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All Alone....by Bob Sanders

 

I've always loved a good mystery but studies suggesting we are becoming increasingly lonely flies in the face of all the instant communications available to us.  What is going on?

Actually, it's more than a mystery.  It's a paradox impossible to ignore in coffee shops, libraries, public transportation, baseball games, the beach, the car, you name it.  Choose your site and it's there.  Heads down, everyone.  Let's ignore each other while pretending to be friendly as we further tailor our personas by way of the often badly-written word and retouched photo.  We haven't had this much fun since the last phony resume.

Who would have thought that a song written nearly eighty years ago would best describe the solitude suggested by studies.  It was Irving Berlin who wrote "All Alone" whose point of view was that a lot of lonely people were waiting by the telephone.  In those days, the coin-operated version offered communications a wondrous mobility of sorts.  We've traded the phone booth for the cell phone--a more convenient means of communication yet lacking the romantic effort it often took to hoof it to the phone and set up a meet at the Oyster Bar, under the clock, or at Ricarrdo.  One wonders how many among us practice a self-con suggesting that a multiplicity of fast communications can replace the reality of a face-to-face relationship.  How many among us upon hearing an "alone" song (there must be at least two dozen) immediately think: "hey, they're playing my song."

The loneliness studies today are impressively scary.  One done in 2010 by AARP found that 35 percent of adults more than 45 were chronically lonely--up from 20 percent a decade earlier.  That suggests Facebook (launched by Mark Zuckerberg in 2004) isn't doing what it is supposed to be doing: making us giddy with the understanding we have so many friends.  Further, another study suggests 20 percent of Americans (60 milion) are unhappy with their lives because of loneliness.

I once tested loneliness' first cousin, isolation, at Wrigley Field, a pretty noisy place--particularly if you normally sat in the bleachers where, as Bill Veeck observed: "Here, the beer is colder, the fans much smarter and you can see better."  Retired from the Chicago Tribune, I was invited more than once to watch the Cubs from the firm's sky box high above third base.  I finally accepted the offer trading banter with the Bleacher Preacher and other habitues of the then cheap seats for the air conditioned comfort and free booze of the corporate digs.  It's pretty rare of me to pass up gratis sauce and I managed three innings, then left never to return.  It was awful; there was no noise other than that emanating from the TV while the occupants provided the kind of un-knowledgeable commentary also available at any World Series game.

One has to wonder about such things as touching each other to convey feelings.  While there are no statistics thus far, it does seem that our intense desire for digital connection is going too far when we spend much more time in isolation touching and feeling a tiny screen rather than each other.  Fingers that once walked through phone books now glide over i-pod touch as we don head phones to make certain we're not sharing the experience while our ears are assaulted by noise accompanied by lyrics either repetitive or boring.  Ah, but what control is ours.

A case can be made that limiting each Twitter to 140 characters is working a remarkable hardship on both our language and the people who use it.  With class warfare a reality as we gird ourselves for six more months of the White House Marathon, is it possible that further class warfare is developing between the Facebookers, the Tweeters and the Bloggers?  As a member of the Blogging class, I'm in what is probably a second tier aristocracy of computer communications bearing in mind the significance of Pulitzer-winning Huffington Post, Politico, the Daily Beast and others of the upper echelon.  On the other hand, the often misinformed and misguided production by Tweeters and Facebookers is staggering and we won't even discuss the tearing asunder of our language largely through laziness.

Since this is an era in which we place almost all screw-ups at the feet of the President, I think it quite likely that John F. Kennedy bears some responsibility for all that is going wrong with fast communications spelling although his sentence structure was, largely, exemplary with a good sense of rhythm.  Kennedy, as we have learned, was a terrible speller and purposely wrote illegibly when he couldn't come up with correct spelling.  Let us now refer to all lack of legibility as a Kennedystroke.

Online dating, of which Kennedy had no need had there been such a thing more than 50 years ago, is a strange term since the socializing is done offline.  It is, perhaps, best exemplified by eHarmony whose television commercials promise tomorrow's nirvana through "matching algorithms."  For a fee, eHarmony and other pimps of the communications skyways collect information about you, crunch the numbers, then pair you with someone "prescreened for deep compatibility across 29 dimensions."  As Ohio University professor of economics William Fenzel once told me: "garbage in, garbage out."

The dubious science of matchmaking is getting a lot of criticism these days.  Eli J. Finkel, an associate professor of social psychology at Northwestern University and Benjamin R. Karney, whose professorship is at the University of California, Los Angeles, have just published a critical article in the journal Psychological Science in the Public Interest.  The study they and three others in the field produced suggests that 80 years of what makes people romantically compatible runs counter to the claims made by the eHarmonies.

Predicting compatibility is at best shaky made even more so since the sites fail to collect, according to the authors, some highly crucial information including job loss, financial strain, infertility and illness.  Research indicates people tend to have difficult romantic relationships if they are emotionally volatile, were mistreated as children or abuse drugs or alcohol.  The romantic brokers say dating pool eliminations are made (four marriages and you're out) but, once gain, garbage in, garbage out if lies are told.

The matchmaking people may have an even larger problem.  With Twitter and Facebook achieving such enormous use, are people simply forgoing the sometimes awkward adventures made possible by the eHarmonies and doing end runs around the panderers?

Knowing there is nothing quite as absorbing as a boy meets girl story and curious about how quick communications might be utilized, I chanced upon what writers of film scripts would be inclined to regard as a likely Woody Allen plot.

Author, public speaker and CEO of something called Buyosphere, Tara (last name Hunt) began showing up all over the Internet a few years ago as Miss Rogue.  I learned this through due diligence that also produced Carlos (last name Pacheco), a character whose perfect realization could be achieved in a delicious Latin fashion by Woody Allen, now a bit long in the tooth for the part but, hey, Woody likes young women.

Carlos began noticing Tara and her triumphs in seemingly anything Montreal or, as he eventually learned, San Francisco, Silicone Valley, New York and, probably, Poughkeepsie.  Tara gets around having spoken at 126 worldwide conferences while traveling more than 476,000 miles.  One of her major Blogging efforts was the unforgettable HorsePigCow and her authorship includes The Wuffie Factor.   As late night TV host Jack Paar used to say: "I kid you not."

In all honesty, there is something voyeuristic about checking out someone like Tara, a very attractive 38-year-old Canadian recently profiled by Joanne Wilson, otherwise known as Gotham Gal.  Photos (found elsewhere) by Eva Blue added to her mystique and Carlos, who lives in Montreal, became intrigued--particularly since Tara had returned there from San Francisco.  One of the Blue photos is partcularly arresting.  It features whipped cream and an interestingly tattooed Tara.

While it's not clear who made the first move, it is certain Tara and Carlos are self-described "slight Tweeters," a term that certainly qualifies as a major oxymoron.  Upping the romantic ante, they first dabbled in Facebook, then consummated some solid back and forth Tweets during which he learned Tara's first major Internet identification was Miss Rogue, not to be confused with Sarah Palin.

Carlos (Woody Allen) was suddenly struck by disaster in the form of his Facebook account being hjacked by co-workers.  The timing, two days prior to Valentine's Day, would have been disastrous except for a fortuitous Twitter sent by Tara and detailed by Carlos in his  Blog of 2012/02/14.  Tara, a party-giver of considerable renown in addition to her other talents, was into the details of a VD party (not what you think) that turned out to be a screening of Casablanca which the cinematically deprived Carlos had never seen.  He did go, however, although he did not speak to the formidable Tara who, according to his highly confessional Blog was simply having pity on him.  True to form, he did not see all of Casablanca but he did like the '20s theater.

According to Carlos, once there I saw her from afar, she was breathtaking (a photo is offered) & surrounded by at least half a dozen friends.  At that point all that courage escaped and my shyness took over.  Also, the last thing I wanted to be was that geeky fanboy from the Internet that showed up alone.  Readers of a bygone era--particularly those who believe Casablanca the greatest movie of all, must be shocked, shocked in the realization that male readers of the Playboy Forum would have handled this one differently.

Aware of Carlos' social shortcomings, good sport Tara invited him to a neighborhood food-discrawl which took on heightened importance as I reminded myself that all this unrequited foolishness was taking place in Montreal, a city where food is as important as women to Hugh Hefner for whom I had toiled more than once in, of all places, Montreal.

Carlos is interesting and may be a split personality who on his Blog describes himself as "a social media voyeur, part-time jogger, reformed hard core gamer, sometimes Blogger and...."  Then, again, he may be putting us on.

We are indebted to Blogger Brad McCarty, managing editor of The Next Web who describes himself as a music and tech junkie living in Nashville and who picked up on what surely had to be the passive Carlos' last shot at Tara.  According to McCarty, Carlos engaged something called the Gowalla Message Service, then planted Gowalla's notes to Tara all over Montreal eventually taking her on a walking date of four hours about which there are no details.  Some of those notes may have been particularly interesting but I guess we'll never know.  Somehow, I can't see Woody Allen doing all that walking.  A series of cab rides makes more sense.

McCarty adds: "The two have stayed together ever since, presently celebrating six months of a relationship together."

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Some afterthoughts about my communications prowl: While "awesome" retains its position as the most over-used word by the lazy, "amazing" is moving up.  The computer and its various family members make it possible for us to be open books.  Frankly, I prefer at least a little mystery.    

Lost and Found....by Bob Sanders

 

It has been a disappointing week.  The Artest (first name Ron) formerly known for rude behavior on NBA basketball courts is back in fetid form under his new and highly inappropriate name, Metta World Peace.  Hardly tranquil was the Los Angeles Lakers small forward's declaration of war on James Harden's head.  Harden's considerable skills are employed by the Oklahoma Thunder and the vicious assault was by way of a World Peace flying elbow.  World Peace claimed it was "accidental" but TV replays suggest otherwise.  For causing a concussion, he got a seven-game suspension, a decided contrast to a 2004 docking of 86.

Joining World Peace as major screw ups were a bunch of Secret Service operatives assigned to protect the President.  Somehow, a number of Columbian hookers wound up at the hotel where President Obama would be staying and, somehow, one of the agents refused to pay for services rendered.  Quicker than you can command room service, hotel management, then the cops were summoned resulting in the mom's apple pie reputation of the Secret Service going in the toilet.  It was the kind of opening scene of inspired lunacy that might have come from the enormously fertile mind of film director/writer Billy Wilder.  The kicker to the scene, of course, is that prostitution is legal in that part of Columbia.  Details, details.

It could very well be that the price-conscious agent has one of those very reactive minds much like head-hunting NFL defensive linemen quite unable to think things through.  As the story develops, it becomes clear that a number of agents will no longer run the risk of taking a bullet for this or any President.

Then, there's the case of GSA official Jeff Neely who became the poster boy for the $830,000 tab run up by his organization at much ado about precious little celebrations in Las Vegas.  What happened in Sin City is not staying there.  Neely had the misfortune to be photographed with two glasses of wine within easy reach while smiling from a hot tub.  Fox News went reliably crazy.

Offering a nice contrast to this country's stupid elite was one of those feel-good stories NBC's "Evening News" likes to sign off with on Fridays.  It's the tale of Misaki Murikami, now aware one prized possession survived the tsunami that destroy his home and community on March 11, 2011.  A football, containing messages of best wishes, was given him in 2005 as a good-bye gift when he transferred to another school.

The ball made it all the way to Alaska where David Baxter, a radar technician from Kasilof, found it while beachcombing on Middleton Island, 70 miles south of the Alaskan mainland.  Baxter and his wife plan to visit Japan next month but will not deliver the ball directly to Murikami.  They don't want to create a fuss.

While on the beachcombing subject, we've been fascinated for a long time by items carried great distances, then found.  People have been putting messages in bottles for something like 2,000 years.  Champion bottle finder appears to be beachcombing Illinoisan Clint Buffington.  A teacher at the University of Kentucky, Buffington is to bottle finding what Art Wall is to the hole-in-one.  Wall, as a touring professional, had 45 plus nine as an amateur.  Californian Norman Manley claims 59 but he wasn't a pro and some of his aces are unattested.  

With bottle-hunting not as popular as golf, statistics are on the rare side.  Buffington claims 38 readable notes in bottles and his pursuit is intense for someone with sand in his shoes.  He once found a Coca-Cola bottle on an island in the Caribbean Sea and got in touch with the daughter of the man who wrote it, perhaps 50 years ago.  The daughter, Paula Pierce of New Hampshire, understandably was impressed: "That gave me the chills.  I feel like they're sending me a message."  Her parents had stayed at the Beachcomber Hotel in Hampton and had placed a note in a bottle promising the finder $150 to be paid by owner Tina.  Dad was, doubtless, a big spender of other people's money.

It was in 2007 on the shoreline of the Turks and Caicos Islands some 550 miles south of Miami that Buffington came upon another bottle tossed in the Atlantic Ocean.  The year was 1999 and the bottle flip a part of a first wedding anniversary celebration by Ed and Carol Meyers in Duck, North Carolina, an outer banks community just a few quacks away from Kitty Hawk.  Interestingly enough, the beach where Buffington found the Meyers' bottle is the same one where he came upon the Pierce container and the note promising $150 to the finder.

A not so far-traveled message in a bottle was one found three years ago by Darin Winkler of the River Run subdivision on the Spokane River.  Walking the banks of the river with his kids, Winkler noticed an old flattened basketball and a bunch of bottles.  One, with an old-fashioned cork stopper, appeared to be of greater vintage than the others.  Carefully extracting a note from the bottle, Winkler noticed the paper was a bit damp, but mostly intact.  A date on it, March 30, 1913, took his breath away.  The note was signed by Emmett Presnell of nearby Rockford.  Research by Winkler suggests the bottle had had a very short trip and very likely spent the better part of nine decades high and dry on a tangle of logs or washed up on a bank making the note so readable after so long.

A postcard can have a lot of travel miles on it and so it was with one received by Vasilia "Vas" Mazzotta last April.  Mazzotta, who now lives in Cromwell, Connecticut, was a bit baffled when she first tried to make sense of it.  Addressed to "Miss Vassoula Sitara" (her maiden name), it was an Easter card, written in Greek and signed by her long-deceased grandfather.  It was dated Athens 20 April 65.  There are no hints of where the postcard had been for nearly 46 years and it remains a mailbox mystery.

Under the right circumstances, balloons can be impressive travelers and so it was when Laura Buxton, 10, released a red balloon ino the air over her home in Stoke-on-Trent in Staffordshire, England.  That was in June, 2001 and on one side of the balloon she had written: "Please return to Laura Buxton," on the other her home address.

About 140 miles away a man in Milton Libourne found the balloon stuck in a hedge on his property.  Noticing Laura Buxton's name and address, the man took the balloon to a neighbor's house showing it to the 10-year-old girl who lived there.  Her name: also Laura Buxton.

From there the story is like something out of the "Twilight Zone."  The second Laura Buxton wrote the first to tell her of the found balloon; the two, thinking the balloon connection extraordinary, decided they had to meet in person.

On meeting day, the two girls wore the same outfit--a pink sweater and jeans.  The girls, both tall for their ages, were the same height, had brown hair wearing it in the same style and even brought their guinea pigs along.  Both  pigs were  the same color and even had duplicate orange markings on their hindquarters.  Both had three-year-old black Labrador Retrievers at home, as well as gray pet rabbits.

The odd events that brought them together have made possible a strong bonding between the two.  They are now 21 and believe their most unusual meeting was too significant to be regarded as mere coincidence.  Can't you just hear Rod Serling introducing the two Laura Buxtons: "You're traveling through another dimension, a dimension not only of sight and sound but of mind; a journey into a wondrous land whose boundaries are that of imagination--next stop, the 'Twilight Zone.'"  Da-da-da-da/da-da-da-da.

Quite a few of our four-footed friends have used a variety of travel means to reappear after unique adventures.  Emily, a one-year-old tabby diappeared from Lesley and Donny McElhiney's home in Appleton, Wisconsin while on her evening prowl.  She soon found herself on a truck headed for Chicago.  Inside a container of paper bales, she was shipped to Belgium, eventually winding up in France where a laminating company's employees found her thin and thirsty.  Wearing tags, she was soon reunited with her family thanks to Continental Airlines.  Emily's across-the-pond adventure totaled 4,500 miles.

It wasn't easy for Troubles, a scout dog, to get back to his First Air Cavalry Division Headquarters during the Vietnam War.  Troubles' handler, William Richardson, was wounded deep in the war zone and the two became separated when Richardson was flown by helicopter to a hospital.  That was a tough break for Troubles who not only lost his handler but was abandoned by the rest of the unit.  Everything was strange about Vietnam but Troubles made it back to headquarters in Anikhe three weeks later.  Troubles, a canine on a mission, wouldn't let anyone near him as he searched tents.  The lengthy search ended when Troubles curled up for a nap after finding a pile of Richardson's clothes to use for a bed.

I wonder if my Joe Sewell glove will ever turn up?  I left it behind when World War II called.  Worn by the Hall of Famer who played for the Cleveland Indians and New York Yqnkees, the glove was given me by Xen Scott, a Cleveland area neighbor and Sewell's coach at the University of Alabama.  That glove would have to travel some 2,000 miles--if it's still in a dusty corner of a basement on Summit Ave. in Lakewood.  That's a long way but you never ever really know about such things.  Da-da-da-da/da-da-da-da.

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Obtusely Ozzie....by Bob Sanders

 

No one has ever accused Ozzie Guillen of thinking things through but the remarkable championing of Fidel Castro by the Marlins manager was as startling as Sarah Palin authoring a book about geography or, perhaps, providing us with an insightful analysis of the New York Times.

In the world of public relations, Guillen's gaffe is one of the grand disasters ranking right up there with the Chicago Tribune's Dewey Defeats Truman.

Highly creative writers of satire would have to draw upon muses of incredible inspiration to come up with Guillen's bizarre foot-in-mouth classic.  Just imagine.  Born in Venezuela and a resident of South Florida for the past 12 years, Guillen was a major league shortstop for 16 years, and a manager the past eight.  Playing with and managing Cuban players, he is well aware not only of life in Cuba, but, also, the low esteem citizens of Little Havana have for Castro.

Sensationally bumptious, Guillen had worn out his welcome in Chicago while plying his managerial skills for the White Sox and owner Jerry Reinsdorf.  Guillen's mouth got in the way of success following a World Series win in 2005 when he called a Sun-Times sports columnist a "fagot."  It was not the only time Guillen had demonstrated a lack of sensitivity when involved with the press.

Timing, as we have come to realize, is everything and Guillen's big trouble in Little Havana was astonishing in its essential perversity.  At least he didn't resort to sky-writing his declaration although, come to think of it, that would have been a fine photo op.

Take what had been the Florida Marlins and, as Henny Youngman would have put it, "please."  The Marlins, in spite of reasonable success on the field, have been box office failures fielding teams on the cheap while unable to connect with South Florida fans any better than Mitt Romney with Tea Party types.  What to do?

Starting with a name change, the Florida Marlins became the Miami Marlins and a new state-of-the-art tax-funded stadium was built within the cozy confines of Little Havana.  It cost $645 million and the sheer logic of it all was breath-taking.  Either by birth, pass along genes, or osmosis, those Cuban-Americans are nuts about what they call biesbol going back to the good old days before Castro, Che Guevara and others turned the country Communist, then invited the Russians to help create those missile-threatening 10 days in May that gave John F. Kennedy his finest moments in office.

Little Havana, once described as a Disney version of a displaced Cuba, is a unique place--so much so that U.S. policy toward Cuba is based upon the feelings of a minuscule percentage of this country's population.  A piece of Miami has the kind of clout envied even by Chicagoans who pioneered in such matters. 

The Marlins needed a manager and Guillen was more than available.  Owner Jeffrey Loria signed him to a four-year contract figuring that a Latino leader, admittedly a little loony at times, would captivate the fans of Little Havana with stream of consciousness rants accompanied by legendary accomplishments on the diamond.  Ah, the anticipated joys of genuine verbal linkage to the baseball fans of Little Havana.

As far as subject matter for those intemperate moments, such a possibility as the manager's love for Castro could not possibly have entered Loria's mind.  Castro's popularity in Little Havana is roughly that of a KKK Grand Dragon in Harlem.

It's worth noting that Chicago's press gave Guillen a lot of slack during all eight years of his responsibilities positioning him somewhere between aldermen on the take and Wrigley's latest chewing gum.  Time magazine's Sean Gregory, unaware that Ozzie is Ozzie, reported off-the-cuff flippancy leading with the manager's love for Castro.  The Chicago press would have turned a deaf ear but the guy from Time failed to play the game with dire results for Guillen.  Guillen, who has a heart-on-his-sleeve for anything Latin American, had expressed earlier devotion to Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez.

Two of the very strange aspects of the Guillen contretemps is Castro's "role" in baseball and Guillen's stupidity in not offering a reasonable explanation of why he loves Castro.  There exists a reason.

A much bandied-about folklore tale is Castro's involvement with baseball.  According to Snopes.com, one odd scenario has Castro awarded a tryout by either the New York Yankees or Washington Senators.  The left-handed pitcher was rejected, so goes the story, thus making possible the overthrowing of the Batista regime, the Soviet-aligned government in Cuba, the Bay of Pigs fiasco, and the Cuban Missile Crisis.

It was a Yale historian, professor Roberto Gonzalez Echevarria, who researched thousands of Cuban baseball box scores finally finding one of an intramural game between the Law and Business Schools at the University of Havana.  It was in El Mundo in November, 1946 when an F. Castro pitched and lost, 5-4.  The dictator, of course, added to the quirkiness of his horsehide "career" by dressing in the uniform of a tongue-in-cheek team called Barbudos (Bearded Ones).  That was after he came to power in 1959 and he played in just a few games.  A photo helps promulgate the myth.

Guillen has reason to love Castro because of pitcher Jose Contreras.  As kindly as Castro might look upon a fellow pitcher, Contreras was tired of being the premier amateur pitcher in the world.  His fast ball was in the mid-90s, his curve exceptional and, besides, there was money to be made in the major leagues for a guy who said he was 31.  Contreras was the sort of fellow who could beat the United States on one day's rest for the championship of the 1999 Pan American Games.  He struck out 13 in eight innings.  Contreras was tired of amateur scuffling and life under Castro had its shortcomings.

The Yankees, quite naturally, had their usual big bucks to spend on a world class pitcher who finally defected to Gotham in 2002.  Contreras got the largest deal ever to run from Castro--$32 million for four years.  Guillen began managing the White Sox the next year.  

Contreras went 7-2 in 2003 and Guillen was particularly impressed on September 23 of that year when the Cuban pitcher shut out the White Sox for eight innings while striking out nine.  The baseball expression that you can't have enough pitching was a canard that year to the Yanks who traded Contreras to the White Sox and a salivating Guillen on July's last day in 2004.

The next year was a singular one for both Guillen and Contreras.  The latter started the season slowly reaching the All-Star break with a 4-3 record.  Contreras became the White Sox most reliable pitcher winning his last eight starts while gaining status as the stopper of the team's losing streaks.  He finished the season 15-7 with a 3.61 ERA getting 154 strikeouts in 204 2/3 innings.  Guillen had to love Castro.

He had to love him even more when the Sox beat the Los Angeles Angels for the American League flag, eventually winning the World Series with four straight victories over the Houson Astros.  Contreras started game one of every series going 3-1.

Contreras was so sensational that television commentators said that the fire-balling right hander had his name banned from being mentioned in Cuba by order of Castro--no way to treat a fellow pitcher.  Further, according to one story, White Sox games were banned from TV and could be seen only by way of illegal television satellites.  Contreras was a household name while Guillen had become the first Latino to manage a World Series winner.  There was a lot of love on Chicago's South Side.

The following year Contreras won a 17th consecutive game breaking the White Sox team record.  The string included eight victories gained the prior season.  Injuries impacted losing seasons the next two years and he was sent to the bullpen, then the minor leagues in 2009.  Guillen finally gave up on Contreras and he was traded to the Colorado Rockies on August 31, 2009 for cash and a minor league pitcher.  Love only goes so far.

The Contreras story continues today.  On January 28, 2010, the now 40-year-old pitcher signed a one-year, $1.5 (later upped to $2.5) million deal with the Philadelphia Phillies, one of baseball's better teams.  The bad news is that Contreras is pitching relief for far less money although further compensation awaits a World Series winner.  The good news is that he finally made it despite years of deprivation in Cuba where, presumably, the beisbol hip hold guarded conversations about that superb pitcher from Las Martinas.

Meanwhile, those with knowledge of Guillen's real raison d'etre for a professed love of Fidel Castro can't figure out the manager's failure to explain the easily explainable and the good fortune made possible when a Cuban pitcher fled his homeland because of appalling conditions, including playing baseball for free.  Thank you, Fidel.

Baseball is a sport where brilliance is sometimes hidden by a failure to communicate effectively.  Casey Stengel, Yogi Berra, and, yes, maybe, Ozzie will attain their status if he can keep his job with the Marlins following five days banishment.

And, should employment at the major league level continue, perhaps Guillen will learn how to spin a disaster like love for Castro.  It shouldn't have been that difficult.

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In the Rotation....by Bob Sanders

 

A jerk of the thumb as in an umpire's "you're out" goes to all those athletes and others of the sports world who have managed to screw up careers and reputations while involving themselves in stories ranging from the remarkably stupid to the highly tawdry.

Many in number, they include such recent miscreants as: baseball's Lenny Dykstra (grand theft auto and more to come) and the NBA's Jay Vincent (mail fraud) now in prison doing three and eight and one-half years respectively; Jerry Sandusky, who awaits trial for child molestation; and the NFL's Terrell Owens who continues to have difficulty trying to figure out how he pissed away $80 million in salary while acquiring four wives and four kids not one of whom he can support. 

Of vivid contrast to these and others is a 49-year-old pitcher with an 83 mph fastball and a story suggesting that his ability to handle success is, as Branch Rickey suggested many years ago, the result of preparation.

After a year's hiatus from major league baseball recovering from Tommy John surgery, Jamie Moyer is, once again, back in a starting rotation--this time for the Colorado Rockies.  It won't be easy--particularly at home where Coors Field's thin air help provide a hitter's paradise--and there are those who believe Moyer is on board as an unusual baseball twofer: a starting pitcher capable of playing guru to a young hurling staff.  Jamie Moyer is loaded with the kind of intangibles never aptly defined by Casey Stengel who, everyone agrees, was highly appreciative of them.

Moyer's intangibles are heavy on attitude and include running out ground balls harder than a great many every day players, fielding his position with precision, and laying down successful bunts--something of a lost art among today's pitchers.  There are players who affect a team's working climate adversely (ex-Cub pitcher Carlos Zambrano is one) and others like Moyer who add immensely to a happy dugout.

Not to belabor the earlier mentioned waywards of the sports world and their obvious contrasts to Moyer, but such specimens as Ryan Leaf, Art Schlichter and those bounty-hunting New Orleans Saints come to mind.  What the Saints' coaches, Sean Payton and Gregg Williams, did was introduce some Bountygate culture into football's Concussion Era by offering $1,500 for "knockout" hits and $1,000 for "cart-offs."  Payton's defenders suggest the coach didn't know anything about what was going on--a laughable intimation in view of Payton's reputation as a micro-manager.  A league source, in a unique commentary about the cover-up being more significant for the penalties meted out than what happened on the playing fields, added it reminded him "of the Nixon White House."  At least there was, apparently, nothing criminal about what happened in a sport of intense violence.  And yet, and yet.

Leaf, a truly sad case, was arrested again the other day for burglarizing a home searching for the usual: prescription drugs.  It wasn't the first time having been accused in 2009 of breaking into a player's home when he was a quarterbacks coach at Texas A&M.  His most recent arrests followed a monthlong investigation starting with a tip that Leaf had been receiving rattling cash-on-delivery packages worth $500 or more once or twice a week.  Adding mystery to the Leaf story is the surgery he had last year to remove a benign tumor from his brain and radiation treatments he underwent later.  Perhaps Leaf is trying to tell us something?

It appears the only Leaf saga winners are the Indianapolis Colts who drafted Peyton Manning ahead of the standout quarterback for Washington State.  That was in the 1998 draft and Leaf, the No. 2 pick, flamed out for the San Diego Chargers while gaining a reputation as, perhaps, the biggest disappointment in NFL history.

Schlichter, a compulsive gambler who, by his own count, has committed more than 20 felonies, found a new venue not long ago for his con artistry: a million dollar ticket scam.  It was earlier this year while under house arrest prior to beginning a 10-year sentence, that the former Ohio State quarterback was re-arrested for possession of cocaine.

Today's overpaid athletes, many with complex problems in a complicated world, make one long for the good old days when career enhancement motivated Tanya Harding to take offense to the threatening figure skating talents of Nancy Kerrigan.  Neither drugs nor intense greed were involved and, with the help of an ex-husband, Harding hired a bodyguard who whacked Kerrigan's right thigh putting her out of the 1994 U.S. Figure Skating Championship won by Harding.  For those unaware of the skater's difficult life, Harding attempted other athletic pursuits eventually turning to boxing, whose science she abandoned in 2004.

Moyer, signed by the Rockies to a minor league contract early in the year, made the team late last week.  During spring training, he pitched 18 innings going 2-1 with a 2.50 ERA.  Of particular interest is his strikeout total: 16.  His best outing was against the Giants on March 22 when he threw four perfect innings, striking out four.  He stumbled in a March 28 start against the White Sox giving up three runs, seven hits and three walks in four innings.  Of greater importance was his ability to work out of trouble while throwing 89 pitches. The Rockies won the game.

This will be Moyer's 25th major league season having come up with the Chicago Cubs in 1986.  His first start will be this Saturday (April 7) against the Houston Astros; with a win, he can become the oldest pitcher in major league history to do so.

Moyer, who can carve up a strike zone with the skill of a surgeon, missed all of last year undergoing Tommy John surgery.  By stepping on the mound Saturday, he will be the active leader in victories (267), innings (4,020) and starts (628).  Completion of all those innings affects other records including giving up most home runs (511).  He has never hit one himself.

The longevity of his career coupled with a major league stadium building spree has enabled Moyer to pitch in a record 49 big league ballparks plus three in Japan.  It was in Atlanta in 2010 that, at age 47, he two-hit the Braves while becoming the oldest major leaguer to throw a shutout. 

Among those pulling for Moyer's success are thousands of children whose lives have been enormously affected by The Moyer Foundation, established in 2000 with his wife, Karen.  The Foundation, whose mission is to empower children in distress by providing education and support, helps them to live healthy and inspired lives.  Not that Moyer needs any more inspiration to achieve his goals, but Foundation officials anticipate the pitcher's return to the mound will attract further support for this country's estimated 1.5 million children who have lost a parent in addition to 8.3 million children living with at least one parent in need of treatment for alcohol or drug dependency.

In an April 2 Moyer Foundation press release the pitcher was quoted as saying: "In sports, it's more than just how you throw the ball.  It's about what kind of life you live off field as well.  I think being an athlete and an advocate helps send a great message to teammates, opponents and beyond."

The organization's network of 40 free bereavement camps, called Camp Erin, are devoted to helping children grieve the death of someone close to them while four free camps, called Camp Mariposa, are for children living with drug or alcohol addiction in their families.  At present, these programs provide support to over 3,000 children annually in Washington, Indiana, Pennsylvania and Florida.

When Moyer wins his first regular season game for the Rockies, he will break a record set nearly 80 years ago when Jack Quinn of the Brooklyn Dodgers beat the St. Louis Cardinals on September 13, 1932.  He was 49 years, 74 days old.  Moyer turns 50 on Nov. 18.

Not bad for a guy who will qualify for an AARP card in November.

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Golf Linkage....by Bob Sanders

 

One of the continuing delights of the computer is stumbling upon something from the nearly forgotten past, then pursuing that subject for an update.  Timely enough with the Masters golf tournament nearly upon us, my Googling was links-connected.

Pursuit began with curiosity about the Blue Hills Country Club whose Kansas City origins go back to 1912 and a location some 30 blocks south of where jazz greats developed their talents.  By the time my TV Guide employment got me transferred to the city in 1959, Blue Hills was deep into plans to build a new a very grand course.

I was introduced to the original layout as a guest of Bill Bates, then general manager of WDAF Radio & TV.  Two other members of the foursome were Jay Barrington, manager of WDAF Radio, and Bob Hanger, then co-owner of Jones & Hanger Advertising.

What Blue Hills left behind became one of those deals that young golfers today can't believe possible in a sport that has become very expensive.  In my case, there were a couple of standouts.  The Winnetka Club, designed by Chick Evans, cost $100 for a year's membership when I moved to the Chicago North Shore community in 1968.  Golf was unlimited and there were no greens fees if you lived within the city's limits.  The other remarkable bargain was the left behind Blue Hills whose membership was $90.  The greens fees were $10.  Unable to recall the new name for the course, I attempted to chase it down without success.  The Blue Hills website fails to recognize its origins, a bit of seeming snobbery in view of the now course-less Blue Hills Neighborhood of affordable housing and where the streets are named after jazz greats.

If it's possible for a man to be in love with a golf course, Bill Bates was that man.  Infatuation is not a strong enough word and Bill's deep and abiding affection was touching.  Even when the new course was completed in all its magnificence (it is called by many the best K.C. links today), he preferred to play the old course.

The four of us saw a fair amount of other courses including the south side's Hillcrest and our tendency there was to play very early in the morning to beat the often intense heat; a companion factor, perhaps of greater import, was the course's modest 19th hole featuring inexpensive beer.  Our enthusiasm peaked late one morning that extended way into the afternoon when the four of us wafted 64 16 ounce rascals.  We kept track of our tippling by stuffing each round's empty cups into four mounting stacks.

We all managed to impair our marriages that day and in one case irreparably.  It was Barrington's whose ended shortly thereafter with Hanger eventually marrying Jay's ex-spouse.  If memory serves, it was the day of the great quaff that Hanger made the second of consecutive eagles on the second hole, in each instance holing out a six-iron.  Hanger, easily the best golfer among us, accomplished his feat on succeeding Saturdays and it may have been that our drinking began in celebration of it.  

Barrington and I would hook up in Los Angeles when I was transferred there in 1966.  Jay was teaching sports celebrities, including Los Angeles Dodger Maury Wills, how to work with the media.  More anon about Jay whose second wife once tossed all his clothes out of a room at what is now San Francisco's Westin St. Francis Hotel.  That last thought, whose construction includes references to both  name and clothes dropings, may be a first for me.

Memories came flooding back when I googled the Hillcrest website and found a lede paragraph drawing attention to the course's signature hole, the 243 yards first.  I mention it because, following our 16th round of beers, we decided to tackle the course again.  Details are a bit beclouded but I seem to recall a general inability to coordinate the golf swing in addition to entangling my golf cart with Bates' bag carrier.  There were claims I did the latter twice while managing to win the hole with an 11.  We played no further.

One Saturday in 1964 found us playing what was then the world's longest course, according to the Guinness Book of Records.  The accurately-named Dub's Dread was designed for masochists by touring pro Harold "Jug" McSpaden in Wyandotte County--just west of Kansas City and close to Monticello where he was born.

Dub's Dread had little character other than being very long.  My recollection is that there were few trees.  The course, then of 8,204 yards, today is a cut-down version of 7,224.

McSpaden was one of the best on tour winning 17 tournaments.  In 1949, when Byron Nelson finished first a remarkable 19 times, McSpaden won none but was runner-up 13 times.  They finished 1-2 so often they were called the Gold Dust Twins.  Ten years earlier playing with Nelson in a warm-up round for the Texas Open, he shot 59.  It was Nelson and McSpaden who invented the golf shoe.  Their take was 25 cents a pair.

Nelson and McSpaden remained friends up to McSpaden's death by carbon monoxide poisoning in 1996.  He was 87 and there is no evidence suggesting his demise followed a bad round at Dub's Dread although the course's location remains within a short drive of where he lived all his life except while on tour.

Commenting about his pal, Nelson told the Associated Press: "I feel like I've lost a wonderful friend.  We never had an argument in all the time we played together."  McSpaden once told him: "If you wouldn't have been born, I'd have been known as a pretty good player."

Dub's Dread, while longest no more, is acclaimed by people who care about such things as the course that inspired other 8,000 yards links.  McSpaden's creation, it must be emphasized, occurred in the pre-titanium era when a course of 1,000 lesser yards was considered long.  It wasn't long before The International Club in Bolton, Massachusetts came up with The Pines whose 8,325 yards still plays to a punishing par of 73 from what are called the "Tiger" tees so named well before Tiger Woods' birth.  Lesser challenges may be found at members' tees where the yardage is 6,547.

A bit smug about "longest leadership," The International people have had to move aside for The Jade Dragon Snow Mountain Golf Club located in a very mountainous region of Yannun Province in China.  At first glance, it appears the course's scorecard must be a mistake of some kind; its par is 72 although it plays to 8,548 yards from the back tees.  Among the par 5s is one measuring 711 yards plus two others that exceed 600 yards.  There are five par 4s longer than 500 yards.  That's the bad news.

The good news is that the ball flies 20 percent further at Jade Dragon Snow Mountain's 10,000 feet of elevation than, say, at Dub's Dread.  For golfer's there's nothing quite like elevation redemption as a rationale for playing Jade Dragon.  Still, that 20 percent of extra length gets the yardage down to a reasonable 6,839.  Let's tee 'em up and don't forget the oxygen.

Appearing to be a threat to Jade Dragon was the El Grande Hombre, an 8,600 yard marathon announced for Las Vegas in 3003.  Judging from the way the Sin City economy is going, the last thing Las Vegas needs is 8,600 yards of golf course--still on hold.

Reflective of the many bizarre moments available at the Nullarbor Links is the Dingo Den hole where a resident crow is prone to stealing golf balls.  The Dingo Den is part of the world's truly longest golf course located on the southwestern outback of the country.  So long is the course (848 miles) that it is spread over two states, South and Western Australia.  Holes average 50 miles apart.

It is the vast emptiness of the area that got promotion-minded Aussies thinking about the tendency of motorists to hurtle down the Eyre Highway never bothering to stop, take in some sights, and, just maybe, spend a little money.  That was five years ago and this fall the Fourth Annual Chasing the Sun Golf Festival will be held.

Seven holes are on existing courses while 11 were built at roadhouses.  While The Masters course has a tradition of naming its holes after flowers and shrubs that lend to the majesty of Bobby Jones' masterpiece, the Nullarbor (Latin for "no trees") Links has been inspired by outback landscape resulting in such tests as Watering Hole, Oyster Beds, 90 Mile Straight, Border Kangaroo, and Golden Horse.

Plans are already underway with the tournament set for September 30-October 6.  Last year 50 golfers participated and an even larger field is expected this year.  Surprises are being arranged at the formidable Cocklebiddy's Eagle Nest hole in addition to the highly challenging Fraser Sheep's Back.  Greens at the roadhouse holes, some made of AstroTurf, others of sand and oil, await golfers with fairways in their natural state.  The world's longest golf course is appallingly arid with grass almost as rare as a wink-less Sarah Palin.

More than 2,500 have played the Nullarbor Links so far.  Should you decide to tee it up, keep a sharp lookout for snakes, wayward wombats, and kangaroos.  There's a road sign at the Cockleberry hole indicating the human population is eight, kangaroos: 1,234, 567.

You might consider hitting cheap or cut balls at Dingo's Den where the crow hangs out.

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Jamie & Lenny....by Bob Sanders

 

At first glance, Jamie Moyer and Lenny Dykstra have a lot in common.  Both have played major league baseball, both are 49, have worn World Series rings and each bats and throws left-handed.  For good measure, you could add relatively high round drafts that eventually brought them to the big leagues.  Moyer was claimed by the Chicago Cubs as the 135th pick of the 1984 amateur draft while Dykstra was signed in 1981 by the New York Mets as the 314th selection.

On the other hand, their contrasts are vivid--particularly in view of recent media coverage.  Moyer pitched a couple of spring training innings for the Colorado Rockies.  He gave up one run and three hits while making 42 pitches of which 27 were strikes.  None were modest cut fastballs whose eventual unleashing is on hold.  Moyer had Tommy John elbow-tendon replacement surgery 20 months ago.  If he makes the Rockies roster, it will be with a team that didn't exist when he made his major league debut with the Cubs in 1986.  If is a big word--particularly if you're sporting a Tommy John scar--and Moyer's 50th birthday on November 18 sets up some remarkable and attainable records should he still be under contract next year.  He will then (wearing number 50, of course) be second only to the remarkable Satchell Paige who was 52 when he was a starting pitcher in 1958.

While Moyer was trying to catch on with the Rockies, Dykstra was adding another chapter to a post-career downward spiral by being sentenced to three years in a California state prison.  The charges: grand auto theft and giving a false financial statement.  The sentence was the latest in a series of financial misadventures and worse during which he attempted to create a financial empire whose underpinnings bore great resemblance to his reckless approach to baseball.

With a net worth estimated at $58 million in 2008, Dykstra filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy the following year.  Having less than $50,000 in assets against liabilities of somewhere between $10 million and $50 million, Dykstra claimed he was a victim of mortgage fraud and lost a home valued at $17.5 million.  It had been purchased from hockey great Wayne Gretzky.  By August of that year, Dykstra was living out of his car and hotel lobbies.  A second home, also in the tony Sherwood Country Club of Thousand Oaks, California, was in a deplorable state complete with a degree of littering often associated with ball park conditions following games.

I was a Bleacher Bum when Moyer first pitched at Wrigley Field.  That was in 1986, one year after Dykstra came up to the Mets.  A bit on the skinny side, Dykstra gave new meaning to the word "cocky" and later on was described by teammate Billy Beane as being "perfectly designed, emotionally" to play baseball while having "no concept of failure."  Dykstra played 14 years with first the Mets (1985-89), then the Philadelphia Phillies (1989-96).  His determined play (he broke a collarbone in 1991 by running into an outfield wall in Cincinnati) earned him the nickname "Nails" as in tough-as-nails.  A cheek full of tobacco added to the persona.

Those early 90s seasons, following his trade to the Phillies, were plagued by injury--not all of them on the field.  A second broken collar bone in 1991 occurred when, while driving drunk in a Philadelphia suburb, he crashed into a tree.  The next year on Opening Day, Dykstra suffered a broken hand when hit by a pitch.  As Johnny Carson might have put it, Dykstra was a "caution."

Just as popular in Philadelphia as New York, the center-fielder provided fans a "new" Dykstra as the 1993 season began.  With steroid rumors swirling about baseball, Dykstra's startling added bulk certainly didn't hurt as he posted a career year during which he hit 19 home runs (his only other double digit season was 10 in 1987), drew a league-leading 124 bases on balls, and made 773 plate appearances, still a major league record.  Although overlooked for the 1993 All-Star team, Dykstra led the league in runs, hits, walks, and at-bats while finishing second to Barry Bonds as NLMVP.  In spite of Dykstra's four home runs and .348 average, the Phillies lost the World Series to Toronto.

Dykstra has never admitted using steroids although Jose Conseco, the self-proclaimed "Godfather of Steroids," claims he did as does the Mitchell Report on steroid use in Major League Baseball.

Moyer first attracted attention pitching for Souderton Area High School in the Pennsylvania community where he also played basketball and golf.  He then pitched at Saint Joseph's University and completed his college degree at Indiana University 10 years after joining the Cubs.

While Dykstra's post-baseball life was spent building financial disaster upon financial disaster, Moyer continued a career whose total years now number more than half his lifetime.  It's a career based upon an intense knowledge of hitters and a precise control of mediocre pitches.  His fastball, averaging 81.1 miles per hour in 2007, was the slowest of all NL starters.  He has yet to resort to junk offerings including the eephus whose invention is attributed to "Rip" Sewell of the Pittsburgh Pirates.  Known for a high arcing trajectory and slow velocity, the eepus (likely to have come from a Hebrew word meaning "nothing") has many nicknames including: bloop curve, the blooper, the soap bubble, the dead fish, the gravity curve, and the Bugs Bunny curve.  Should Moyer feel compelled to utilize such contrivances, the wily pitcher will doubtless come up with something effective.

Not content with a career of record-breaking proportions, Moyer and wife Karen impact the lives of thousands of children in distress each year through The Moyer Foundation whose establishment occurred when the pitcher was with the Seattle Mariners.  Winner of numerous awards for philanthropy and community service, Moyer citations include the 2003 Roberto Clemente Award, the 2003 Lou Gehrig Memorial Award, the 2003 Hutch Award and the 2004 Branch Rickey Award.

To put things in startling perspective, Moyer's father-in-law once suggested it was time Moyer got a real job.  The lefty had been sent down to Class AAA Toledo, a Detroit Tigers farm club.  That was 20 years ago and the father-in-law was/is Digger Phelps, whose baskeball coaching successes included Notre Dame.

Phelps' advice was four years before Moyer was traded to the Mariners where he won 145 games during nine seasons.  Since turning 40, he has won 103 times.  Thinking of retiring six years ago, Moyer accepted a trade to Philadelphia where he went 56-40.  Sixteen of those wins were in the Phillies' 2008 championbship season.

On Monday, Dykstra was sentenced to three years in a California state prison.  The charge was grand theft auto involving scams to lease high-end automobiles claiming credit through a phony business.  Dykstra is scheduled to stand trial this summer on bankruptcy charges.  Claiming he had only $50,000 in assets, Dykstra filed for bankruptcy two years ago indicating he owed more than $31 million.  According to Federal Prosecutors, the former ballplayer hid, sold or destroyed more than $400,000 worth of items from what had been his mansion without permission of a bankruptcy trustee.  Dykstra also has pleaded not guilty to indecent exposure charges for allegedly exposing himself to woman he contacted through Craig's List.  

There more to the Dykstra saga whose details strongly suggest he is an even bigger screw-up than either Dwight Gooden or Daryl Strawberry, also of the 1986 World Series ring-winning Mets.  According to the Wall Street Journal, a Beverly Hills pawnshop got $56,762 "to help pay the former major leaguer's $31 million debt."  Dykstra, the subject of articles in The New Yorker and Vanity Fair, also faces federal bankruptcy charges and is scheduled to stand trial this summer.  According to federal prosecutors, the former major leaguer hid, sold or destroyed more than $400,000 worth of items from the mansion once owned by Gretzky.

The New Yorker piece by Ben McGrath, titled "Nails Never Fails," appeared around the time the very odd Jim Cramer called Dykstra "one of the great men in this business."  If Cramer, of TheStreet.com, feels a heightened sense of camaraderie with the former major leaguer, it's probably because Cramer is to Wall Street what Dykstra was to baseball: an enormously brash and not very accurate talker.

Dykstra, the subject of at least two dozen legal actions since 2007, began a high-end jet charter company the next year.  That was in addition to Player's Club, a publication that was part of a business plan designed for athletes to help them contend with the challenges that accompany high salaries.  There was a website: "Nails Investments."

Not all of Dykstra's problems have been financial.  There was a charge, later dropped, of sexual harassment of a 17-year-old woman employed at his car wash, press reports that he had used offensive terms when speaking about Blacks, women and homosexuals, and an accusation of sexual assault by his housekeeper.  That was a year ago January and occurred a month after being accused of writing a female escort a bad check for $1,000.  Dykstra must, by now, miss running into those outfield walls.

Nails turns 50 in prison next February 10.  Moyer will celebrate his 50th this fall when at the very least he'll look back on a tryout he feels he had to take.  It was necessary not because of the 50 factor or because of Satchell Paige.  He's doing it because he knows he can still pitch.

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To put things in startling perspective 

Golf's Sometimes Bunker Mentality....by Bob Sanders

This is the time of year when golfers and those who follow the game on television begin thinking of The Masters, that grand competition set against dogwood and azalea on the best maintained course in the world.  If, by chance, you are planning on attending for the first time, be aware that the egg salad sandwich with pimento cheese is still $1.25 and security people will give you the goofy eye should you step somewhere you shouldn't.  The people who run The Masters are concentrated traditionalists in an ever-changing sport.

That tradition has included not keeping records for caddying in the tournament begun in 1934.  A game of record second only to baseball, golf has acquired all manner of information about the winners.  You could try to look up who carried bags but it's not in the books.  Only the winners are.

While many professional tour caddies today pay taxes as lower class members of the One Percent Club or are close to qualification, it wasn't always that way--particularly in those days when golf professionals were not allowed to enter country clubs by the front door, when black caddies carried the bags of the pros at The Masters, and when first place in the fournament produced a check for $500.  That's what Sam Snead won the first two times out playing Bobby Jones' creation, now a thoroughly revered site.  Snead's winnings today might buy a rather limited round of drinks for semi-intimates--a thought rarely, if ever, contemplated by the tight-fisted Slammer.

In spite of its lofty status in golf, The Masters took for many years a minimalist role in the sport's continuing evolvement.  Not inclined to participate in social engineering, the tournament refused to invite black players finally relenting in 1975 when Lee Elder became the first African-American to play for the green jacket.  That was three years after Elder requested consideration.

Only the course's black caddies carried bags of the pros until 1983.  The pros, eventually playing for prize money that even the NBA's vastly over-paid would find interesting, demanded that their personal caddies tote their sticks.  It made a certain amount of sense; the pro's caddy had intimate knowledge of the strengths and weaknesses of his employer's game.  On the other hand, there is nothing quite like local knowledge and The Masters caddies had that in what we used to call spades.  A breakthrough year was 1970 when Gary Player's caddy received a death threat by an anti-partied demonstrator.  To the rescue came Carl Jackson, then a Masters caddy who volunteered to replace the threatened bag totter.  Jackson was so good with advice about the subtleties of August's greens that Player won.  This April, for the 51st time, Jackson will tote a bag at what many consider the biggest of the majors, another of those records not in the books.  For those who wonder just how much a caddy can mean to a player, be sure to check out the degree of involvement Jim Mackey has in boss Phil Mickelson's game.

While the most notable aspect of Masters' management over much of the event's history has been an attitude resembling that of pre-Civil War plantation owners, it was golf commentator Gary McCord who once explored the organization's lack of humor.  Bringing attention to the slick greens at August, the quick-witted former journeyman golfer suggested that the putting surfaces were so slippery that groundskeepers must have used "bikini wax" on them.  The imperiousness of the anger vented by the defenders of the golfing shrine toward the CBS employee was and remains severe.  Eighteen years later, McCord continues to be barred from The Masters which gave him an identification enabling him to charge upwards of $30,000 for personal appearances.

As the only sport in which players call penalties on themselves, golf has prided itself as the most honest of all.  While amateurs have been known to improve lies, whack unlimited Mulligans, and exhibit highly creative writing skills on score cards, the sport's professionals have remained remarkably un-tainted.  There have been notable exceptions but they tend to involve interpretations of rules.  One of the more recent embarrassments involved Tiger Woods whose cheating off the golf course a few years back was the stuff of Twitter and Facebook.  A sudden alliance of Woods' fans provided aid and comfort on the par 5 13th hole of the 1999 Phoenix Open, now aptly named The Waste Management Open.  Having pulled a drive into an untenable position beside a boulder roughly the weight of a particularly large NFL lineman, Tiger asked for relief and oh, what a relief it was.

Six Friends of Tiger, having heard the magic words "relief" and "loose impediment," completely ignored the spirit of the rule and rolled the boulder to a position that enabled the smiling Woods (he offered encouragement) to par the hole and, eventually finish third.  Today, the boulder bears a plaque telling of the momentous occasion believed by many Tiger fans as approaching Biblical proportions.

The tournament's rules persons, having given Woods a highly questionable favorable ruling, then were relieved of their explanatory duties by the PGA which, aware of Tiger's impact on TV ratings, conducted what can only be called a campaign of explanation highlighted by inclusion in a rule book by Arnold Palmer.  Yes, the boulder was a loose impediment.

The only woman professional golfer to be found guilty of cheating was Jane Blalock whose LPGA pals took exception in the mid 70s to her inclination to place a marked ball closer to the hole.  Regarded as a hippie by the 29 players who signed papers to dismiss her from the tour for one year, Blalock, one of the tour's more unpopular players, was also noted for drawing peace symbols of little artistic merit on her golf bag.  She confronted her suspension with a winning law suit. The charge against Blalock eventually was identified as being in violation of antitrust laws.

For those with a penchant for a look inside the ropes, there's a golf blog (Waggle Room) written by an LPGA caddie who in 2010 commented about the ethics of Korean lady players.  Detailed in the blog is a situation in which two of the Koreans misplayed each other's ball on the last hole of a round, then signed cards ignoring the indiscretion.  

With the advent of doping in sports has come the poster juicer of a sport heretofore left out of things.  The highly unlikely Douglas Barron, whose best finish has been a tie for third in the 2005 Byron Nelson Championship, was given a 12-months banishment in 2009.  The people who run golf and who are highly sensitive aboult those who fail to regard the sport as being mentionable in the same breath with  football, baseball and basketball, were hoping for a Davis Love III, Justin Leonard, or the they-should-be-so-luck, Rory Sabbatini.

Barron, whose "steroid" plight began with a needfor testosterone replacement (Testopel), has a body reminiscent of Craig "The Walrus" Stadler on a five pizza day.  Not exactly the Alex Rodriguez of his sport, Barron required 238 PGA Tour starts to get that tie for the bronze.

The golfer no one had ever heard of sat out most of the 2010 season, then had his ban lifted by the PGA in September of that year.  Having investigated the very lengthy World Anti-Doping Agency drug list, the PGA granted the golfer a Therapeutic Use Exemption (TUE) for testosterone replacement therapy.  Oh, the ignominy of it all in a port desperate for attention searching for bona fides.  The only winners appear to be the people who write about golf who no longer have to Google the name Doug Barron.

Oh, yes.  I'm delighted to report that Barron has acquired a sponsor--the highly logical Slate Pharmaceuticals, Inc. that markets Testopel.  The logo possibilities are extensive.

The subject of Pro Tour cheating was introduced by Golf magazine in January when 50 PGA Tour caddies were questioned about the pros--particularly if any had observed cheating.  Fifty-four percent answered "yes" while 44 percent said "no."  The rest would not comment.  At first glance, this seemed a condemnation of Pro Tour Players.

But, wait.  Maybe the 27 caddies were talking about players other than those for whom they carry bags; further, maybe many or all of those offering condemnation have in mind two or three golfers observed over 10 or 20 years of caddying and it's the same two or three being referenced.  Maybe, their indiscretions fall into the Blalock Syndrome suggesting they are psychologically unable to resist something like replacing a marked ball closer to the hole.

Good golfing news has arrived in the form of New Rules for 2012-2015 and it's tempting to take a Bill Maher approach to new rules.  The most significant change evolving from a collaboration between the Royal & Ancient (R&A) and the United States Golf Association (USGA) is helpful to those who might be victimized by wind.  As devotees may recall, it was Rory McIlroy who was penalized in the British Open when his ball was moved on the 7th green by the wind after he had addressed it.  Since wind, in a particularly strenuous case, also can be caused by flatulence, it is believed that golf's rule makers likely will continue to kick that one down the fairway.

While on the subject of the human body that continues to grow exponentially, it's worth mention that golf's rules people, once again, have ignored the belly putter.  However, it was exciting to learn that the Gecko Euro Pro Tour, a mini event in Spain, has banned the club in all future events although major tours continue a hesitant approval.  Two belly putter victories last year by Webb Simpson plus Keegan Bradley's win at the PGA (a major's first) have made the instrument one of much discussion.

The belly putter and its taller first cousin, The Broomstick, are essentially cheating devices of remarkable timing as we pursue our propensity for obesity.  The belly putter is decidedly more effective when the club's owner is of ample girth thus affording a greater fulcrum for the stick and subsequent delivery of the putt.

Of course, the very essence of golf, promulgated by equipment manufacturers, is to lower scores and we've seen a remarkable 30-year re-design of equipment to the point where pros who drive 250 yards have little chance.  Distance is too much of what it's all about thus enabling stars to carry three wedges.  Persimmon woods (how I miss that sweet resonant click) are a thing of the past and tees from which balls used to be driven are now called "tee boxes," an all too descriptive public course phrase now adopted in what be part of that public relations program mentioned earlier and designed to popularize the game, excuse me, sport.

Let me know if you've noticed any boxes at The Masters, Pebble Beach, or Pine Valley, will you?  Tee boxes are what they used to have at Dyker Beach in Brooklyn where a homeless guy lived in a patch beyond the second hole.  There was never a rumble with the guy mostly because he was armed.  The 14th fairway used to feature immigrants who picnicked and played volleyball on weekends.  They had little appreciation of golf.  That's where you find tee boxes.

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The Yips....by Bob Sanders

 

The problems inherent in producing superior sports performance has been the subject of a great deal of analysis and it may be that Yogi Berra was on the right track when he observed that "90 percent of this game is half mental."

Everyone has bad days.  People who write for a living have been known to stare at paper in a typewriter or the computer equivalent, realize the muse is not being helpful, then toddle off to a park or bar for inspiration.  Major league hitters don't have time to be so selective.  Most pitches come in somewhere between 85 and 100 mph.

The Pittsburgh Pirates had a pitcher, Steve Blass, whose dependability earned him a World Series MVP honor in 1971.  The following year he went 19-8 with a 2.49 ERA.  The right-hander with a herky-jerky motion had difficulties finding home plate the next year going 3-9 with a horrendous 9.81 ERA.  Having been diagnosed with what is today called Steve Blass Disease, the hurler was sent to the minors the next year where he walked 93 hitters in 56 2/3 innings and was gone from baseball.

Proficiency in turning the double play at the second base position is one of those talents of enormous appeal to managers likely inclined to take for granted the ability to execute a throw to first on routine ground balls.  Steve Sax, named NL Rookie of the Year in 1982 while playing for the Dodgers, did everything expected of him and more.  Great things were to happen the next year but, suddenly, he couldn't make the easy throw to first and things go so bad that jocular fans behind the first base dugout began donning batting helmets.  Sax, who committed 30 errors in 1983, got better eventually and six years later led all AL second basemen in fielding percentage and double plays while playing for the Yankees.  Second basemen of errant throws are perceived to have the Steve Sax Syndrome.

While baseball has seemingly been the sport with the greatest variety of head cases (the Chicago Cubs within recent years have employed both Milton Bradley and Carlos Zambrano), such athletic pursuits as basketball (failure at the foul line), tennis (serving shortcomings) and some of the NFL's normally reliable field goal kickers have been perplexed by the mysterious yips.

Incurring the yips is one of those sports phrases more associated with golf than any other.  Indeed, it was Tommy Armour, a major pro player, who left the tour after acquiring the yips, also called flinches, twitches, staggers, jitters, jumps, shakes, and jerks.  It was Armour who brought attention to the problem when he observed: "Once you've had 'em, you've got 'em."

The yips are so common that researchers at the Mayo Clinic suggest that somewhere between one-quarter and one-half of all mature golfers become afflicted.  Careers severely damaged by the yips include those of Ben Hogan, Harry Vardon, Johnny Miller and Sam Snead.

Armour, often called The Silver Scot, won three majors, became known as one of the best iron players ever and, oddly enough, holds the record for the most strokes, 23, on one hole in PGA Tour play.  Achieved at the 17th hole of something called the Shawnee Open, Armour's feat was accomplished prior to acquiring the yips.  One wonders if the Armour record for inefficiency might have been even more impressive had he then been in the throes of the leaping willies.

Not to put too fine a point on the recent AT&T Pebble Beach Pro Am Tournament won in spectacular fashion by Phil Mickelson, but the competition's big loser was Tiger Woods who confirmed what we have suspected for some time: he has the yips.

While the game's TV observers have yet to suggest that Woods is so afflicted, his final round of 75 included five missed putts of less than five feet.  The game's commentators, including the aforementioned Miller, continue to talk around the subject much as family members of an Alzheimer's patient using phrases like "memory loss" and "early dementia."  Tiger's performance was in sharp contrast to Mickelson who carded a sizzling 64, 11 strokes less than his playing partner who finished tied for 15th.

Those Mayo folks so far haven't come up with the exact cause of the yips but suggest that the condition may result from biochemical changes in the brain that accompany aging.  Because Tiger is but 36, it appears science will have to dig deeper in his case.  It may very well be that Tiger is simply a head case while addressing short putts as thoughts of driving into fire hydrants in the wee small hours race through his rattled mind.  Then, perhaps, he thinks of a now wealthy ex-wife whose concentration these days involves flattening a former home to make possible a manse of greater square footage.

Trying to figure out what is wrong with Tiger is like trying to determine what is right about the AT&T Pebble Beach National Pro Am which used to be the Bing Crosby National Pro-Amateur.  Back in more casual times when the tournament was often referenced as the Crosby Clambake (Snead won the first two with $500 payoffs each time), golf's "progression" is reflected in the event's battle to retain luster as the most important non-major stop on this country's pro tour.  Playing on three great golf courses, the field is lessened by a decision by many top European Tour players to forsake the beauty of Monterey Bay for a stop at the Omega Dubai Desert Classic.

The Clambake's beginnings in 1937 were an opportunity for the entertainment world's golfers to rub cashmeres with the golfing elite.  With TV came actor Jack Lemmon's annual and pronounced Pebble Beach adversities.  There was nothing quite like Lemmon's three decades of jousting the elements on Pebble Beach's 18th hole.  Crosby crony Bob Hope soon came up with his own tournament in Palm Springs and it wasn't long before singer Andy Williams had one in Torrey Pines north of San Diego.  Once considered a weak link on the pro tour, California tournaments became monetarily meaningful to the people who run golf and the charities splendidly served.

Whether or not Crosby's second wife, the exceedingly private Katherine Grant, was a long-suffering golf widow is anyone's guess, but it appears likely when one considers how quickly the entertainer's name faded from tournament reference following his death in 1977.  Gone were Crosby's pals including Phil Harris and it's quite likely the golf widow exacted the revenge dreamed of by a great many women.  AT&T became the event's sponsor in 1986.

What we have now is a trade-off of sorts with corporate America's finest joined by football players and coaches whose golf swings are now analyzed in agonizingly slow motion by host experts including Nick Faldo.  Golf, sensitive for a long time that critics believe the game is a skill rather than a sport, appears to be insisting it is the latter by association with participation by such coaches as Bill Belichick, Nick Saban, and Bob Stoops and quarterbacks Aaron Rodgers, Tom Brady, and Tony Romo.  Denver Bronco quarterback Tim Tebow was a scratch due to injuries.  This association process involves millionaire coaches as extensions of corporate America plus brainy millionaire quarterbacks the new show biz personalities.  Every mindful that women also are involved in sporting activities, host Jim Nance proferred an awkward reference to a daughter of one of the coaches who apparently directs lacrosse at Ohio State.  One wonders if Joe Paterno or Jerry Sandusky were ever invited.

 With the exception of always funny Bill Murray who replaced Lemmon as the event's fairway doofus following his death in 2003, the old show biz people are down to an un-precious few who include comedians George Lopez and Ray Romano plus links spiffy Andy Garcia.  All had  their swings analyzed, we learned that Mickelson's grandfather used to take a train down from the Bay Area to Pebble Beach to caddy for 25 cents a bag, and Murray was resplendent in a camouflage and feather ensemble.  He gave no evidence of the yips other than the normal physical idiosyncrasies evidenced by a golfer with a 15 handicap.

Through it all, there was sadness on this viewer's part that the tourament has all but abandoned Crosby connection in spite of lip-service suggesting otherwise.  Maybe there is just too much money involved.  Murray's days of entertaining on a golf course may be numbered and we may be reduced to watching him play golf course superintendent Carl Spackler in the still hilarious Caddyshack.

The largely humor-less touring pros aren't crazy about playing with eccentrics who could very well induce the Yips. 

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You Can't Beat Fun....by Bob Sanders

 

A couple of weeks ago I reached into the past for some vignettes of laughter either experienced by me or told this unremitting appreciator of hilarity.

The following are more of the same and provide, I believe, further proof that seriousness is something we should avoid at any peril.

Some of the best stories come from the world of golf and it could be that a game both wondrous and reviling has contributed more humor than any other pursuit.

I first met actor Forrest Tucker in Tulsa when he and Larry Storch were promoting "F Troop" and we met, again, 18 months later at Lakeside Country Club, a hangout for the entertainment industry in Los Angeles.

Tucker was a terrific golfer playing to a 2 handicap at Lakeside while belong to four other clubs including England's Wentworth.  With skills honed in burlesque, Tucker gained considerable legitimate stage experience with impressive presence augmented by a highly commanding voice.  He made nearly 100 action films although his ingratiating Beauregard Jackson Pickett Burnside role in Auntie Mame was likely his best.

One day I ran into Tuck on the back side of Lakeside where I had hooked a drive on a lengthy par four.  The hole ran parallel to the one being played by the actor and he had pulled his shot so that his ball and mine were within a few feet of each other.  We exchanged greetings.

In his foursome was singer/actor Gordon MacRae whose golfing skills were equal to those of Tucker.  When it came to handicaps on the links, MacRae had two--the other being liquor.

"How you doing, Tuck?" I asked.

"Hey, Bob.  I'm doing fine but Gordie's got a problem.  He ran out of booze on the 11th hole and ever since he's been drinkin' the ball wash."

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Among my great good fortunes in living a life includes working at the Cleveland Press in the early 50s.  I started off a copy boy and one of the delights of the job was being privy to the give and take that took place among the print troubadours who included stars, supporting players and supernumeraries of an enormously colorful newspaper.

Among the denizens of the paper's copy desk was a New York Irishman, Joe McCarthy, whose employment included the august Herald Tribune.  Dour of disposition, McCarthy had an unhealthy look about him.  It was as though the only light that had ever been cast upon him had come from a Budweiser sign.  The word was that he was a reformed alcoholic.

One day McCarthy came back from lunch and I could see he was positively glowing.  Demon rum was coursing through his veins as he returned to the copy desk; suddenly, he burst into a story about how he had put one over in the distant past on the Herald Trib's copy desk.  The newspaper business in those days made Tom Sawyers out of, otherwise mature adults and the role of copy boy was similar to being a golf caddy where close proximity to country club players provided insight into human kind.

Covering a police court, McCarthy observed Puerto Rican Jose Rodriguez, new to this country, attempting to persuade a judge that an arrest for having fighting game birds was insensitive to those fond of the sport.  Illustrative of Rodriguez's point of view was his bringing to court some caged birds.  McCarthy turned in his story that "played one edition until some smart ass editor noticed the lede and killed it."

McCarthy then pulled from a tattered wallet proof of his stunt--a dog eared clipping of his triumph with a lede that read: "Jose Rodriguez, 27, of 1341 Bloch Street, strode to the stand with cock in hand."

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Helen Hayes and Charles MacArthur have been gone long enough that introductions make sense.  She was one of our great stage actresses (Victoria Regina) who also performed splendidly on the screen (A Farewell to Arms) while he was a playwright whose work with Ben Hecht produced The Front Page eventually filmed a number of times with the Cary Grant/Rosalind Russell version (His Girl Friday) the best of the re-makes.

My favorite very touching romantic vignette is built aroiund their difficult early times, a park bench and a bag of peanuts.  It was in 1928, shortly after their marriage that they shared a Central Park bench while communicating their hopes and dreams that eventually came to exceptional fruition.  MacArthur offered his wife the bag of peanuts commenting: "I wish they were diamonds."

Many years later, the two acclaimed successes sat on the same bench that had become "their's."  MacArthur offered his wife a peanut bag containing diamonds and observed: "I wish they were peanuts."

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There are a lot of people still at the party who believe Charles O. Finley was crazy enough to be institutionalized.  Owner of the Kansas City Athletics midway through the last century (he later moved the team to Oakland winning three straight World Series (1972-74) and five straight division titles (1971-75), Finley was baseball's wild card with loopy ideas generated at a remarkable pace.

One involved "The Pennant Porch."  Enormously frustrated because he felt the confines of his ballpark did not accommodate his largely left-handed long ball hitting lineup, Finley called upon a Conference of Carpenters who quickly erected additional stands in right field so that routine fly balls could become home runs.

Bizarre developments followed as Finley became baseball's all-time Machiavelli.  Threatened by the American League president to tear down his creation, the devious Charles O. then had a three-foot alley sawed to the wall--a move of such flagrant deception that the press quickly called it a "Half-Pennant Porch."

Working for TV Guide in Kansas City, I read the magazine's advance piece about Finley's "creativity" written by Mel Durslag, an outstanding writer for the Los Angeles Examiner.  The story extolled Finley's imagination and represented the first positive look at the highly unique team owner.

I called Finley, read him the story, and pitched him about doing a promotional spot for the magazine.  He would be seen sitting in his half pennant porch while wearing an A's baseball cap.

A lengthy pause was followed by: "Well, Bob, that's a very interesting idea, but I can't do it."

"Howcum?"

"Well," said the man whose mode of transportation around an infield following home victories (accompanied by Looney Tunes music) was by mule, "it lacks dignity."

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George Davis was drama critic of the Cleveland Press when I worked there and a good one he was.  Well into his 80s at the time, Davis liked to drink in his stocking feet while banging out theatrical observations.  A tidy person, he was very inclined to create trails of newspaper pages which he followed while advancing to the conveniently located men's room.  Decidedly old-fashioned in his attire, the critic favored buttons over zippers.

One evening in the midst of evaluating the night's entertainment, he took the paper trail and was gone an extended period.  Working the 4 p.m. to midnight copy boy shift, I saw Davis re-enter the newsroom.  The elderly newsman was bent over and couldn't straighten up.

"I can't figure this out," complained Davis.  "I can't stand up, yet I don't feel any pain."

An examination of the puzzled reviewer revealed he had buttoned his fly to his vest.

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Small Scale Pinch Hitting....by Bob Sanders

How one of those outrageously strange and thoroughly memorable baseball anniversaries managed to pass me by is, perhaps, another indication that advanced age is creeping up on me.  Recollections of the odd happenings of August 19, 1951 required a bit of internet jogging and I'm indebted to some of the usual providers including Wikipedia--not always the most reliable of sources.

Mention the name Eddie Gaedel to just about anyone other than a baseball fan of reasonably good memory and you'll get the groggiest of groggy looks.  Here are some hints: he was vertically challenged, played in one major league game, wore an unusual number on his back, and achieved immortality in a couple of minutes.

Gaedel knew a Chicago booking agent who had done business with Bill Veeck, owner of the Cleveland Indians from 1946-49.  Having "advanced" to ownership of the St. Louis Browns, Veeck contacted the agent with an idea for a gag to be consummated on a major league diamond.  The agent put Veeck in touch with Gaedel and the initial plans were kicked off for a midget to become a celebrity by walking in a major league game.

Veeck, sometimes called The Barnum of Baseball, was one of two wild men never understood by their fellow owners whose approach to the game and relations with their employees bore distinct similarity to plantation owners of pre-Civil War days.

The other crazy was Charles O. Finley whose insanity tended toward personal involvement such as: riding a mule around the Kansas City A's infield (later in Oakland); the hiring of a beautiful Chicago TV weather girl who, as a color commentator, knew as much about baseball as Finley did robot surgery; and the Machiavellian creation of a pennant porch built by a college of carpenters and designed to result in more A's (and opponents) home runs.  To Finley's credit, it was he who suggested that World Series games be played at night.  This development came 36 years after the Cincinnati Reds hosted the first night game in 1935.  Baseball is often slow to recognize, then seize upon good ideas.

The inspiration for Veeck's canard is a bit murky.  Frequently accused of stealing the idea from a James Thurber short, You Could Look It Up, Veeck denied the charge in his charming autobiography, Veeck As In Wreck, telling readers he stole the idea from John J. McGraw.

McGraw, an enormously successful manager of the New York Giants, was a pal of Veeck's father, then president of the Chicago Cubs when the younger Veeck became aware of a hunchback McGraw kept around his team as a good-luck charm.  Further, Veeck more than once heard McGraw, having had a drink or 10, proclaim his desire to send his gnome up to bat.

The year of the midget pinch-hitter also was the Fiftieth Anniversary of the American League, an event the cheapskate organization did little about other than provide special emblems for players' uniforms.  Anniversaries to Veeck suggested parties and he soon involved the Falstaff Brewery in celebratory cake and beer, a culinary combination totally foreign these days to Martha Stewart.  Consumption would be during a double-header between the Browns and the Detroit Tigers.  Neither team was going anywhere.  The Tigers would finish in fifth place and the Browns last as usual.

It's hard to believe, but the Browns would encounter such financial problems two years later that the team implored fans to return foul balls.  Batting and fielding practice was skipped on the season's last game and umpires allowed balls to remain in play that should have been discarded.  That game, the Browns' 100th loss of the season, not only was the last of the year but the last ever in St. Louis for the team that moved next year to Baltimore.

It was agent Marty Caine who introduced Gaedel to Veeck.  Caine knew Veeck from the days when he owned the Indians while employing all manner of box office attractions including Max Patkin, most often referenced as the Clown Prince of Baseball.  In addition to Patkin, described in his New York Timesobituary as having "a toothless face capable of contortions rivaling a knuckleball's," Veeck's attendance enhancements included exploding scoreboards and a movable fence whose flexibility of 15 feet changed from series to series depending upon home run capabilities.

Editorial accuracy demands that Veeck also be acknowledged as a solid baseball man whose appreciation of talent (and fairness) led to his 1947 signing of Larry Doby, the first black player to play in the American League, and Satchel Paige, the oldest rookie ever (42) the following year.

Gaedel, who stood 3' 7" with his socks on, was a bit dubious when Veeck approached him about his major league debut.  Veeck asked how much he knew about baseball and the answer suggested he was reasonably well-schooled in the game's basics: "Well, he said.  "I know you're supposed to hit the white ball with the bat.  And then you run somewhere."  Who could ask for anything more under the circumstances?

As Veeck worked on the little fellow's batting stance, the Browns' owner became fascinated by the nuances of pitching to a midget.  At one point, Veeck grabbed a ruler and determined Gaedel's strike zone measured 1 1/2 inches, a severe challenge to the Tiger pitcher who, when game day rolled around, turned out to be Bob Cain.

The contest's scorecard that day reflected the rarity of the moment.  Offering further proof of his unique resourcefulness, Veeck, the man who first placed names on the backs of players, put the number 1/8 on Gaedel's uniform, borrowed from the bat boy.  The wily Veeck, not wishing to tip his hand, identified the new player in the scorecard as #18.

Veeck had taken care not to magnify his deceit by offering it as a lone piece of derangement certain to offend baseball's power structure.  A between games celebration included classic cars circling the field and a band featuring Paige on the drums.  Further, Veeck's circus (he once tried to buy Ringling Bros.) included festivities at all the bases including a hand-balancing act at first base, a trampoline exhibition at second and a team of jugglers at third.  Even Patkin was there.  He pulled a woman out of the grandstand and jitterbugged with her on the pitcher's mound.  Gaedel first got into the act when, suited up, he jumped out of a birthday cake.  The crowd of 18,000 quickly put him out of mind--but not for long.  

As a pinch hitter, Gaedel had to bat for somebody who turned out to be Frank Saucier who had defended his center field position in the top of the first.  During the rest of Veeck's life, he felt badly about Saucier's involvement.  A minor league phenom labled "can't miss," Saucier was a favorite of Veeck's.

The Browns came to bat with the ballpark announcer intoning: "For the Browns, number one-eighth, Eddie Gaedel, batting for Saucier."  The crowd buzzed and confusion reigned.  Gaedel began warming up by swinging three toy bats.  Chief Umpire Ed Hurley took a look at Gaedel, blanched, then headed toward the Browns bench.

"Hey," he shouted to manager Zach Taylor, "what's going on here?"

Taylor responded bringing to the plate papers that included Gaedel's contract.  The active player list was produced proving that there was room to add a player.  Cain and his catcher, Bob Swift, huddled at the mound to discuss the imponderables of pitching to a midget.  Swift, acknowledging the significance of the moment, dropped to both knees giving his pitcher the best target possible.  Meanwhile, Gaedel had abandoned the rehearsed crouch Veeck had come up with and was aping Joe DiMaggio's classic feet spread style.  Would he attempt to hit one of Cain's pitches?

Gaedel followed Veeck'sscript and Cain failed to find the strike zone, such as it was, while laughing between attempts to find the tiny strike zone.  Gaedel walked on four pitches.  The last pitch was at least three feet over his head.  Jim Delsing then ran for the midget hitter who patted his replacement on the butt, waved to the crowd, shook hands with the first base coach and took a lot of time crossing the infield to the third base Browns dugout.  He loved his considerably less than 15 minutes later confessing he "felt like Babe Ruth."  During all of the next season, Delsing wore #18.

Veeck had a lot of fun with league president Will Harridge and others in baseball's hierarchy so offended by his hi-jinks.  Leaping upon the phrase "little people," Veeck called for further clarification about minimum heights and what the height of a player should be.  References were made to New York Yankee shortstop Phil Rizzutto ("not much over five feet tall") with the inimitable Veeck suggesting Rizzuto was either a large midget or a short major league player.  Harridge decreed Gaedel's name would be stricken from all official records, a decision of chagrin for Veeck who had promised Gaedel immortality.  Veeck countered by suggesting that if Gaedel hadn't batted, then Bob Cain would not have thrown the pitches and that Swift hadn't caught them.  Moving right along, it also meant that Delsing had come in to run for no one, meaning Saucier had been deprived of a time at bat.  Veeck's case boiled down to the integrity of the sport's records having been compromised.  Records, of course, are the holy grail of baseball.

The Saucier aspect of the midget who pinch hit story is both complex and sad.  Born in 1926, he served 38 months in the U.S. Navy during World War II, then began a spectacular minor league career in 1947 hitting .348 at Belleville in the Illinois State League before being promoted the next year to Wichita Falls where he hit an amazing .446, the best in all of baseball.  His .343 average during 1950 for the San Antonio Missions in the Texas League won the batting title and he was named Sporting News  Minor League Player of the Year.  At the threshold of success, Saucier was pulled into the Korean War, suffered an injury and attempted to resume his career after Veeck signed him while adding a substantial bonus.  That was in July, 1951.  He played mostly hurt (severe bursitis) in but 18 games getting one hit in 14 at bats for a .071 batting average.  He never returned to the majors and eventually became a successful businessman.  A graduate (with degrees in math and physics earned at Westminster College (Fulton, Missouri), he is proud of an athletic field there named after him.  The college may be recalled as the site of Sir Winston Churchill's "iron curtain" speech in 1946.

Gaedel gained re-entry into the record books and you could look it up.  He earned 100 bucks for having the shortest career in the history of major league baseball.  When he died in 1963 of a heart attack following a mugging, Gaedel got a front-page obituary in The New York Times.  The honor normally is reserved for statesmen, generals and Nobel Prize winners.  The lone baseball person to attend services was Bob Cain, the only major leaguer to pitch to a midget.

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