Tag: baseball

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From My Seat Sports

Pandemic Baseball Day?

CREDIT: Jj Gouin/Dreamstime

Be careful what you wish for in a sports column.

For the better part of two decades, I’ve written in this space about the need for National Baseball Day, a holiday to recognize and celebrate this country’s longtime national pastime. The day would coincide each year with Game 1 of the World Series, Americans from coast to coast would be allowed to stay home with family and friends and — should they choose — watch the Fall Classic together, with the first pitch at 3 p.m. Eastern time, early enough for the youngest baseball fans to see the final out. How is it that a country so devoted to sports and leisure doesn’t have a day on the calendar to formally salute the rewards of recreation? National Baseball Day would check that box nicely.
Jj Gouin/Dreamstime

So, here we are in 2020, and more people will be at home for Game 1 of the World Series — by choice or by pink slip — than in any other year of our lifetimes. A pandemic has slammed doors shut both on business and recreation, those of us fortunate enough to be able to work from our dens and living rooms doing so, while those unable to earn a salary without gathering crowds and cheering audiences . . . endure the best they’re able.

As for the World Series, all games will be played at a neutral site (a “bubble” in pandemic terms), Globe Life Field in Arlington, Texas. Major League Baseball and the state of Texas will allow small “pods” of fans to scatter safe distances within the ballpark. So, yes, there will be some cheering when the Tampa Bay Rays and Los Angeles Dodgers take the field Tuesday for the 116th World Series. (Alas, the game is still scheduled to maximize ad revenue. So, first pitch will be in prime time.) In a year with so much on hold, can baseball’s showcase lift a nation’s spirits?

For anyone with a modicum of affection for baseball history, 2020 has been an absolute kick in the teeth. Al Kaline — for many, the face of the Detroit Tigers franchise — died in April. Tom Seaver — for everyone, the face of the New York Mets franchise — died in August. The two greatest World Series heroes in St. Louis Cardinals history — Lou Brock and Bob Gibson — died within four weeks of each other, just as this year’s postseason arrived. Earlier this month, Whitey Ford died, the most decorated pitcher in New York Yankees history. Three days later, Joe Morgan passed away. Playing for the fabled Big Red Machine of the 1970s (a team that feature Johnny Bench and Pete Rose), Morgan was named MVP after each of Cincinnati’s championship seasons. All of these men were Hall of Famers, all of them World Series heroes from a time that seems further away in 2020 than it did 12 months ago. A packed Busch Stadium cheering Gibson’s 17th strikeout to close Game 1 of the 1968 Series? That’s an image from a dimension we can’t seem to reach, one we now wonder if we’ll ever see again.

The 2020 baseball season was abbreviated, of course. Reduced from 162 games to 60, the campaign was more of a sprint than baseball fans are used to, and 16 teams — six more than has been customary — made the playoff field, an attempt to make sure a rightful champion doesn’t get erased because of the sliced schedule (and yes, more televised playoff games to pad the sagging bank accounts of MLB owners). But the games have indeed been a happy distraction, particularly in the climate of a national election taking place in the most divisive America many of us have seen. The bitter debate over a Supreme Court nominee not your thing? Tune in to see former Memphis Redbird Randy Arozarena slug cowhide for the Rays. Worn out by a U.S. president downplaying a virus that’s killed almost a quarter-million Americans? You gotta see the exuberance Dodger outfielder Mookie Betts brings to the diamond. British writer Charles Kingsley said it best: “All we really need is something to be enthusiastic about.”

My enthusiasm for National Baseball Day is unabated. The sport needs new life, younger life, and it’s getting it on the field in the form of Acuna, Washington’s Juan Soto, and San Diego’s Fernando Tatis Jr. But young fans? Casual fans? They’re diminishing, turning to more modern distractions (many requiring screens and an internet connection). But we can find baseball again, when we find our new normal. Sitting in a ballpark — under sunshine — is my happy place. I’ve missed it in 2020. Which means I’ll appreciate it in ways I haven’t since I was a child, the next time I stare at grass the way God meant it to grow. For now, let’s enjoy a Texas World Series with no teams from Texas. (Hey, the Houston Astros are done. So, the year ain’t all bad.) Cracker Jack tastes good on a couch, too.

Categories
Sports Sports Feature

Rock for Hall of Fame?

There are currently 12 members of the Baseball Hall of Fame who played or managed in Memphis during their illustrious careers. Sports Illustrated‘s Tom Verducci makes the case for a 13th: Tim (Rock) Raines. On the ballot for the first time next month, Raines starred for the 1979 Memphis Chicks (.290 batting average, 104 runs, 59 stolen bases).

Writes Verducci: “Why wait to appreciate Raines? Shouldn’t we know by now that Hall of Fame greatness doesn’t always have to be about MVP awards and the big, round numbers? Even without the fancy hardware, Raines, for an extended prime, was one of the most dominant players in baseball (especially as a leadoff hitter), which is as good of a beginning as any when you start defining Hall of Fame players.”

Read Verducci’s pitch here.

Categories
From My Seat Sports

FROM MY SEAT: Warming by the Hot Stove

• The
matchup for the second annual Civil Rights Game is well nigh perfect. The New
York Mets and Chicago White Sox both have minority managers who happened to be
fine infielders during their playing days. New York’s Willie Randolph has had
his team in contention each of the last two seasons, and Ozzie Guillen led
Chicago to the 2005 world championship. Beyond the two managers, each club
happens to have a minority general manager — Omar Minaya with the Mets and
Kenny Williams with the Sox.

In
historic terms, the franchises fit nicely in Memphis, as each was once the
parent affiliate of the Bluff City’s minor-league outfit. My father (born in
1942) grew up associating the Chicks with the White Sox. Luis Aparicio played in
Memphis before enjoying a Hall of Fame career on Chicago’s South Side. Another
White Sox Hall of Famer — Luke Appling — managed the Chicks to the Southern
Association playoffs in 1952 and 1953.

As for
the Mets, they were affiliated with the Double-A Memphis Blues from 1968 to
1973, a period when the Amazin’s won the 1969 World Series and the 1973 National
League pennant. Presuming the game will be televised nationally, having a New
York team in the mix will do wonders for selling the message of the Civil Rights
Game, not to mention the beauty of AutoZone Park. Lots of televisions in the
five boroughs.

• Among
the charms of the Civil Rights Game are the three Beacon Awards. Last March the
honorees were the late Buck O’Neil (Beacon of Life), Vera Clemente (Beacon of
Hope), and Spike Lee (Beacon of Change). Far be it from me to handpick the 2008
honorees, but I’ll take just enough cyberspace to nominate Bill White. A Gold
Glove first-baseman for the 1964 world champion St. Louis Cardinals, White went
on to become the first African-American league president when he oversaw the
National League from 1989 to 1994. He’d be yet another nice fit in what is,
after all, Cardinal Country.

• What a
mess the 2008 St. Louis Cardinals appear to have. (And it’s still 2007, right?)
Former All-Star Scott Rolen has apparently made it known he won’t share a dugout
with Cardinal manager Tony LaRussa (who just signed a two-year contract
extension). With three years and more than $30 million still owed Rolen on his
current contract, the Cardinals find themselves in a position where they have to
move a disgruntled star coming off his third major surgery over the last five
years. Any takers?

If I
were new St. Louis G.M. John Mozeliak, I’d hold the pouting Rolen to his
contract obligations, at least long enough for him to prove what kind of
post-surgery player he’ll be. At the least, this would remove one variable from
an unfavorable bargaining equation. And come the 2008 All-Star break, teams will
emerge with postseason aspirations that will be more willing to discuss
prospects in a deal for the seven-time Gold Glover.

• Though
it may turn your stomach, imagine yourself a lifelong Minnesota Twins fan. In
Johan Santana, you have the finest pitcher of the decade, one on the fast track
to Cooperstown. A pitcher of Santana’s ilk is the most challenging piece to
place on a championship chess board. And he turns 29 in March, just entering his
prime.

Happy
days, right? Nope. The two-time Cy Young winner is too expensive. So a call goes
out to the only two clubs that can afford this kind of asset: the New York
Yankees and Boston Red Sox. Cultivate that farm system all you like, Twinkies,
but the prize crop will be harvested ultimately in the northeast. (Other clubs
have recently been thrown into the mix, but this is merely bargaining strategy
on Minnesota’s part. Should hike Santana’s asking price for the Yanks or Bosox.)

It’s
hardly news that the greenback shapes major-league rosters far more than actual
personnel needs or fan loyalty might, but this kind of team-hopping makes a
mockery of baseball’s class system. Until the sport devises a salary cap — in
one form or another — the haves will distance themselves from the have-nots. And
Twin fans still have garbage bags in their outfield.

Categories
Sports Sports Feature

FROM MY SEAT: Don’t Look Now, But…

• The Memphis Tiger football team is two wins from bowl eligibility, and with three of their remaining four games at home. Ask anyone other than coach Tommy West if he or she felt the 2007 squad would be fighting for a bowl berth after their 36-point loss at UCF on September 22nd and you’ll either see a head shake or know you’ve found a hopeless dreamer. The fact is, the first and most important step for West’s program to take toward national respect is to compete in Conference USA. Which means they have to beat the likes of Rice and Tulane, even on the road. Saturday’s win in New Orleans � on a last-minute touchdown pass by Tiger quarterback Martin Hankins � is precisely the kind of game Memphis is notorious for losing.

This Saturday at the Liberty Bowl the U of M will host the one team they trail in C-USA’s East Division. And they’ll be underdogs against the East Carolina Pirates. But consider these numbers: the Tigers have outperformed the Pirates in total offense (419 yards per game to 355) as well as total defense (428 yards allowed per game to 437). With a 1 pm kickoff and the home team playing for first place, Saturday’s attendance will say a lot about the Tigers’ hold on this region’s football attention. Mark this down: the team with the fewer turnovers wins.

• John Calipari isn’t the only University of Memphis coach recruiting well beyond the Mid-South region. Women’s soccer coach Brooks Monaghan is fielding a team this fall with players from 12 states and three countries. I saw a terrific match Sunday between the top two teams in Conference USA, the Tigers (now 12-3-1 overall) dropping a double-overtime affair to UCF at the Mike Rose Soccer Complex. With two regular-season games to play, Memphis is now 5-1-1 in C-USA play, trailing only the 6-1-1 Knights. Junior Kylie Hayes has already broken the 13-year-old program’s record for career goals with 34. Only four of Monaghan’s 30 players are seniors, so this is a team that should challenge for an NCAA tournament berth for years to come.

• A few observations from the 2007 World Series:

This year’s Series was the sixth straight to feature a former Memphis Redbird on the field. Adam Kennedy played for the Angels in 2002; Braden Looper pitched for the 2003 Marlins; Albert Pujols was among several former ’Birds who fell to Boston in 2004; Cliff Politte was in the bullpen for the 2005 White Sox; Yadier Molina and 11 other Cards won last year’s championship; and J.D. Drew played rightfield for the 2007 Red Sox.

• It’s a shame the country was denied seeing one of the hottest teams in baseball history take on the mighty Red Sox when the Series opened last week. Having won 21 of 22 games � a streak unmatched over the last 70 years � the Colorado Rockies had their sizzle turn to fizzle by an eight-day layoff between their sweep of Arizona in the National League Championship Series and Game 1 of the Fall Classic in Boston. It’s just not right to see a team penalized for dominating its opposition in earning a pennant.

So here’s the solution. When I’m general manager of a pennant winner someday, and my team has as many as three � let alone eight! � days off in October, there will be a roundup in our farm system. Twenty-five players � of my manager’s choice, based on our club’s scouting reports of the potential Series opponent � will report to our home stadium for a series of exhibitions. The teams will play daily, with free admission for fans. Concessions open with as much championship gear as we can sell. We’ll set up our starting rotation so our ace is on track for Game 1 of the Series, and these games will be played to win. Keeping score, strategy, platoons, bullpen activity, the works.

As simple as the notion seems, it’s a profound truth: to play baseball well, a team must play baseball games. The Rockies may as well have been playing in February when the World Series opened. And it showed.

• There’s a famous story of Marilyn Monroe returning from a tour of overseas performances at U.S. military bases. When she gets back, she tells her husband, Joe DiMaggio, “You’ve never heard such cheering!� The Yankee Clipper pauses a moment before replying, “Oh yes, dear, I have.�

In watching and reading media coverage of “Red Sox Nation� and its adoring relationship with Boston’s baseball team, one gets the impression that no such love affair can be found west of Fenway Park. That no fan base has such an appreciation for its team’s history, legends, successes and failures like those � primarily in New England � who cheer on Manny, Tek, and Big Papi. That no one has experienced the profound visceral joy of witnessing greatness in the home team’s uniform like that in Beantown.

I lived four years in Boston, but I’ve spent 38 as a member of Cardinal Nation. And yes, Boston, we have.

Categories
Sports Sports Feature

FROM MY SEAT: Pitching a Holiday (Again)

Someday
Major League Baseball will get it. And, importantly, so will the U.S. Congress.
Someday — hopefully in your lifetime, dear reader — the World Series will again
be played under the sun. (For those curious, the last daytime game played during
the Fall Classic was in 1987 . . . and it was under a roof in Minneapolis. The
last time natural shadows were actually cast at the World Series was in 1984.)
The time has long come not only for daytime baseball during the game’s signature
event, but for an actual holiday devoted to our country’s definitive pastime.
Let’s call it National Baseball Day.

For
years, now, I’ve argued that America should take a day off in late October —
midway between Labor Day and Thanksgiving — for a holiday where we can remind
ourselves how integral sports in general, and baseball in particular, have
become in the way we conduct our lives as Americans. I’ve made the case — until
this year — that this holiday should fall on the Wednesday when Game 4 of the
World Series is played. With the MLB powers that be having changed the Series
schedule, the holiday would still fall on a Wednesday, but it would now coincide
with the opening game of the Series. Even better, in my eyes, and an indication
— my fingers firmly crossed — that baseball is, in fact “getting it.”

Why
close schools, government offices, even banks(!) for a lousy baseball game?
Because leisure, friends, is what Americans do . . . and do better than any
other country on the planet. Enjoy Labor Day for what it is, a nod to the hard
work that pays your mortgage, your rent, your car note, those ever-inflating
utility bills. But take National Baseball Day as a reminder that Americans work
not to pay bills, but to play.

These
days, the argument could be made that the NFL and NASCAR have supplanted
baseball as America’s most popular spectator sport. But holidays are earned with
history, folks, and baseball was shaping Americans’ downtime long before Joe
Namath saved professional football or Richard Petty gave us an appreciation for
trading paint. And baseball remains singular in its reflection of our country’s
behavioral trends, from Babe Ruth roaring in the Twenties to Jackie Robinson
knocking down barriers in 1947, from Roberto Clemente adding a Latino flavor in
the Sixties to Ichiro Suzuki turning the sport global, indeed, in 2001.

For
National Baseball Day to happen, the money-making fat cats that run the
television networks will have to put aside their appetite for ad dollars in
favor of a big-picture view of their most critical commodity: fans. The
10-year-old boys and girls going to bed before the fifth inning of World Series
games in the eastern time zone will be the 25-year-old ticket-buying demographic
more familiar with football and stock-car racing — events held largely during
the afternoon! — in just a few years. If baseball and TV want to capture (and
hold) an audience, they should take a lesson from cereal companies and (sadly)
beer distributors: start young. Game 1 of the Series would start at 3 p.m.
eastern time, so every kid from Portland, Maine, to Portland, Oregon, could
watch every pitch if he or she chooses. (And if you think advertisers will run
from an afternoon sporting event on a weekday, tune in to the NCAA tournament
next March.)

“I don’t
give a whit about baseball,” you say? Have never watched a game, and never will?
That’s fine, too. Take the day and do something — with leisure in mind — that
you couldn’t otherwise on a regular Wednesday. Take your significant other to a
movie. Walk your dog in a new park. And if you have them, make your children
smile with an excursion (if, and only if, they don’t have a team to cheer in the
big game). However it is you catch your wind, just remember that baseball helped
the cause.

More
people bought tickets to Major League Baseball games in 2007 — almost 80 million
— than in any other season in over 120 years. Yes, Americans still love
baseball, still love the World Series. It’s time for baseball — and the World
Series — to love us back.

Categories
Sports Sports Feature

FROM MY SEAT: Just Thinking…

A few
not-so-random thoughts from the world of sports:

• I
admire coach Tommy West and the University of Memphis football program for the
strength they showed in playing last week’s game against Marshall, as
scheduled, in the aftermath of Taylor Bradford’s murder. The marching band’s
rendition of “Amazing Grace” at halftime may have been the most poignant
moment I’ve experienced at the Liberty Bowl.

I
strongly disagree with the decision to play less than 48 hours after a member
of the team was shot and killed, but if three hours in helmets and pads in
front of 25,000 friends helped ease the pain, even briefly, the effort was
worthwhile.

It’s
now the responsibility of the U of M administration, of course, to be
proactive in raising awareness about gun violence in Memphis. Our flagship
educational enterprise simply must focus attention on this city’s single most
damning weakness. However isolated or “targeted” the administration considers
Bradford’s murder, guns taking the lives of young Memphians is epidemic. The
university owes this larger battle (and far more than a football game) to the
memory of Taylor Bradford.

•
Having caught my first glimpse of the 2007-08 Memphis Grizzlies at last week’s
public “Lunch Time” scrimmage, I’ve got a name for you: Casey Jacobsen. Mike
Conley and Darko Milicic will be popular new faces at FedExForum and will play
large roles in determining how close this team is to playoff contention. But
the sharp shooting Jacobsen — a college star at Stanford who cut his pro teeth
in Europe — is going to be among the most popular Grizzlies in the season
ahead.

• Can
SEC football get any better? The 12th-ranked Georgia Bulldogs go to Tennessee,
ready to put a beat-down on the sagging Vols, having won their last three
games in Knoxville. Instead, UT discovers it can run the ball and whips the
Dawgs by 21 in a game that wasn’t that close.

Then a
few hours later, top-ranked LSU finds itself on the ropes against the
defending national champions, only to rally with one fourth-down conversion
after another, scoring the winning touchdown with less than two minutes to
play. Don’t bet against these Tigers the rest of the season. (And how many
Mid-South football fans were shedding tears over Florida being eliminated from
the national-title hunt the first week in October?)

•
Tradition will take a beating in the National League Championship Series later
this week. The senior circuit’s two historical whipping boys — the Cubs and
Phillies — both went down in three-game sweeps, and at the hands of two clubs
(the Diamondbacks and Rockies, respectively) that weren’t playing baseball as
recently as 1992.

Consider these “historical” factoids. The greatest player in Arizona history —
the currently hobbled Randy Johnson — has pitched in more games as a Mariner
than he has as a Diamondback. In 10 years of baseball, Arizona has changed its
uniform design more often than the St. Louis Cardinals have in 116 years. As
for the Rockies, they aim to reach their first World Series having still never
finished atop their division. Bless the wild card.

Even
with tradition out the window, the NLCS will be a healthy introduction for
many fans to some of the best young players never seen east of the Rocky
Mountains. Colorado’s Matt Holliday (.340 batting average, 36 homers, 137
RBIs) is — with Philadelphia’s Jimmy Rollins — one of two viable NL MVP
candidates. Rockies shortstop Troy Tulowitzki (.291, 24, 99) is a likely
Rookie of the Year winner. And rightfielder Brad Hawpe (.291, 29, 116) could
stand — in full uniform — at Times Square and not be recognized.

As for
Arizona, reigning Cy Young winner Brandon Webb (18 wins, 3.01 ERA) would be
making commercials if he played in New York, and centerfielder Chris Young (32
homers at age 23) will be a perennial All-Star by 2010.

So
forget the uniforms, the swimming pool in one ballpark and a humidor in the
other. (Mark this down: If Colorado wins the pennant, we’ll see the first snow
delay in World Series history.) Sit back and enjoy some great baseball.

• How
does a King lose his kingdom? He starts by wearing the opponent’s baseball cap
to a playoff game in Cleveland. How tone-deaf must LeBron James be to show up
at Jacobs Field in a Yankees lid? Here’s a thought for the next time the
Bombers come to Ohio for a game, LeBron: Yankee boxers.

Categories
Sports Sports Feature

FROM MY SEAT: The Defense Rests

What price a championship?

I’ll go
out on a limb and argue that the 2007 St. Louis Cardinals season has been the
most painful, trying campaign since this proud franchise first laced up spikes
in 1892. Had any of the following five(!) events taken place, the season would
have been played under a cloud:

•
Pitching ace — and 2005 Cy Young winner — Chris Carpenter was beaten around by
the Mets on Opening Day, then lost for the season with elbow damage. His surgery
will keep him out a good portion of 2008 as well.

• Relief
pitcher Josh Hancock — driving drunk, without a seat belt, on his cell phone —
was killed in a car accident in late April.

• Scott
Spiezio, the Cardinals’ top reserve during their 2006 championship run, entered
a rehab program in August to help him overcome a chemical dependence.

• On the
last day of August, rightfielder Juan Encarnacion had his left eye socket
crushed by a foul ball as he stood in the on-deck circle at Busch Stadium. The
question now is not so much if Encarnacion will play baseball again, but if
he’ll have vision in his left eye.

• After
a sparkling late-summer month that saw Rick Ankiel steal the national spotlight
by hitting nine home runs in less than 100 at-bats, Ankiel’s name came up in an
investigation of an illegal pharmaceutical ring. According to the investigation,
Ankiel received shipments of human growth hormone near his Florida home in 2004.

Wow.
Take me out to the ball game, right? Keep in mind, these are merely the clouds
that formed after Opening Day. Future Hall of Fame manager Tony LaRussa was
booked for driving under the influence last March after he fell asleep at the
wheel near the team’s spring-training facility in Florida.

Injuries
and chemical substances are nice excuses if one chooses to go that route. But
the fact is, the 2007 Cardinals were profoundly lacking in the one commodity a
baseball team cannot win without: starting pitching. When the St. Louis brass
decided to let sixty percent of last year’s rotation (Jeff Suppan, Jason
Marquis, and Jeff Weaver) leave via free agency, they did so not anticipating
that the other forty percent (Chris Carpenter and Mark Mulder) would miss
virtually the entire season to come. Find any major league baseball team —
champions or otherwise — and eviscerate its starting pitching to this degree,
and calamity will ensue. The extra, often tragic, baggage endured by this year’s
Cardinals was merely distraction as the house burned. (Consider that the
combined record of starters Kip Wells and Anthony Reyes is 8-31. Perhaps Suppan
was worth an extra million or three.)

So
what’s next? Far more questions than answers as the Cardinals start their
earliest offseason in four years. Will LaRussa return, and be part of the fix-it
team? (The guess here is that he’s gone. A pitching rotation can be dismissed in
a single offseason, but rebuilt?) Will veterans Scott Rolen and Adam Kennedy —
shelved for the season’s final month for surgery — regain their primes, or will
they be expensive baggage (that word again) surrounding Albert Pujols in 2008?
And what about the kids — Brendan Ryan, Ryan Ludwick, Skip Schumaker, and yes,
Mr. Ankiel — who found more playing time at Busch Stadium than anyone
anticipated in a title defense? Who among these names will be part of the
solution?

Death,
drugs, and catastrophic injury. If a deal was truly struck with some
otherworldly power for the Cardinals’ unlikely 2006 championship, the argument
here is that the debt has been paid, and with considerable interest.

I’ll
wrap this week’s column with seven words I’ve never spoken or written: I’m glad
the Cardinals’ season is over.

Categories
Sports Sports Feature

FROM MY SEAT: Just Thinking…

• As
disheartening as it was to read of the Tiger basketball program’s latest
appearance on the police blotter, it was that much more discouraging — though
somehow not surprising — to find Joey Dorsey’s name in the mix. When freshman
Jeff Robinson and transfer Shawn Taggert were arrested on Beale Street in the
wee hours of September 2nd, some margin might have been granted to a pair of
kids not yet aware of the responsibility that comes with the quasi-royalty of
being Memphis Tiger basketball players. (Having been on campus a year, though,
Taggert gets less margin than does Robinson.)

But Joey
Dorsey? The 23-year-old senior “leader” of a team with national title hopes?
Having been previously connected with transgressions large (bar brawls in
February and June) and small (pouring water on another U of M student), Dorsey’s
track record already made him a lightning rod for controversy. Even if he was,
say, handing out 20-dollar bills, for the 6’9″ center of the city’s flagship
basketball institution to jump on top (!) of a bar is well beyond any boundaries
of taste and civility (at least this side of the Coyote Ugly staff).

I, for
one, can’t figure Dorsey out. I recall his humble post game assessment as a
sophomore on areas he needed to improve upon for his team to advance deeply into
the NCAA tournament. When I tried to touch on the same area last winter, he held
up his hand and proclaimed his policy of not speaking with the press. From
there, he proceeded to compare Ohio State’s Greg Oden to the Biblical David with
Dorsey himself in the role of Goliath . . . in front of the national press.
However lacking Dorsey may be in the details — and message — of scripture, he’s
apparently just as shallow when it comes to his conduct after dark. It’s gonna
be an interesting year covering the Tiger cagers.

• When I
saw Pete Sampras win the 1996 Kroger St. Jude championship at The Racquet Club
of Memphis, I told myself that — at age 26 — I had already seen the greatest
tennis player I’d ever see. From his serve to his forehand, from his net game to
his decade-long consistency, Sampras was a standard I placed on a pedestal
beyond reach of mortal players.

Then
along came Roger Federer. In winning his fourth straight U.S. Open — on the
heels of winning his fifth straight Wimbledon title in July — the 26-year-old
Swiss titan has made a tennis court his canvas, his opponents merely part of his
medium of choice. Whether it’s power (he out-aced Andy Roddick, remember) or the
surgical precision of his groundstrokes, Federer brings a beauty to a sport that
has been customarily bludgeoned in recent years by power-serving sluggers who
can’t cover half the court if their service is returned. Next time you watch
Federer play, count the times he stumbles or grunts. (Wouldn’t you think the
countless players — men and women — who incorporate screams with every stroke
might look at Federer and reconsider their volume as wasted energy?) With 12
Grand Slam titles to his credit, Federer may well break Sampras’ record of 14
next year. It seems the only challenge ahead of this racket-toting magician is
Rafael Nadal’s supremacy at the French Open and a calendar-year Grand Slam
sweep. Don’t bet against him.

• On
July 19th, I took my 8-year-old daughter to her first night game at AutoZone
Park. It happened to be Rick Ankiel’s 28th birthday. When Ankiel reached first
base after his second at-bat, the stadium organist serenaded the Thursday-night
crowd — and Mr. Ankiel — with the familiar jingle of “Happy Birthday.” I
remember how complicated it felt to try and explain to Sofia how exceptional it
is for a baseball player who has reached the highest level of his sport as a
pitcher to metamorphose into a power-hitting outfielder . . . and return to the
major leagues. That conversation was, well, kid stuff compared with the topic of
human growth hormone. Is a third-grade mind ready for a summary of HGH?

• The
39-19 loss suffered by Southern Miss at Tennessee Saturday is not a good sign
for Conference USA. It’s never easy to win in Neyland Stadium, but when the
preeminent program in C-USA loses by 20 to a team generally considered the third
best in the SEC’s Eastern Division, the recruiting gap between these conferences
is growing, not shrinking. Try convincing a blue-chipper life as a Golden Eagle
— or as a Memphis Tiger — would be better than that of a Vol, or a Gamecock, or
heavens, a Wildcat.

Categories
Opinion

Striking Out

Northwest Airlines willing, when this column appears I will be about as far away from Memphis as you can get and still be in the U.S.A.

Unalakleet, Alaska, is 400 miles northwest of Anchorage on the Bering Sea at the edge of the Arctic Circle. I am told the sun shines 22 hours a day this time of year. I am told that by my son Jack, who is a fishing guide at Unalakleet River Lodge and my benefactor for this trip. He promises to watch out for grizzlies while backtrolling and putting me on some monster salmon, grayling, and Dolly Vardens.

Honestly, this is a waste of high-grade talent and expensive tackle on a rank amateur. I don’t know a Dolly Varden from Dolly Parton. My fatherly knowledge of hunting and fishing consisted of “pull the thingee and it goes bang” and “if you can’t tie good knots, tie lots of them.”

When Jack was growing up, summer was all about baseball. We spent our evenings in the living room with Greg Maddux, Fred McGriff, and the Atlanta Braves. Summer weekends meant tournaments, car pools, “it’s our turn to bring the drinks,” and “will we ever beat Germantown?” (No.) This lasted about 10 years, from coach-pitch to kid-pitch to high school.

Then suddenly it was over. Really over. For 95 percent of baseball players, the game ends before they even reach their physical prime. Tennis players, swimmers, and runners can compete and get better well into middle age. Basketball players can get a game at the gym until their knees give out. For most baseball players, though, high school is the end of the road. Try rounding up 18 guys next weekend for a pickup game. You might as well put your glove and spikes on eBay.

Jack got a last trip around the bases. He tried out at the University of Tennessee, threw 87 miles per hour once he got one close enough to the plate for the gun to measure it, and impressed Coach Rod Delmonico enough to make the team. In the spring of 2003, he pitched three innings in three games at Knoxville, Baton Rouge, and Johnson City and sat on the bench for what must have seemed like about three years. My wife and I would pick up the broadcasts of the games on the Internet, our hopes rising and falling with every blowout. One year of that was enough for us and for Jack, too. He quit the team.

He would throw no more strikes. Instead, he would strike out alone like Thoreau (Henry) and Theroux (Paul) for the woods and distant places. End was beginning.

Fly rod replaced baseball glove. Time spent in the weight room and on the bench became time spent fishing the French Broad, the Hiwassee, the Cumberland, and streams in the Smokies. Then he traded his fly rod for a passport.

In a year and a half, he hiked the Gower Peninsula in Wales, played rugby in Swansea, rode the Heart of Wales railway at midnight, made the last bus to Cardiff and the Snowdon Sherpa to Snowdonia. He fished the Wye, got loaded on Guinness in Galway, and watched punters on the Thames. In Argentina, he drove a rented Fiat 1,700 kilometers to Tierra del Fuego, saw Che Guevara’s motorized bicycle and Butch Cassidy’s hideout, picked Malbec grapes for $15 a day, watched the evidence of global warming on the glaciers near the Strait of Magellan, smuggled a puppy from Chile, taught English, learned Spanish, froze in the howling wind of the Glaciers National Park, and fished the Limay, Chimehuin, Malleo, Arrayanes, and Rivadavia. He came home for six days last month then took off for Alaska.

“I’m learning a lot about outboard motors, salmon runs, waterfowl, the Eskimos, and the Arctic. I’m having fun, eating well, and staying healthy,” he wrote.

Four years after Jack threw his last curve ball, I can see things in a different light. There is a huge gulf between good and great athletes. Once in a while a few of Jack’s contemporaries make the sports page. Paul Maholm from Germantown High pitched against Roger Clemens when “The Rocket” made his return to New York. Matt Cain from Houston High was the losing pitcher against Maddux a few weeks ago. Luke Hochevar from U.T. was one of the first picks in the draft last year. I hope they make the Hall of Fame. And Rod Delmonico got fired. Serves you right, Coach. And thanks.

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Rick Ankiel’s “Ruthian” Journey

With 19 home runs through June 21st, Rick Ankiel has been the offensive star for the 2007 Memphis Redbirds. St. Louis Post-Dispatch columnist Joe Strauss calls Ankiel’s transition from the pitching mound (where he won 11 games for St. Louis in 2000) to the outfield “Ruthian.”

High praise, indeed, for someone who makes his living playing baseball. Read Strauss’ profile here.