the color of pine tar

those pitcher's mounds are something else.
hard to see them in the winter months with the ground covered in snow,
but even in the summer,
it's not really clear what's buried under there
and even if the stadium is gone
and dirt naturally not the same,
there is still a name or an event,
a carl mays,
his 29 shutouts,
abominable personality,
underhand delivery,
reputation for coming inside
and that one pitch that really got away
and sent ray chapman to his early death.

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carl mays became a scout for the milwaukee braves.
it was 1963,
he probably visited county stadium at some point during the season
or maybe not,
but either way,
mays was connected to the menominee river valley
where cooper waved his hands to guide the ball down down down back in 82
and deer sent easter egg sunday 1987
and one anonymous regular season game after another
including the end of days overlooking miller park's construction
and now jean segura will play shortstop.....
those degrees of separation are always so much fewer than we imagine
and all so terribly invisible.

baseball's one night stand

i was handed the keys to a penske truck and instructed
to drive it out west,
to san francisco.
it was filled with expired skin creams.

that was a long time ago, but
i remember colorado and
and meeting some navajo indians outside coors field
one of em sipping a hair spray cocktail
and the others having a conversation about something.
two of us went to the game
and then to boulder
and then i took a detour to the four corners
followed by a long highway darkness that made las vegas
truly the city of lights.

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it gets me thinking of cc sabathia
and the brewers trading one of their hyped prospects,
matt laporta back in 2008.
and how lights out sabbathia was for the rest of the season.
11-2 with a bunch of complete games and flirts with no hitters.
the brewers won the wild card and
a couple of first round draft picks
when sabbathia signed with new york in the off season.

where is laporta these days?
how often does the window open for starving teams?
kansas city and toronto don't care about "depletion of a farm system"
and they shouldn't.

i don't buy meat because it has potential.
i buy it because i know it's good.
let someone else test taste and die with prospects.

de-liriano-eees

i'm happy for the pirates.
because i too slammed my head against many walls,
more of a soft core equivalent to james brown,
no pimping for me,
but i made my share of false identity detours.

i dig honus wagner
and the world series pirate crowns
before the yankees even existed,
but that's all scratchy news reel stuff to me.

but i do remember barry bonds hanging his head
in color tv memory
after sid bream scored
and then barry leaving pittsburgh
and then the pirates becoming steve blass syndrome.

is liriano really worth it?
when is enough enough?
how many more one last chances?

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where will shawn marcum pitch next year?
are the brewers still bitter because he conked out at the end of the 2011 season?
who cares!
sign the marcum for half as much as liriano signed with the pirates
marcum's career numbers blow liriano away.

gorzelanny

panning through salvation army piles is an ode.
i see kids around the flag pole,
playing east west war.

one kid braves the mobile assault and
dares his tongue against the metal.
none of them care about the polyester symbol waving free up above and neither do i.

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the brewers signed tom gorzelanny yesterday to a two-year contract.
The news didn't make it to mlb.com's top 7 stories
which is rare because news in the winter is usually sparse,
but apparently aj pyrzinski signing with texas is bigger news,
but anyway who cares!

it is the biggest signing for the Brewer's this off season in terms of money and filling a need.
The Brewer's bullpen was bad last season and the starting rotation
after gallardo and probably fiers and estrada is still very much up for grabs.
 gorzellany is a rare 30 year old lefty not because he's 30 or lefty
but because he can start and relieve and be pretty good at both.

melvin didn't buy into the hype and panic and pay double digit millions for old pitchers.
he refused to sign them to 3 year contracts. been there, done that with suppan and wolfe.
so there are no christmas candies for hungry brewer's fans this year.
the team is going with what it's got and i like it.

milestone

we didn't run on the field in 1982
but we jumped butt naked into lake michigan
on easter sunday 1987
and we didn't know it at the time,
but we kinda baptized ourselves
as brewer fans for the rest of our lives.

i still smell the alewives.

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loyalty in baseball is far from dead.
yeh sure, some players move on to the highest bidder
or closer to home
or wanting to win a championship,
but some players sign long contracts with one team,
really long.

i don't know who started it.
maybe ryan braun or maybe it was troy tulowitzki.
i guess they like dropping anchor and avoiding  all that shop around contract hassle.
if they got families, they can buy a house and sign up the kiddies for school.
either way, players make a really good chunk of change,
but there must be something else going on like some sort of old loyalty.
braun must really want to win in milwaukee. i guess that's kind of obvious.

braun will be the brewers all time home run hitter soon.
he's 49 away from robin yount's 251.

under the mound

don sutton crowned 1982's second half
as the best baseball time of his life
and he pitched with some good ones...
koufax, drysdale, tommy john, charlie hough
and then with nolan ryan as an astro in 1981.

but it was the trade the following year to milwaukee

that sticks with the hall of famer.

who can blame him?
i don't think the party in 82 ended until 1984
and the brewers didn't even win the world series.

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there's a fan whose name i don't remember.
he was there in 82
and is still there today.
he wears dark rimmed glasses and looks a heck of a lot like cal tjader.
he told me about vuke,
sleeping off a drunk in the bullpen
and waking up to the sound of his name,
"and now today's starting pitchers."

vuke probably tucked his shirt in during the long walk out to the mound
and started up his smoke and mirror "hargrove rain delay" psych out.

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i don't know what's become of axford's mustache,
but man oh man is he ever easy to like.
as a matter of fact,
i can't think of anything more amazing than a spring training invite to a canadian
and the wash up making the opening day roster
and then performing beyond any scout's or statistician's recommended expertise.
it's an absolute revolution to me.

the brewers have a scout stationed in quebec.
his name is JP Roy.
he shows up at the local tryout camps put on by major league baseball.
most major league teams probably have one scout for canada
and rarely one specifically for quebec.
no surprise with the brewers since melvin and ash are both born in ontario.

the brewers currently have 12 canadian born players in their system.
only the blue jays have more.

one of them is from montreal. 

--Philippe Valiquette, Montreal, Que. (0-1, 8.49) double-A Huntsville; 

-- (0-0, 4.00) Single-A Brevard County Manatees.

i like dreaming when it's snowing outside. 

this town of montreal is still made for baseball!
it's got vuke's grit.

there's gold in dem hills

i'm not against hot prospects
and don't hesitate to admire
a 10 walking with her curves in full swag mode.
she steps up to the bar rail and twirls her curls
and even the gay men in the back
take notice of her.

she gets fat,
maybe squeezes out a few kids,
but still takes the rail with the same moxy.
i'd buy another round to hear her sing karaoke.

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i guess the brewers were willing to trade brett lawrie
because rickie weeks existed.
weeks was the number 2 overall pick back in 2003.
weeks still holds the highest career batting average in ncaa history.
.473 at southern university.

you can say what you want about "level of competition,"
but southern u. is division 1 and
even if it wasn't.
even if it was whiffel ball united,
.473 is a monster number
because there are always 8 fielders waiting for a batted ball.

weeks slumped for the first half of the 2012 season and then some,
but then he turned it on in the second half and then some.
i'll take my chances with weeks now and forever.

baseball's hot foot

i learned like the buddha about old age, dying, disease,
but i learned it all at county stadium.
i was a kid holding my dad's hand
looking for autographs.
i had no idea about...
paper beer cups exploding,
people making out under the bleachers,
giant urinal troughs,
drunk boxing matches,
and everyone eventually having to exit.

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chemistry on a baseball team
is like any other chemistry.
it's invisible and yet,
so many people take about chemistry
as one of the keys to success.

they might be right,
but why even talk about it?
it's like trying to describe a feeling between two people,
better left unsaid.

what gets me is people who preach that
chemistry has to be positive.
what about the yankees in the 70's?
and all the cat scratching between reggie and martin.
or what about the pirates in 1979?
that "we are family' hype was apparently an irony.
those guys were a mixture of ethnic upbringing variety,
inevitably loud and combative
or so phil garner remembers
in the book,
"The Pirates" by Lou Sahadi.

bert blyleven was on that 79 pirates team.
i met him a few years later as an indian.
i was hanging out beside the indians dugout at county stadium,
whining for autographs,
"mr. blyleven, mr. blyleven, will you sign this ball?"

next thing i knew mr. blyleven pointed to my shoe.
he had pranked me a hot foot.
i was initiated.
that's the only baseball chemistry i've ever known.