Final Post

I am officially hanging up my spikes. Where does that phrase come from, by the way? My baseball career has come to an end and I feel no need to 'hang my spikes' anywhere. I mean, I may get them dipped in gold for my display case and add some dramatic backlighting, but they won't be hanging.

This morning, I accepted a job as an analyst for an IT consulting firm. I'm extremely excited about the opportunity. The position is definitely a good fit for me and I really enjoyed everyone I met during the interview process. (I'm also excited about beginning my ascent towards the poverty line, which has loomed above me for so long.)

Sharing this news with people has yielded some interesting responses. I get the sense that people are half expecting me to be disappointed about making this transition. While I am sad about the end of my playing career, any disappointment in that area is far overshadowed by my excitement about the new job.

If I'm being perfectly honest, with every day that passed since my release, two things became more and more clear to me:
1) The likelihood of a team taking a chance on me started low and diminished with time.
2) I wasn't missing the game as much as I had anticipated.
I definitely miss my teammates and I miss the camaraderie. But I think the best part about playing baseball was having that clearly defined goal in your sights and pursuing it relentlessly. The good news is, I started to realize that I can find that elsewhere. Any disappointment I'm feeling is not because I no longer get to play baseball, it's because I didn't achieve my goal of pitching in the Major Leagues. And since I have no regrets about the way I chased that goal, this disappointment has been a surprisingly easy pill to swallow.

There is one thing though.
As a minor leaguer, you often daydream about getting called into your manager's office and finally getting that amazing news. When I had this daydream, I never envisioned myself trotting out to the mound at Dodger Stadium, or signing autographs for adoring fans. I didn't think about the paychecks or the chance at fame. I always thought about making the phone calls to my friends and family. I dreamed of calling my parents, who have been so amazing and supportive my entire life, and sharing the good news. I thought about calling my brother, Justin, who has always been willing to do anything for me. And I thought about calling my wife. She has sacrificed so much, and has never made me feel even a sliver of guilt for pursuing my dream at the price of a 'normal' relationship. I love all of you... thank you.

A Game of Failure

This weekend I spoke with a friend of mine about Bryce Harper's future. Despite his impressive body of work there is just so much that we don't know about him yet. Probably the hardest thing about scouting a player is projecting how well he will deal with the inevitable failures associated with the game of baseball.

I will never forget a brief conversation I had with Blake Dewitt in our first season of pro ball. We were in our clubhouse after a loss in Ogden. Blake had 3 strikeouts in the game and was seated at his locker. I patted him on the back and offered some generic words of encouragement. He responded:

Oh, I'm fine. It's just strange... I struck out 3 times tonight. Before coming out here I don't think I had 3 strikeouts in my life.

He didn't mean that he had never had a 3 strikeout game in his life. He had not had 3 cumulative strikeouts in his lifetime.... period. And let me also say that he was absolutely not trying to impress me with this comment. Blake is one of the best guy's I've ever met and he is as humble as they come. He was simply acknowledging how difficult the adjustment was going to be. I think that Dewey (and probably all great hitters) trusted that he would be successful in relative terms. But learning to deal with failure was going to be tough.

Hanley's Evening Jog

Initially I thought that people were making too much of Hanley Ramirez jogging after the ball in Monday's game. (video here) While you hate to see it, it certainly didn't influence the outcome of the game. If he had come in the clubhouse, apologized, and admitted to a mental lapse - it would have been water under the bridge. But he didn't. Instead he had this to say about his manager pulling him in the next half inning:

That's the example [Gonzalez] set with me. If you don't hustle, hopefully, he does it with everybody.... It's OK. He doesn't understand that. He never played in the big leagues. That's fine.

I find this response infuriating. This is absolutely not the time to play the "he never played in the big leagues" card. It does not take big league experience to evaluate his level of effort. It doesn't even take baseball experience. Anyone who has ever cared about anything knows what it means to try.

Karate Kid Remake

The original Karate Kid is near and dear to my heart. So near and so dear, in fact, that I once named my fade-away jumper "the crane kick" - because "if do right, no can defense." It's one of those movies that I end up watching every time I come across it on cable (others include A Few Good Men, The Shawshank Redemption, The Princess Bride, and Ferris Bueller's Day Off.) The movie is just so watchable, and for my money, it doesn't get any better than Bill Conti singing "You're the Best Around".
Naturally, I'm a little hestitant to get excited for this remake. (view the trailer below) After a brief analysis of the trailer, I have two major concerns.
1) Jaden is just too young for the part. I think the bullying will play in his age group, but if they try to bring in a love interest it will be pretty difficult to take seriously.
2) Jacket on, Jacket off? That sounds like a bad South Park joke to me. Also, some of the most uncoordinated experiences of my life involve me getting in and out of jackets. There is no way that could be the foundation of a fighting style. The only thing that could be worse would be Wetsuit on, Wetsuit off.

This is actually really similar to my own performance at my middle school talent show. The only difference is I played Hot Cross Buns on the recorder instead. And it wasn't in the auditorium and there wasn't an audience per se, just some stuffed animals that I arranged on my bed in my room. So I guess it was more of a rehearsal than an actual talent show.