If Rick Anderson Starts Drinking More, We'll Know What Happened -- A Story

It's about 11 pm. Joe Vavra and Rick Anderson go to a bar after the game that the team they work for as the hitting coach and pitching coach, respectively, just played. They badly need a drink.

The establishment is a small place: a little too dark and a little too rank to be considered "nice." There are only a handful of people inside. The men take their seats toward the far end of the bar and wait for the bartender to finish her conversation with another patron.

"Summit, tall," Rick requests when she wanders down to greet them. "I'll have the same" Joe adds. The bartender is an average woman: a little too old and a little too heavy to be considered "pretty." It's clear she and the bar have been together a long time. She retreats to tap their beers.

"So, that was another clunker, huh?" Joe offers, trying to generate some small talk.

"Yeah," Rick replies, rubbing his brow. "But at least your guys have some fight in 'em. My guys...I don't know..." he continues with a sigh.

"Well, my guys aren't exactly perfect. They're hitting into way too many double-plays. And I still can't figure out how to get them to hit with more power at home.... But, I hear ya'. Yeah, I don't know what to tell you, Andy. They're capable of doing so much better." Joe replies helpfully as the bartender returns with their drinks. The men thank her. She lingers to see if they want anything else and to be friendly.

Rick continues, trying to include the bartender, because his frustration runs so deep, he's willing to vent to anyone who'll listen -- even strangers. "I don't know what their problem is. They're just not listening to me. They have great bullpens, but then they go out and stink up the joint. They're leaving pitches up....They're not trusting Mauer.... They're not making adjustments.

"They're so shitty lately, and I'm getting so sick of walking out to the mound every fifteen minutes to tell them to trust their stuff. I'm sick of all of it!" he yells, and then cuts himself off.

The bar becomes quiet as Joe, the bartender, and even the other patrons look at Rick with both concern and sympathy.

Suddenly, Rick slams his fist on the bar.

After a moment, the bartender looks at Rick and states, "hell, if they were my guys, I'd line them up just like kids picking teams, pick out the good ones and take them to Dairy Queen. The bad ones? I'd sell them for beer money."

What It Must Be Like To Be Rick Anderson (a story)

Rhonda Anderson wakes up at 4 am and notices her husband Rick has gotten out of bed. She gets up, puts on her sea-blue robe with a little sailboat embroidered on the left side, slips on her fuzzy purple slippers, and shuffles downstairs to check on him.

Rick, who happens to be the pitching coach for the Minnesota Twins, is sitting at the dining-room table in the dark. He has made himself a bowl of Cookie Crisp cereal, but he's playing with it more than eating it. "What's the matter, hon?" Rhonda asks with as much compassion as she can muster at such an early hour, "Can't sleep?"

"No," he grumbles, "I just can't figure it out."

"Figure what out?" she says sleepily as she shuffles to the kitchen counter to start a pot of coffee.

"The pitchers. I can't figure out how to get through to them. They've always been so good before -- they've always listened to me. They always used to do exactly what I asked of them. They always took my advice and treated me with respect.

"Now...well, now they seem to be intentionally defying me. I tell them to pound the strike zone, and they throw right down the middle. I tell them if they have to miss, miss low, and they leave pitches up. I tell them to throw strikes, and they walk guys. Oh, and whenever I try talking to them, they just sigh and say 'I know,' or worse, they roll their eyes and walk away. I don't know what to do anymore -- they just won't listen. It's as if they've turned into a bunch of surly teenagers that are getting bad grades. You know what I mean?...Rhonda?"

Rhonda looks up from her bag of Dunkin Donuts coffee grounds, and looks at Rick. After a pause, she says, "Oh, I'm sorry honey, what were you saying? I wasn't paying attention."

Blame It on the Sleeping God (a story)

Twins 9 - Indians 12 (11)

What a wild game -- down and up and back down again. It's as if the Baseball Gods were goofing around with it. Hmmm......

The Baseball Gods have a get-together on Mt. Doubleday to celebrate the last full moon of the season. The God who looks over the Yankees, Steinbrennerus, is crankier than usual. Colangelo, the God who looks over the D-Backs, approaches Steinbrennerus to chat.

Colangelo: Hey Steinbrennerus, how's it going this year? I hear the Yankees aren't going to make the playoffs. What's up with that?
Steinbrennerus: Aw, hell. It's those stupid Rays. Ever since they dropped the "Devil" from their name, they have all this...spunk. I hate spunk.
C: Why don't you mess with them and make them lose?
S: I wish I could, but Espn, the Supreme High Commander of All Sports Gods, has taken a liking to them. I need to keep him happy. He's been giving the Yankees ballpark a whole bunch of coverage on his little cable-tv project. And I'm going to ask for more coverage next season when the new park opens. So I'll just leave the Rays be. But I am feeling a bit vengeful this evening. I think I want to mess with somebody. Who else has spunk?
C: Well, I hear the Twins are surprising a lot of people by hanging in their pennant race.
S: The Twins, huh? Who watches over them?
C: Um, I think Pohladus does.
S: That old fart? Ha! Do you know he's richer than I am, but he won't spend it on his team? That just bugs me. Oh, this will be perfect. Where is he?
C: He's asleep over there. He's been there since Saturday. I guess he powered the team's bats in a double-header, but he overdid it and hasn't recovered yet. In fact, I doubt he even knows they lost two in row to rookie pitchers.

Steinbrennerus walks over to where Pohladus sleeps.

S: Hey Pohladus, you SOB! Wake up! I'm gonna mess with your team.
Pohladus: Huh? What? Wait, you can't do that. They're in a pennant race.
S: Just watch me. Who's starting tonight? Liriano? Heh heh. I give Liriano "Failure to Locate".

Just then, a thundbolt reaches down into the Progressive Field bullpen where Franciso Liriano is doing his pre-game warmups.

P: Aw, crap. I'm too old for this.
S: Ha! I give Punto "Throwing Error".
P: [sighs] Fine, I'll play your little game. I give the Twins bats "Hitting".
S: I give Justin Morneau...
P: Hey, you can't touch him. He's MVP material. It's in the rules.
C: Yeah, Steinnie, he's right, you can't touch him.
S: Fine. I give Delmon Young "Swing At Everything".
C: Dude, he already has that. It's chronic.
S: Oh, right. Ok, I give Carlos Gomez "Liner to Third for Double-Play".

Someone from off-stage calls out to Steinbrennerus to inform him the Yankees are losing again. Steinbrennerus exits to go watch over Yankee Stadium for awhile.

P: Good. Got rid of him. I give the Twins bullpen "Effectiveness".

Pohladus sits down again and begins to doze off. Steinbrennerus returns.

S: What? They took the lead? This is no good. Quickly, I give Grady Sizemore "Home Run to Tie". Ok. now I have time to think of what to do.
C: Got any ideas?
S: Yeah, you know how everyone says that Joe Nathan might be the best closer in the game?
C: Yeah. So?
S: Well, I hate that. My man Mariano Rivera is the best closer in the game. I know...I give Joe Nathan "Rusty Arm."
C: Um, I don't think you can do that. Pohladus gave the bullpen "Effectiveness".
S: So? Who's he going to tell? He's asleep over there.

To Be Continued...

Problem with Poonkees (a story)

(Twins 4 - Yankees 12)

Bright and early Monday morning, the Twins players started arriving in the visitor's clubhouse at Yankee Stadium. When they got there, there was a shoe box sitting nicely on the bench. The tag on it read, "To the Twins, All My Love, Sid."

"Hmm. Wonder what it could be," said Alexi Casilla.

"I don't know. Do you think it's a trick? Joe, what do you think?" asked Delmon Young.

Joe Mauer glanced at the box as he wiped off his milk moustache and said, "I don't know. I don't really remember what kind of guy Sid was. It's probably ok. Open it and see. I have to go make a phone call." And he held up his Qwest phone and walked away.

So Nick Blackburn opened the box and smiled. Inside were a bunch of adorable fuzzy colorful creatures. "Awww. These are cute," he said as he picked one up.

Craig Breslow walked over, picked two out the box, and said, "hey, these are pretty cute."

Soon, several of the guys were picking them up, snuggling and playing with them and smiling. Mike Redmond walked through and said, "hey, those look like Tribbles."

Everyone looked at him with a confused expression. "You know," he explained, "Tribbles? From Star Trek? Oh, never mind." And he walked off to go put on some clothes.

Boof asked, "what is he talking about."

"I don't know," replied Matt Guerrier, "I think it's a old-guy thing."

Soon, Denard Span stopped in the doorway. "Hey Denard, look at these," exclaimed Brian Buscher. "Aren't these great?"

Denard replied, "Nah. I think they're kind of creepy. I ain't touching 'em." So he left.

A moment later, Joe Nathan walked in and stopped dead in his tracks. "What are you doing? Put those down right now! Don't you know what those are?" he cried.

The guys stared at Joe and mumbled, "What? What are they?" as they set the critters down on the bench.

"Those are the Yankee Stadium Poonkees. They're evil. The legend goes that they're the mutant spawn of all the left over concessions that have been stored all these years. I heard they're even worse this year because they're feeding off all the reminiscing about the stadium. You didn't let them get their dust on you, did you?"

The guys looked at themselves and brushed off their shirts and mumbled, "yeah, a little."

Joe continued, "No. This isn't good. These things have curses. If you get their dust on you, you're doomed."

"What kind of curses?" the guys asked.

"In order to reveal their curses, you have to act like a Yankees Fan and shout the super-secret string of obsenities." And he proceeded to swear and cuss with a rhythmic tempo.

Soon, the Poonkees revealed their curses: