“I fucked up,” I say. “I get it.”
David Francisco, the RedHawks’ number seven hitter, steps up to the plate and hits my first pitch for a long fly ball to center.
On the mound, I’m still talking to myself, One more out to go, Ila. Man on first, and the number eight hitter up. But Smith is a good hitter. Whatever you do, stay ahead, or you’re gonna get smacked. Think about it and be smart.
Cory Smith finds the hole between short and third for a single to left field. The crowd stirs, and I can see George and my coaches getting antsy, directing the fielders to reposition a little more back. Two outs, runners with speed on first and second—concentrate on the batter. Chad Akers is up again. I tell Briller at third that I have that side if Akers bunts. With two outs, that’s unlikely, but Chad is fast and the infield is back, so it’s a possibility. The scouting report shows him hitting to the left side. (Earlier he singled between third and short, and grounded out to short.) So we all shift in that direction. He’s also a first-pitch hitter. I throw a screwball away, and he hits a sharp two-hopper to Brito at short, who underhands it to Switzenberg for the force out at second. No runs, one hit, no errors, two left on base.
As I head back to the dugout, I pass Maury Wills, the Fargo-Moorhead first base coach, who looks me in the eye and says, “Nice inning, Ila.”
His words catch me off guard. I look up, smile, and say, “Thanks.”
Well, maybe I am changing some minds. I take a seat on the bench and think back to what it was like when I first got to Duluth.
June 26, 1997. During the short flight from Minneapolis–St. Paul, I had looked out of the plane window at a placid landscape of forests and water. I was coming from the Saints, a classy organization from the top all the way down. Now I was starting over. What would this club be like? Would I fit in? Where would I live? But hey, I still had a job in baseball.
After landing in Duluth I headed toward baggage claim, wondering how I would get to the stadium—life at this level of baseball tends to be one foot in front of the other, with little planning. But Jim Wadley, the club’s owner, and Bob Gustafson, the general manager, were there to meet me. They grabbed my bags and put them in the car, and we were off in a hurry—the game was about to start and they wanted me there. Mr. Wadley was a trim, white-haired man, well but casually dressed (he owned the Mr. Big & Tall clothing store in Norwalk, California), outgoing, and talkative. He was interested in baseball and history. He told me that he liked to be called “Jim,” and that he was happy to have me in Duluth, and I felt it.
The Dukes’ ballpark is a real throwback. The façade of the stadium is built of old bricks that had once paved nearby streets. From the top of the stands you can see Lake Superior and the loading docks of the wonderfully named Duluth, Missabe, and Iron Range Railway. Wade Stadium was a collaboration between the Works Progress Administration and the City of Duluth. Grandma would have been eleven years old when the Wade opened in 1941. Maybe she had walked those brick-paved streets.
Wade Stadium is a pitcher’s ballpark, with lots of foul territory and 340 feet down each foul line. Even better, the wind usually blows in off the lake. Great, I thought when I first saw it. This is more up my alley. But because of the lake’s proximity, games are sometimes delayed or even called when the fog rolls in. And when the wind kicks up, it can freeze you to the bone. During my weeks with the Saints, I wore foot and hand warmers whenever we played in Duluth. In early May the field had been covered with snow, the sunken dugouts buried in it.
By the time we pulled onto the field that served as the parking lot, the game had already started. I hustled into the merchandise store to get my uniform—the only one available was number three—and then to the umpires’ locker room to change. I felt anxious about how things were starting out. I had hoped to arrive well before game time so I could mingle with my teammates. Now I would have to go through the clubhouse to get to the field, and I hesitated, all suited up in my number-three uniform, until Jim Wadley said, “They’re expecting you. Go on in.”
I opened the door to the back of the clubhouse. The showers and bathrooms were there, then a wide doorway opened to the lockers alongside the walls, with benches in front of the lockers, a whirlpool, and trainer’s table off to the side, and finally an office right before the stairs down to the dugout. Just as I was about to creep down the stairs, a guy came out of the shower room. I felt like a kid caught stealing, and my face probably showed it. I stopped and said over my shoulder, “Sorry, man. There’s no other way to get to the bullpen.”
Remembering to make eye contact when I meet someone, I turned around. He came up close, a towel wrapped around his waist, looking like he was going to rip off my head. He was about my height but must have outweighed me by fifty pounds.
“What the fuck? You think you can just come on in here, like this is your place without putting in your time? You’re a fuckin’ rookie. I could have been naked, and my wife would have been really pissed off. How would I explain that to her? You tell me.”
Not knowing that this guy had no wife, I pondered the question.
“Sorry . . .” I said, but he cut me off with a huge laugh, wrapped his arm around my neck and gave me a shake, while a couple of guys in the background giggled nervously.
“I’m just fucking with you,” he said. Then he pulled back, eyed my uniform, and said, “Welcome, Babe.”
That’s how I met Tony, one of my fellow pitchers. It took me a minute get it. My uniform number was three, so apparently my nickname was no longer “Shorty”; it was now to be “Babe,” for Babe Ruth, who had worn the same number.
I smiled back at him. “Wow, that’s a step up from ‘bitch.’ Sounds good.”
I escaped into the dugout, grateful that most of the Dukes were on the field, and introduced myself to George Mitterwald, my new manager, and Mike Cuellar, the pitching coach. Both were friendly. As I stepped onto the field to head for the bullpen, the crowd erupted with applause and began to chant, “Ila, Ila, Ila!”
Great, no chance of being invisible here. As I jogged to the bullpen, I saw the pitchers on the bench there, watching me closely. I figured they were likely to give me hell for getting applause just for going to the bullpen. Think of something witty to say, I told myself, but nothing came to mind. I went up to each of them, looked them in the eye, shook their hands, sat down and waited for someone to speak. Everyone was nice; everyone smiled, but then, silence, which made me more nervous. Uh-oh, I thought. They have no clue they can joke around with me.
Then here came Tony toward us.
“Why the hell is he coming out here?” someone said. “He’s a starter now.”
They tried to wave him back to the dugout, but he ignored them and sat himself down right next to me. Nodding toward the guys, he looked at me and asked, “Did you tell them your nickname?”
I smiled and shook my head.
“It’s Babe,” he announced. “You cannot call her anything else. It is Babe.”
Another guy wanted to know if Tony had told me his nicknames. No? Well, he was known as “Dickwood,” “Fatso,” and “Shorty.” Tony, officially listed at five feet eleven inches, was actually shorter than I was, at five feet nine. No longer would I be Shorty.
“No,” Tony replied, in stock ballplayer fashion, “but I told her your wife was good last night.”
A guy down the bench said, “Ila, watch out for Tony—he’s a little whore, even though he has a girlfriend.”
And so the banter went. One of the guys confided that his wife was upset about him being on the road with me, a woman.
“Well, just tell her I’m gay,” I told him, and we both laughed. We both knew his wife should worry not about me but about all the women lining up for the guys after games. Then the binoculars came out. We were way down the right-field line and there was no bullpen phone here, so I figured they were looking to pick up the opposing team’s signs. Finally one guy handed me the binoculars.
“What do you think of th
at girl right there?” he said, pointing out someone in the stands.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean I am going after her. How much will you pay me if I sleep with her tonight?”
“Nothing,” I said. “I see how they all fall for you guys, and I don’t get it.”
“Hey, if you saw what I have, you would get it.”
While the guys on the bench were still laughing, I grabbed the binoculars and carefully scanned the stands. “Ah,” I said. “I found just the girl for you.”
“Where?”
I pointed above the visitors’ dugout. “There—five rows up and fourteen seats to the right.”
He grabbed the binoculars and looked. “Nice,” he said. “Now I know to never rely on you to do my scouting.”
The lady was about seventy years old and very overweight.
Over the season one guy in the bullpen kept his binoculars handy. We would lay bets as to which woman he would go with. It did not seem to matter to him that he was married—all during the game all he worried about was finding the hottest girl in the stands. I came to wonder why he had gotten married. I felt sorry for his wife.
Not all the antics were limited to our bullpen. I first met Bill Murray, the comic actor and the Saints co-owner, after I was sent to the Dukes. We were playing in St. Paul, and there was Bill, hanging out at the Italian restaurant near the visitors’ bullpen. I liked his look of a large, friendly, rumpled jokester, usually in a Hawaiian shirt. Murray had grown up in the Midwest, and maybe he found St. Paul a normalizing haven from Hollywood. He did seem to genuinely enjoy being with the club, sometimes taking batting practice and playing catch before the games. That night he was in his element, flicking spaghetti noodles and horsing around with the diners and us in the bullpen.
I began to relax, not expecting to be called in to pitch—down by three runs, we were hitting in the bottom of the eighth. Then we noticed pitching coach Mike Cuellar.
“What the hell is he doing?” one guy said, seeing him give an unfamiliar sign.
Mike would put his hand on his head to indicate he wanted the tall guy up. Or use a side arm signal, for the side-arm guy. He would point to his left arm for the other left-hander and to his right arm for the right-hander. Now he was doing this waving motion. No one in the bullpen knew this signal.
Finally one of our teammates, Al Barsoom, ran over, and said, “Ila, start warming up.”
As I was taking off my jacket, a guy asked, “What’s Mike signaling?”
Al replied, “He’s doing the hourglass sign with his hands to mean the girl.” Then he told me, “If our pitcher gets into trouble in the top of the ninth, you’re in.”
In the bottom of the eighth we went down one, two, three—and suddenly here came Mike’s hourglass sign. Geez, I thought. Welcome to Duluth. I made the long jog to the mound, not knowing anyone on the field and feeling lost. Javier Rodriguez, our starting catcher, came out and asked what pitches I had.
“Two-seam fastball, four-seam fastball, curveball, and screwball,” I said. “I’m working on a slider, but it sucks.”
“All right,” Javier said. “Shake me off. You call the pitches, because George and I don’t know your stuff yet. As soon as we do, George will call the pitches, so enjoy this while it lasts.” (George Mitterwald had been a pro catcher for eleven years and had his own ideas about what pitches to throw when.)
First batter up got a base hit on a fastball away. Damn it, I thought. Focus. If I had paid attention in the bullpen, instead of fooling around with those binoculars, I would have known more about the guys coming to the plate. I told myself to calm down and just get a ground ball. No point throwing to first, because they were up by three, but I changed up my cadence to keep the runner honest for a potential double play. Next batter hit a grounder, and we turned two. Right on, two outs. One more, and I could breathe again.
Javier and Anthony Lewis, our first baseman, came over to the mound to say, “This guy’s a first-pitch hitter and will chase balls.”
I shook off Javier’s sign for a curve, then nodded at his second one for a screwball away. I threw it so it ended up in the dirt. Sure enough, he swung—another grounder. Out of the inning. The entire crowd was on its feet, clapping and chanting, “Ila, Ila, Ila!” as I came into the dugout, and that is how I met the rest of my new team. My fielders came up from behind and slapped me on the back.
“Good job,” Javier said. “Great pitch.”
I made my way to the bench, ducking to avoid the low roof, put on my jacket, and sat down. The bench inside the dugout was only eight feet long. There was also standing room in front of and below the bench, but you cannot see the game from there, so most of the guys liked to sit on a bucket in front of the dugout or stand, leaning against the fence. As our guys batted, I realized that if we came back I could get the win. Wow, what a great beginning that would be. My reverie was interrupted by the smell of smoke. At first I did not think anything of it until I saw flames creeping up my pants leg. As I smacked the flames out, I laughed, but the guys were loving it. They had pulled off that traditional initiation, quietly setting an unsuspecting rookie’s shoelaces on fire: my first hot foot.
We never did come back in that game, but when it was over the guys came in from the bullpen to say, “Good job, Babe,” before heading for the showers. Meanwhile I went outside to do an interview or two and to sign autographs. I was still there at eleven o’clock, when Jim Wadley came over to tell me that I would be staying at the Best Western Hotel until they found me a host family. The hotel was conveniently downtown, and I could easily catch a ride to the ballpark with a couple of the other players staying there. Beautiful—privacy. That night I slept through until one o’clock in the afternoon.
The rooms at the Best Western faced the parking lot, which was just off West Second, a busy street. The hotel was one story, so anyone coming and going was easily visible. I was afraid a stranger might show up at my door if it became known I was staying there. There were reasons for my fearfulness. While most of the mail I received was positive and included a return address, because the writer requested an autograph or a photo, others made it clear what they wanted by enclosing a condom or a bra. It was the letters with no return address that frightened me. As I recall, one said that someone needed to take me out—whether it’s a broken leg or an accident, he warned me to watch my back. Another writer said that women were bringing the game down. I received a few death threats and kept the worst ones in my duffel bag in case one of these characters acted on his threat; someone would know where to look for the culprit.
Meanwhile Dad kept asking whether I was getting any weird mail, and I told him no, as I did not want him to worry—or overreact and come up to Duluth. This was my battle; I just needed my parents to be smart back home in California, where people continued to call and stop by our house. Dad promised to ship the letters that had arrived and gave me the family’s new phone number he had to get. “Just be heads up,” he said. His attitude had changed. No longer was it “Suck it up.” Now it was “Be careful.”
“Dad,” I said, “the people who come after me now should be careful because of how you raised me. I am a machine and can handle anything.”
Dad and I were now equals. I told him to watch out for Mom and my sister and brothers.
Later that season I learned just how careful I needed to be. One day, after we arrived in Sioux City, like always I picked up my key from George Mitterwald and went to my hotel room. When I opened the door, two men were standing in front of the bed. I was lucky to catch them off guard. I slammed the door and ran to the front desk, my mind reeling: Why were two men in my room? Should I report this? Request security? Or just shut up and take care of it myself? The front desk clerk ran back to the room with me, but the men were gone. We looked outside but saw nobody. Then we searched the room for clues as to who these guys were. Nothing. The clerk wanted to check the security cameras, but I turned down the idea and just asked for another room. I did
not want to create a stir with the club, afraid that if I gave them any reason to think I might threaten legal action or attracted any negative publicity, I would be gone. In the end I said nothing. But from then on, I always tried to take a room next to a teammate. Even if the media caught on and reported it, I figured I would be safer. Sometimes I asked a buddy to come into my hotel room with me while I checked under the bed, in the closet, in the bathroom. Sometimes I changed rooms during the middle of our stay. Before I went to sleep I always jammed a chair against the door. I wanted to give myself a chance to fight if I had to.
Next day I woke up, put on my jeans, running shoes, my Minnesota sweatshirt, and a beanie I got from Connie. I was hungry. I went to a 7-Eleven and bought a box of Honey Nut Cheerios—not enough money to buy milk. Back at the hotel, I filled my ice bucket with half of the box of cereal and water. Lunchtime came, and the other half was gone. I got by that day on three dollars. The Dukes proved to be sympathetic toward the survival of us players who made 750 dollars a month. After home games the vendors made sure we left the stadium with hamburgers or pizza and water or pop.
One of the pitchers on our team, Dave Glick, was also staying at the Best Western. Glick, as I came to call him, drove a truck, and offered me a ride to the stadium. During our drive to the ballpark, he told me that he was from California, too: Valencia, in the Santa Clarita Valley, about an hour-and-a-half drive from my home. I liked him right away. He was tall, with dark good looks, and very much his own man. These days you see lots of ballplayers with tattoos, but in 1997 Glick was the only one I knew who was tatted. He had them on his chest, shins, back, arms, all over. He told me that he hid them from management because they hated tattoos. In 1996 the Ogden Raptors had cut him because of them, even though he had gone 3-1 with a 3.41 ERA. After his time with the Dukes, he continued pitching for another ten years, making it into Double-A ball and then back into the independent leagues. David was a strikeout pitcher with a three-to-one ratio to walks and threw ninety-plus miles per hour. To me it seemed all wrong that he did not go farther. But Glick had not received a big signing bonus—he had been drafted by the Milwaukee Brewers in the forty-eighth round of the 1994 June amateur draft; the players who do get the big bonuses tend to get mulligans again and again.
Making My Pitch Page 17