When the Ball Died at Second

Posted on June 21, 2007

We had all bled on the field and played through the pain at one time or another, but none of us had ever seen the ball bleed before. Parry had hit the damn thing so hard that we didn’t hear the familiar crack of bat on ball—some of us heard nothing, while others, me included, swear they heard it scream, real quiet, just a tiny yelp like when you step on a dog’s toes. And instead of leaping off the bat and soaring over the outfield wall, it tumbled to the ground and skittered in the dirt at my feet at second base.

There was no open wound, but the blood flowed freely, as if from a gunshot. I refused to touch it, even as Artie chugged past me on the way to an inside-the-infield home run. The ball lay there, groaning. A low painful hum. A sad sound of resignation, as if prepared to die. It seemed wrong to lift the ball out of its deathbed and toss it into someone’s uncaring glove as if nothing strange had happened. I heard my wife yelling from the bench to get my head in the game, her voice shrill and angry. Angrier, even, than last night, when she told me that she knew—that she’d always known—about my affair with the neighbor woman. I’d been fucking around with the woman next door for about six years, and I think I was probably trying to get caught. It was the only way I could think to hurt my wife, and, besides, I couldn’t stand to be in the house anymore because I was sure it was haunted. “If you knew,” I’d said, “then why would you wait so long to do something about it?” She turned off the light, pulled the covers over her head, and lay in silence for at least an hour. As I began to drift off the sleep, she told me, again, that I had to stop blaming her for what happened. Then we had that old argument again. I was tired of that argument the first time, and now I can’t stand even thinking about it.
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The Legless Catcher

Posted on June 14, 2007

By the time we finally won a championship, we were twenty years deep into the war and nobody cheered, because everybody was either dead or dying. We were replacement players, called in because we were unfit to be soldiers, but just fit enough to be able to squeeze into uniforms and put on a show for the people. All the real players had been sent overseas. Their unions had resisted at first, but in the end, public pressure forced them to cave; our freedom was on the line and these were our greatest athletes. They had to go.

The league contracted to ten teams and then loaded the rosters with all of the army’s rejects. Most of us were fat and diabetic, or had bad hearts or were too old to fight. Others were considered defective. Our pitcher only had one arm; he played without a glove and we always prayed that no one would hit a liner right back at him. The first baseman was blind in one eye. The shortstop was a burn victim, his skin a grotesque canvas of purples and reds. I was the catcher. They put me there because I had no legs—I was the first pro catcher in history who didn’t have knee problems. The irony, chuckling broadcasters liked to mention, was that I’d actually lost my legs in the war, way back when it started. I never really thought it was that funny.

We were worse than a high school team, but still good enough to win the World Series. Everybody in the league had played when they were younger, but had given up their dreams long ago. Now, we were paid like superstars to play ball worse than our children would. I made six million a year, despite the fact that every base runner we ever allowed had stolen second base; without my legs, I had a hard time throwing anyone out. But I was considered underpaid.

By this time, the country’s biggest expenses were, in order, defense and pro sports. I don’t remember what was third. Whatever it was, it didn’t get much attention. Everyone was so preoccupied with the war and the World Series that we barely even noticed that the rest of the country was crumbling beneath our feet.

Three years ago, the champion had gotten a standing ovation from a stadium packed with over 100,000 people. The next year, the number had been cut in half. Only 100 people watched us win the championship. They looked so tiny and helpless up in the stands that I thought they might blow away like confetti. They watched in grim silence as the game unfolded. I heard them coughing sometimes, during breaks between the generic rock music that blared through the stadium, but they never cheered, booed, or even clapped.

The final out came on a collision at the plate—the guy bowled me over, because I couldn’t very well stand my ground. Everyone on the field thought we’d both died at home plate. The guy who barreled into me was at least seventy and he could barely run. He hit the ground with an awful whump, like a corpse dropped out of a helicopter, and he didn’t seem to be breathing. Our teammates, crying, rushed out to us, and, even though they saw that I still had the ball, they didn’t feel right cheering. Even when the other guy choked out a weak breath, and I lifted the ball triumphantly, we were silent. It still didn’t feel right to cheer; in fact, it hadn’t felt right for years, but it wasn’t until then that we realized how wrong we’d been all along.

Williams Beta to argue records case

Posted on May 30, 2007

Tuesday, November 8, 2033

Williams Beta to argue records case

by Reade Seligmann
Associated Press Writer

NEW YORK (AP) – Commissioner of Baseball George W. Bush will today hear arguments on both sides of the continuing battle over the achievements of Yankee’s infielder Ted Williams Beta. Bush is not expected to make a decision until late next week.

Lawyers for Williams Beta are expected to argue that the slugger’s accomplishments – in particular this season’s on-base-percentage of .612 – should be added to the official MLB records for the original Ted Williams, now known as Ted Williams Alpha. Williams Alpha once held the major league record for career OBP at .481, but was surpassed by Barry Bonds during the 2008 season. The addition of Williams Beta’s percentages from this and last season would regain the record for the collective Ted Williams.

Clone rights advocates fear that the Williams case will re-open a wound well on its way to closing: whether clones are themselves unique individuals or extensions of their former selves.

“We’ve come too far,” said Darrin Miles Beta, reproduced from late Scottish meat magnate Darrin Miles Alpha. “We felt we were only a few years away from finally beating this silly Beta label, and now this. If Williams wins, he’ll set back clone rights five, maybe ten years.”

Miles and others worry that while they have gained a superficial level of acceptance in the US, most Americans are waiting for a reason to reject them. The oldest clones are only 25, and have not yet had a chance to establish themselves in communities. Williams Beta, at 24, is in one of the few professions in which someone so young can gain such national recognition. Many fear that a ruling in his favor all but damns the case of clone rights, especially considering the US Supreme Court’s increasing reliance on the precendents of professional sports decisions.

“It’s like the Brett Favre thing back in, what was that, 2010?,” Miles Beta points out. “Once the NFL said you had to count five Mississippi before rushing him, suddenly the Court agrees that, yeah, some people are important enough to require special treatment. Sports dictate the direction of this country. I just don’t want to see everything we believe in change because of some silly records.”

But not everyone takes Miles’ devil-may-care attitude towards the stat books. Reached for comment in his suburban Los Angeles home, former San Francisco Giants slugger Barry Bonds – who currently holds the single season On-base-percentage record of .609 in 2004 – said he didn’t believe Williams Beta’s case had any merit at all. “What the [expletive] is everybody so puzzled about?” Bonds asked. “This guy, he’s not even a real person. He was made in a little bitty tube. That’s not sports, science people. That’s [expletive] is what that is.” Bonds has held this position since the announcement of Henry Aaron Beta in 2017. It is widely rumored, though never substantiated, that Bonds tried to clone himself, but that the boy produced was the scrawny, wiry teenager Bonds now calls his youngest son.

This is not the first time the name Ted Williams has been associated with controversy. Williams Alpha, a Boston Red Sox great in the 1940s and 50s, died of heart failure in 2005. His head, body, and some DNA samples were suspended in liquid nitrogen with the hope that medical advances would one day allow him to be thawed and re-animated. The procedure was at the time considered ghastly and absurd, and Williams Alpha’s children fought bitterly – and publicly – over the fate of the body. But while it and its brainy counterpart still sit frozen, some DNA samples were used in 2009 as the first high-profile use of the then emergent technology of human cloning. In fact, it was the cloning of the Williams DNA that spurred US lawmakers to finally deal with what was on the brink of becoming a shadowy black market industry.

It seems the only person not speaking publicly about the case is Williams Beta himself. Despite the debate between the conservative right – claiming that clones are nothing more than soulless copies of real people – and the progressive left – who believe that clones are unique and fully human – Williams Beta has refused all requests for interviews. Perhaps he desires only to rise above the squabbles of a nation divided and to stick to the real business of America, which is sports.

Home Opener

Posted on May 11, 2007

By: Adam McGrath

Very, very early on the morning of April 9th, Pat McCarthy and his buddy Tim Donahue walked up to the front door of Casey Moran’s, one of the ubiquitous Irish Pubs that populate Wrigleyville. Normally, these two would have been stumbling out the door at this time of day, instead of waiting in line to show their IDs to get in. Today, however, was different. Today was the Cubs Home Opener, and Casey Moran’s was the place to start the day off right, by drinking lots of Bud Light and trying to win tickets to the game from the members of the Q101 Morning Fix, who were doing their first live broadcast ever.

“So far so good,” Pat said to Tim, as they were each handed a complimentary T-shirt for being two of the first 200 Cubs fans through the door at 5:30 a.m. on a Monday morning.

“I guess the weekend continues,” replied Tim, as he searched to see if his favorite bartender was taking this special shift.

The weekends were what these Chicago natives had been living for the past couple years. As they shared a dorm room at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, they now shared a two-bedroom apartment in a mid-rise building on the 1100 block of N. Lasalle St. It was only a couple quick stops on the L down to Harold Washington College, where Tim taught students older than himself how to put a paragraph together. Pat, on the other hand, had an hour-long commute out past O’Hare to the U.S. Cellular Headquarters, where he’d been moving up in the New Acquisitions department.

Both young men had grown up with a passion for the Cubs, groomed by their fathers and uncles to root against the Billy Goat curse and maintain hope that the championship would come to the north side. The sting from the White Sox’ glorious journey to the top two years ago, and the city’s embrace of that feat still lingered in everyone’s minds.

“Ginger Jordan looks pretty good in person,” remarked Tim, as he scoped out the setup of the eclectic group of comedians/disc jockeys from the still nascent morning radio show that was a blend of skits, bits, and legitimate journalism.

“And did you have any idea that Clarissa Jenkins, the traffic girl, was a white guy putting on a black woman’s voice?”

“Holy shit, you’re kidding me! That’s almost as funny as Jim Lynam’s rants about Lance Briggs.”

“Yeah, he’s passionate about his Chicago sports – check him out there in his high school football jersey. He looks like he’s had a rough night.”

“I wonder what McCarthy will say today—probably be something snarky about this being the Cubs’ year.”

And that was the real topic for discussion today, how the Cubs might actually make it back to the playoffs, and not blow it like in ’03. Thankfully, the names Thome and Konerko were the furthest words from the crowd’s lips today. With the acquisition of Soriano, and the return to form of D. Lee, the offense looked like they might be able to put up some runs this year. The two young men chatted about the players to watch, the $300 million spent in the off-season, and whether Dempster would be run out of town if he insisted on blowing every save opportunity thrown his way. Not to mention the new manager of the club, the singular Lou Pinella.

“Maybe he can bring some fire to these guys,” Pat said.

“Well at least we better not see him napping in the dugout.”

The early morning matured as the bar filled up with Cubs fans, an even mix of young, preppy North-siders and rugged die-hard fans sporting their Ryne Sandberg jerseys. The Bud Light flowed, hopes were voiced, Madina Lake played some tunes, and everyone had a good laugh at the jokes of the radio show crew. Every hour they gave away a pair of tickets to the game, but Tim and Pat were not among the lucky winners. They left Casey Moran’s around 11 with nothing more than their novelty T-shirts and a good buzz going. They had already decided to stick around the ballpark even if they couldn’t get into the game, so they made their way over to The Cubby Bear to try to get a seat and some grub. On the short walk over, they passed the massive line outside the gates, filled with buzzing Cubs fans from all walks of life. Even though the team was only 3-3 after their first week on the road, nothing could dampen the crowd’s enthusiasm. They spotted the “Woo-Woo” guy near the front of the line, taking pictures with some small children, while others looked down at their feet, reading the inscriptions on the personalized bricks that were planted in the sidewalk during the off-season.
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A press release from Kyle Korver and Kevin Curtis regarding racial inequalities in professional sports

Posted on April 17, 2007

With the full support of their families and friends, NBA forward—and Ashton Kutcher body double—Kyle Korver and NFL wide receiver Kevin Curtis are proud to announce the founding of the Alliance for the Preservation of White Athletes (APWA), a civil liberties watchdog group that intends to fight unfair hiring practices in professional sports.

It is common knowledge that the number of white athletes in the NFL and NBA is diminishing rapidly, and the APWA is very concerned about this trend. “I just don’t feel comfortable being stuck in a locker room with all those black guys,” Korver says. “I mean, it wasn’t long ago that there would have been two, maybe even three American whites on the floor at once, and now we’re lucky to see that a couple times a year.”

“It’s sad,” Curtis says. “White kids in the suburbs used to have role models they could believe in. Steve Largent, Fred Biletnikoff, Ed McCaffery, that McConkey guy who played for the Giants, I think. Now, there’s just me and a handful of others, and I include guys like James Thrash who probably aren’t even white, but they could pass for it if you looked from really far away. The point is, there aren’t enough white guys in the league, and, frankly, I think it’s wrong.”
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When we Knew the World Was Going to End

Posted on April 4, 2007

When the national anthem began, we stood as one, hats flipped off of heads, hands over hearts, eyes on the field where the President stood, and we really listened to the words again, after years of ignoring them, sipping on our beers and sneaking looks down the tank tops of the underage girls two rows in front of us and whooping like idiots when the singer sang about bombs and death. We realized how sad the song is, how we’ve come to celebrate death and savagery wrapped in a cloak of godliness. And we shed a few tears—but only a few because the last few days had wrung us dry—when we asked ourselves the inevitable question: is this the same kind of song they sing before their soccer games or camel races or kabaddi or whatever they do over there? Then we remembered again. We were sure we would always remember.

The air was still thick with dust and days-old smoke, a mist washing over us, curling into our nostrils and diving into our lungs. It was relentless; no matter how hard we coughed or how often we blinked, it was still there, coming, coming, always marching toward us, and we couldn’t help but wonder what we’d just swallowed—was that just dust from a broken cinderblock that rested on our seats? Was that ash from a burning car that fell on our tongues as we breathed open-mouthed so as to avoid smelling the death in the air? Was that our fathers, brothers, sisters, neighbors dusting our hair and following us home? Read more

Stillman Wanted a Championship

Posted on February 9, 2007

Stillman had spent a lifetime waiting for a championship, and when it finally came, he barely noticed because he was too busy dying. When the first baseman— his first baseman, the one whose jersey he’d worn for years, the one whose trading card was worth hundreds of dollars, the one he’d loved as desperately as he’d ever loved anyone—gloved a slow grounder and trotted to the bag to record the final out, the city erupted as one, a simultaneous civic orgasm.

Stillman didn’t feel the city’s collective shudder because he sat slumped against his bathroom wall, his head dangling limply over the toilet, a thin line of vomit stretching from his lip into the water. Without furniture or a TV—almost everything was either repossessed or broken—his apartment felt cavernous in the silence; the sound of his retching echoed through the rooms. While the team mobbed each other on the field, Stillman cried from the pain—his tongue burning from the bile and his stomach twisted like a rag being squeezed dry. Tears plopped into the toilet and swirled downward when he tried to flush the smell away.

Outside, neighbors banged pans together and howled at the moon. They hugged strangers and gave each other beers. They toasted their heroes and re-affirmed their faith in god. Outside, somewhere, was his son.
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