead in the garage from carbon monoxide poisoning. From then on his family had been just he and his mom.
Mentally he stepped out of the batter’s box and cleared his head. He turned off his radio and let his mind percolate. A term he had heard earlier—“create an edge”—popped into his head. It came from Greg Rosecrans. Greg was a back-up infielder in his fifth year in the minors and he was looking for a way to turn his career around. Greg had been feeling him out over the last week, dropping hints, and earlier today had let slip the word “Deca.” Deca was short for Deca-Durabolin, a steroid.
Greg did not come right out and tell him he was going to take Deca. Instead he worked around it, passing on the rumor that their catcher Jose Estrella was taking Deca. The truth was in the results, he claimed. Last year Estrella looked like them and now he looked like Lou Ferrigno in catcher’s gear. Two weeks into the season and Jo
se already had five homeruns. He had ten all of last year. He had created an edge, Greg said, and maybe it was time for him to create an edge, and what did Dane think about it. Should he or shouldn’t he?
Dane didn’t give him an answer. That bothered Dane because he knew the answer. It was cheating and it messed up your body, maybe permanently. He also knew the defense for it: it wasn’t a banned substance and it worked, increasing arm strength if you were a pitcher and bat speed if you were a hitter. It gave you an edge and with so much at stake, players needed an edge, whether it was nicotine, amphetamines (whites) or something else. Plus everyone was doing it. Dane turned off his radio and walked back towards the crowd. Yes, he thought wryly, that was man’s great savior. No matter what people did to “create an edge”—take drugs, steal or blow up people—they could always say “everyone was doing it.”
Shakespeare Glover was holding court. As had become tradition, every year towards the end of the Lyon’s Picnic, as the lights dimmed and the families shuffled on home, Shake would attract a crowd of players and coaches under one of the canopies to listen to him expound on baseball, life and the Bard. Usually it was after midnight once the band quit, but this year, for whatever reason, the band had quit early and so Shake’s gabfest had gathered early. Shake sat talking, nursing a beer, while players and coaches, some in chairs, some sitting cross-legged on the grass, huddled close to hear every word.
It usually started with a question.
“What’s a harder jump,” asked a player. “Single-A to Double-A, double to triple, or triple to the show?”
“Single-A to Double-A is the toughest jump in the minors,” replied Shake. “A lot of guys spend their whole career in A ball, or leave and end up in an independent league. It’s a gladiator pit and only the strongest make it out. Triple-A is a turnstile; there’s always guys coming and going. The only thing worse than playing in Triple-A is…?” He glanced at Rick Burton.
“Not playing in Triple-A,” replied Rick on cue.
“Exactly. Double-A is a sea of tranquility by comparison. Rosters stay pretty stable throughout the year, and here you get time to hone your craft. The quality of play is high and you play in front of good crowds, plus the buses are air-conditioned. But getting here’s the trick. If you’re a pitcher, you gotta have a good off-speed pitch to go with your fastball, and if you’re a hitter, you gotta be able to hit ninety-four and the off-speed stuff. And once you’re here you can just as easily jump to the bigs as you can from Triple-A. Look at Canseco.”
“Not many make it to the majors,” said a player.
“I read somewhere it’s about four percent” said another.
“I think it’s higher than that,’ replied Shake. “It depends on how you calculate it—ten days in the majors, ten years, or just one day. Even if it’s one day you can still say you made it. If you play long enough in the minors like Kalecki here you can get a “good guy promotion.” Nearly twenty years in the minors and they call you up in September and give you some at bats as a way of saying thank you. Can’t beat that—to stand out on a big league diamond with a major league uni on and your family in the stands. Nothing beats that. Meanwhile you’re playing professional baseball. And where would you rather be? Selling cars? Eating nachos on the couch? There’s no place I’d rather be. I love coaching Double-A and they pay me to do it.”
“As long as you win.”
“It’s a balancing act. Yeah, they expect you to win—you wanna win—but my real job here is to produce talent. The farm system is like a big company’s R&D department. Like Bell Labs. The big club pumps a lot of money into their R&D department and my job—all our job—is to develop talent and get you ready for the big leagues. But if you expect to stick around you also gotta win. That’s just talking straight.”
“Is it better nowadays to get signed out of high school or college?”
“Depends on your situation. If your family needs the money and they offer you a big contract out of high school—hell, yes, take the money and run. But if you got the resources, my advice is to go to college. Look at Bonds and Clark: right out of college and into the bigs. Granted, not everyone is Will Clark, but I guarantee you everyone here was a hotshot in high school. Am I right?”
“Except for Santiago.”
“Yeah, he was too busy getting laid.”
“Everyone should be good at something,” laughed Shake. “But here’s my point: being a hot shot in high school, winning a state championship, getting named all-league—most of us can lay claim to that. But coming out of college, maybe being named All-American—that’s something different. A good college program like Arizona or Texas gives you an advantage. The level of play is at least as good as Single-A and it gives you a head start. But that’s just my opinion. In the end it comes down to talent and hard work.”
A waiter came by and with noticeable embarrassment announced that the picnic was over. “Mrs. Cornwall wants the Kingsmen to go home.” They ignored him and he went away.
“Where’d the Kingsmen come from?”
“I heard you named ’em.”
“I did,” confirmed Shake. “It’s from Elizabethan England. Shakespeare’s time. Acting companies back then needed a license to perform, and if you wanted to succeed you had to have noble patronage. Shakespeare’s patron was the Queen herself and actually, back then, they were called the ‘Queen’s Men’ but I didn’t think you’d be too happy playing for the Queen’s Men. After she died they became the ‘King’s Men’ under King James, so I went with that. And it has nothing to do with all that King Arthur stuff they got going on at the ballpark. That’s all Rex’s idea—the jousting knights, Galahad the mascot, Round Table Pizza.
“The Kingsmen were talented performers. When they weren’t performing on the London stage they were traveling the countryside, going from town to town plying their trade. Just like you guys. One week you’re in Pittsfield, another in Nashua and another in Waterbury… Some of you have heard me talk about this before. The ballfield is like a stage where everyone plays a part. You have an audience. You have heroes and villains. A game of baseball is identical to a Shakespearean play, like A Midsummer Night’s Dream. It has a beginning, middle and end and is filled with surprises and twists of fate. It can be a comedy of errors or a tragedy like Julius Caesar where you get a knife in the back in the bottom of the ninth. Comedy or tragedy, it’s one or the other, unless you’re playing an old rival like the New Haven Admirals. Then it’s more like Henry the Sixth and the War of the Roses.”
“Did they have baseball back then?”
“They had cricket, which is a close cousin. I’m sure Willy was a fan. I can see him sitting in the sun eating capers and drinking sack while taking in a game. And he knew his baseball even though it hadn’t been invented yet. That was his genius. How else can you explain the line from Macbeth:
I’ll catch it ere it come to ground.
There was laughter from the huddled masses. Shake smiled and looked down the spout of his bottled beer. There was still some left so he finished it off with a long swig and then finished off his lesson with something he always added at these gatherings: “Count your blessings. Be grateful you’re playing pro ball in New Britain—in New Britski, The Hardware City, home of the coat hanger—and not some Podunk town in Single-A. You get good crowds here and ownership takes care of things. Rick and I have been on teams where the owner refused to call a game in a monsoon because he didn’t want to lose the gate, where we worried about umpires showing up on time and there were gunshots in the parking lot. So look around, gentlemen, and count your blessings.”
In a large living room with a vaulted ceiling, Rex Lyon stared down his daughter. They had been going at it for an hour and it showed no signs of letting up.
Rae
If you don’t like it move out.
Rex
It’s my house. I built it!
Rae
My name’s on the title or have you forgotten that, too.
Rex
That gives you no right—
Rae
It gives me every right! It’s my house now and I’m sick of these events and these people eating our food and tearing up our lawn. It’s a big waste and I’ll not have it. This is the last baseball picnic at my home.
Rex
Fifteen years! For fifteen years I’ve had this picnic. It’s tradition!
Rae
Screw tradition! That’s all you got anymore—tradition! You got no money and no more sense but, hey, you got tradition.
Rex
You’ve got a tongue like your mother. A snake’s tongue! I’ve raised a thankless daughter. Get away from me!
Rae
Don’t bring my mother into this. This house should have been hers but you cheated her out of it. Now it’s mine and you can move out for all I care. Go move in with your precious Corey. Oh, wait, you can’t. You kicked her out of your life. Perfect! There’s a father for you!
Rex
You’ll see!… God help me… I’ll get you back for this… The whole world will see, I’ll do such things… I don’t know what… but I’ll do such things… terrible things…
Rex collapsed on the floor and his daughter turned her back muttering, “You’ll do nothing” and walked away. Just then her husband rushed into the room (he had heard the yelling), saw Rex on the floor, and came to his aid. He called an ambulance and Rex was rushed to the hospital where he was diagnosed with a coronary artery spasm, treated, and let go the next day. He went home but shunned his harsh daughter, staying upstairs away from the bother.
6
CHAPTER
Either he was out very late or he was out very early.
Casey Stengel
Hank pulled up to the curb in front of Quick’s Cocktail Lounge and walked around back through the ally. It was almost one o’clock and he had to report to the ballpark in a couple hours. He needed a blunt. A couple tokes before the game calmed him down and made him play better. His connection did business out of Quick’s and sometimes slept in the back room.