"I see great things in baseball..."

"It's our game--the American game... It will repair our losses and be a blessing to us...."
-- Walt Whitman (as loosely quoted by Annie Savoy in BULL DURHAM)

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There are many things about our country which are not all they could be, but there are still some things which remain as perfect now as they ever were.

Chief among such rare isolated examples of a Kind And Loving God is the grand and glorious game of baseball. Football may well be a more true reflection of our nation's violent and militaristic character, and basketball with its flamboyance and impossible feats of high flying athleticism might well be the jazz of our age, but baseball... it remains a pure portrait of where we came from, where we once hoped to see ourselves going, and where we can -- when the mood and winds are just right -- still imagine that we might yet return: that innocent and joyful place under a sky of blue, on a field of green, the smell of grass and horsehide and chalk dust hanging on a warm afternoon breeze, with all our "foes" still smiling friends who will salute our good fortune and buck us up in the aftermath of any inconsequential failure.

What's even more thrilling (again, in my opinion) is the occasional story that comes along which reminds us that perhaps not all such nostalgic golden-toned visions of America lay filed away in memory or fantasy, that instead there are places and moments where this quaint idea of Baseball as the embodiment of the best aspects of the American soul is not only real, but actually confirmed, appreciated and venerated.

We are reminded of this by those beautiful stories where we find baseball taking root in some strange place where its simple clean innocent joys have never before been known.

Like Iraq.



In a pretty wonderful little turn of events, Rachel Maddow of CNBC helped the first-ever Iraqi National Baseball Team find uniforms and equipment so that the Great American Game might have a fighting chance to find purchase in the war-torn sands of the Persian Gulf. Ebbets Field Flannels -- one of the coolest companies out there -- makers of the world's finest reproduction classic baseball jerseys, stepped in to design and manufacture some pretty cool duds for the Iraqi team, and copies of the unis are now on sale through the Ebbets Field website, with proceeds helping veterans of the ongoing hostilities in the region.

Read the the full story HERE and see if you can stifle a smile.

I dunno. Maybe old Walt was righter than he knew.

"Ilaab!" ("Play ball!")
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that game which comes in the spring

There are those who will claim that Christmas is their favorite time of the year. Others favor the summertime for its vacations and long lazy days, while still others lean towards autumn and its first touch of cool breezes and shower of golden leaves.

For me, there's no time like the early days of spring, when the grass is green, the air is shaking loose the stale winter chill, and lines of chalk on a diamond of green define all that is great and glorious with the game we call baseball.

I love football for its precision and tactical formality, for its controlled stylized violence and warm spirit of martial camaraderie. The feel of a perfect pass leaving the fingertips, its inevitable perfect path to a receiver's hands already as clear in your mind's eye as if drawn in glowing laser light... the surge of ancient instinct -- "RUN! NOW! GO!" -- when a cutback lane opens in the edge of your vision in the maelstrom of a play in progress... the animal joy of impact, flesh on flesh, as you connect squarely with that foul bastard who dared suggest that he might encroach on your territory. All of this is capital-G Good.

I love basketball for the free-flowing improvisation and infinite variation it affords: five individuals all swirling and dancing in some impossible non-choreographed ballet no one need explain or think about... the cocky giggle in the back of your mind when you glance into your opponent's eyes and realize that he's scared, that he has no idea what to do to counter you or best you... the insane feeling of connectedness when you stop and pop a 16-foot jumper and know from the millisecond it leaves your hand that you are safe to turn and head back upcourt,' cuz that rock ain't goin' nowhere but the bottom of the bucket, baybee... again, all very Good.

But baseball... never has Man yet designed a better test to reveal a man's weaknesses and strengths, his deepest fears and best attributes. Timid? Unsure? Arrogant? Complacent? Indecisive? Lazy? Baseball will find your faults and make them known. The better and more experienced players understand this, and that's part of what brings them back every season: the determination to stare into the face of that magic all-knowing field of green and say "You bested me before, but today -- right here, right now -- I'm ready, I'm worthy. This day is mine."


To stand and face an entire team of agile defenders whose only goal in life is to deny your claim to safe passage across that tiny slice of ground between home and first base. To step into a square drawn in the dirt, a club in your hand, as an opposing pitcher smirks a literal stone's throw away secure in the knowledge of all those foul tricks he'll use to try and make you look foolish and incompetent. To know that your best efforts to overcome these tricks will be judged -- harshly -- in real time and for all time by a heartless bastard of an umpire who feels no love, brooks no debate, and who is by his own definition both infallible and incontestable.

There's no going back, and no going around, and the only way forward is to live through that hungry moment looming before for you now with bared teeth and naked claws.

"You really think you're ready, little man? Well, let's find out...."

To accept and realize that you are locked in a contest where many times your greater success for your team very often results from your own personal failure, and that sometimes your own success will in fact hurt your team's cause. That you can do everything right yet still fail, or do everything wrong yet still succeed. That here, in this game, "sacrifice" is not just a vague concept but is instead an actual codified and defined play outcome. That no matter how well you play, you will never play as well as you dream, as well as you soon will wish you had in hindsight. Baseball more than any other sport forces you to mentally replay every single moment and realize all you might have done differently, done better.

To breathe deep and know the smell of baseball -- a smell which in my experience has no comparable analog in other sports: the glove leather, the new mown grass, and the dust of sandy clay soil, and acrid sweetness of the lime chalk, the warm horsehide smell of the ball, the distant faint smolder of ozone you can sometimes catch on a still night when the towering vapor lamps first fire up so as to give the gods themselves a clearer view of your impending futile testimony.

To endure the unpredictable spans of relative boredom in the field, when you are required to stand ever-ready, on guard for an attack which might never even come, or, when it does, will not be as you'd anticipated. The split-second decisions required by the various component parts of the defensive team, as you have to know instantly what angle to take on the ball, where to try and receive the catch, what kind of throw to make, what target to choose, and what insanely precise body control is required to make a comically non-areodynamic sphere of leather, string, and cork cut through swirling winds in order to hit a glove sized target half a football field away... and then live in hope that the other members of your team all arrived at the same immediate conclusions and are in proper position to then make use of whatever preliminary try at a play you've offered.

To shudder slightly in terror as you dig in at the plate, a feeling which somehow mixes with an eerie calm as you set your stance and wait for Inevitability to come out and play, because every swing you make (or refuse to make) has in some strange draft model of the Universe already been made, been tried, been long resolved since the beginning of time, and all you can do now is play out your part in this strange little sequence.

To see the pitcher's stretch, the delivery, the hiss of the approaching pitch screaming in at your head OH JESUS AT MY HEAD then you calmly snap your wrists and twist your hips in an explosive move you've practiced hundreds times -- ten thousand times, from days before memory -- and then, if your testimony is clear and pure and the gods deem you potentially worthy, a round stick will connect square with a round ball, and a silent diamond will be punctured by the pistol crack sound of rapturous unadulterated joy AAAAIIEEEEEEEE! and you discover yourself already sailing toward first, and suddenly the crowd reappears in the back of your awareness as you become the living breathing absolute undeniable indisputable Center of Everything, and for a flickering moment you feel what it is to be absolutely in control of every aspect of your reality -- yours is the hand on the tiller, the will at the helm -- and then you arrive at first, and the moment subsides, and you breathe a deep sigh, pleading silently with the Almighty, "Please, God -- let me feel that just one more time before I leave this world. Just once. Please..."

For me, that's Baseball. That's Spring.

And it ain't bad.
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got passion?

Was reminded last night -- while coaching a bunch of 8 year olds in fall baseball, of all places -- of what value I place upon "passion."

Not the clichéd overwrought flimsy disposable kind that gets squirted around like squeez cheez on the afternoon soap operas, but the more classical old school poet-warrior sort more akin to the original Latin root of the word, where "passio" meant "righteous suffering."

I'd missed the last two games for my squad -- one as I was out of town for a week for the Austin Film Festival, and then this past week as I was away leading a Cub Scout campout -- and in both games the team was reported to have played "flat." We won the first of those games, but not with the usuall verve and flash. The second of those games we lost 2-1 in a game where we managed 18 strikeouts in 18 at bats. In other words, the opposing team did not once field the ball or make a play -- we simply struck out every time (versus a pitching machine that throws strikes 80-90% of the time!). We rolled over and took a pointless loss against a team we'd easily manhandled earlier this season.

Last night our guys seemed flat again, and the first three innings showed us scoring zero runs, managing only two hits against 8 strikeouts (in 11 at bats).

And thus the team got The Return Of The Loud Guy.

I'm not some gung-ho "winning is the only thing" sorts of coaches, especially not in fall ball which is designed and intended as an instructional league. I rotate my players -- good and bad ones -- every inning, and everybody sits an innings, and everybody plays infield at least an inning or two every game. yes, this often costs us hits allowed and sometimes runs allowed, but my job is not to win imaginary trophies and championships in instructional league. My job is to teach these monkeys how to play baseball better.

And for me, you cannot engage in a sport (or any activity where there is competition and failure and heartbreak and joy and the requirement of focus and work and sweat) without that magical ingredient, passion.

So in the third inning I did something I've not had to do for a season or two: I told all the parents to walk away from the dugout, and then I barked once as my team to get their attention. After a second, they all became very quiet and saw that i was not wearing A Happy Face.

"Don't talk -- just raise your hands to answer me. Who's wearing a Red Sox jersey right now?"

All the hands went up.

"Who's wearing a Red Sox cap?"

All the hands went up.

"Who wants to turn in their jersey and cap and leave this dugout and not come back? 'Cuz that's the way you guys are playing."

Silence.

"We've got maybe one more trip through the order. Those guys over there are laughing and having a great time 'cuz you guys don't seem to care enough to even try. That's not what you've been taught, and that's not how you know to play. If you want to wear that jersey, and wear that cap, and sit in my dugout, you'd better start playing like you care about this team. Do you get it?"

"Yes, coach!"

"When they hit the ball, we catch the ball. When they run, we tag them. When we see a strike, we bang it. When we move, we move fast. Head in the game -- heart in the game. Every pitch, every play, every inning, every game. You got it?"

"We got it!"

"Then show me. Hats and gloves -- hit the field. NOW."

I'd like to say our team rallied for a thrilling comeback win. We didn't. We lost 9-1, but we did win the final inning.

Our post-game talk was calm and positive, and I thanked the guys for remembering how to play the game the way they are supposed to, but I also reminded them that it's waaaay too easy to fall back into the pattern of being lazy and uncaring.

"Here's the thing, guys: I don't care about the score, or who wins or who loses. What I care about -- what makes me come stand out here on a cool October night and scream and yell and stomp around -- is helping you guys understand how much a little effort and a little heart can do."

Afterwards, a few parents snuck over to thank me for tearing into the kids. That always surprises me, as I half-expect some of these parents to say "we don't really like Little Jimmy ever having anyone suggest that he's not perfect as-is." Instead, they seem oddly appreciative that some weird big stranger is (gently) tearing their kid a new one... even while that kid clearly never gets any remotely similar message or treatment at home.

And yes this relates to writing.

Actually, it relates to pretty much everything. Something I've noticed increasingly in recent years is the way that passion -- intense focused effort and desire -- seems more and more rare, especially among younger males. It's as if the very notion of intensity and passion is somehow an ugly thought, and that we were meant to spend our lives in some sort of stuporiffic waking coma, where we smile politely and just let whatever happens happen, with nary a thought, word, or care.

Fuck that.

There are things in this life worth working for. Worth fighting for, and suffering for. In fact, I dare say most all of the truly good and worthwhile things we might ever have opportunity to pursue fall into this class of thing: something worthy of passion.

And I'm to the point where I very much distrust any adult incapable of summoning some real passion for something in their life. Life is too amazingly cool and potentially brief to sleepwalk through your one turn on stage. Find something you care about, and then care 'til it hurts, Throw yourselves into things with gleeful reckless abandon, and stay connected to that delicious child-like joy that comes from a really awesome wipeout. Make a mess. Make a crater. Make some noise. Make a bit of a fool of yourself. Pain don't hurt near as bad as do shame or regret. Go hard or go home.

So, the moral of today's pomposity is "passion: it's a good thing." It will serve you well, and at the very least will scare the hell out of a good chunk of those you find yourselves competing against.

Get some.
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this is why we play

Eleven year old son -- the sporto in the bunch -- had his final summer baseball tournament of the year this past weekend, and it was memorable for a variety of reasons, all of them good.

Our team finally played up to their long-rumored potential and ran roughshod on the first day of play, winding up the #1 seed after Saturday's "pool" games. Come Sunday, it's single-elimination, with the road to the trophy requiring three wins in one afternoon.

Over the course of those three games, we saw our shortstop lay out airborne and grab a linedrive fast on its way to the gap for a would-be double. We saw a pair of perfect double plays -- one of the classic 4-6-3 variety, and the other a far trickier play where a onehopper to third was fired to first for the force, and then the first baseman fired back across the infield to cut down the runner trying to advance from second behind the throw. We saw three or four diving stabs in the outfield.

We saw an opposing right fielder streak deep into the corner and lay out for a full layout grab on what would have been a game-tying double, and then in a later game we saw an opposing centerfielder make an unbelievable play running full-out AWAY from the infield to dive and catch a ball just inches short of the fence.

We saw one of our pitchers gut out a complete game win in 105 degree heat when we told him "we need you to eat up as many innings as you can so we can save pitching for the finals." We came back from a 4 run deficit to win the semis going away, the capper being a cannon shot HR 30 feet over the centerfield sign.

In the finals we went into the final inning trailing 8-1, and with two outs mounted a rally that brought us to within a single run. Our best player was stepping in to the batter's box with the bases loaded when the opposing manager called time to go calm his pitcher. I trotted down to talk to our batter.

"Hands clammy?"

"Yeah," he said. His nervous eyes told me all I really needed to know about his emotional state.

"Yeah," I said. "Right now I can feel sweat all over my neck, my heart's running 200 beats a minute, and it feels like I have a rabbit doing backflips in my stomach. Kinda feel sick, in fact."

"Yeah, me too."

I patted the top of his helmet, and he looked up at me.

"Feels kinda neat, doesn't it?"

"I dunno. I'm pretty nervous."

"Dude-- come on! This is the good stuff! THIS is why we play! A trophy on the line, bases loaded, two outs, bottom of the last inning. This is storybook stuff. You're the best hitter we have, and there's nobody else I'd rather have with a bat in his hands right now. All we can ever ask for is a chance to win, and lookie lookie-- here we are."

He looked up at me, still clearly nervous. "This is why we play," I repeated. "To get this feeling. The guys who stay scared of this feeling quit playing. The ones who learn to like it are the ones on baseball cards. This is why we play -- to see which kind we are."

Now, I'd love to say the kid went on to rip a tournament-winning double, but that would be just the afterschool special version of the tale. In reality he hit a hard shot towards the second base hole, and the fielder made a nice pickup and a good enough throw to beat my batter by one step.

The batter crumpled to the dirt after a headfirst dive towards the bag, the umpire called the final out, and with that a summer of baseball ended.

All he seemed able to do was pound the dirt and cry at coming up one step short of enduring glory. I sat in the dirt with him for a second and put a hand on his back.

"You know, this isn't going to mean much to you right now, but I'm going to say it anyway. When we suit up and compete in any contest, all we can ever really hope for is to be in the middle of the action when it matters most. To be the guy with the bat in his hand when the last pitch is thrown. One team is going to win, and one team is not, and after it's all over, it's pretty damned sweet to know that you left everything you have out there in the dirt on the field of play."

"But I wanted to win," he sobbed.

"Me, too. But here's a cool secret, dude: any jerk can win. Winning is easy. It takes a man to fight to the end of a loss and then walk away with his head up high. So, come on -- get up and trot over to line up at third. We need to shake hands with these guys."

After the game, we were cleaning up the dugouts and getting ready to head home, the season well and truly over.

"Dad?"

"Yeah?"

"There at the end, when we were trying to come back, I saw you coaching first base and you laughing and smiling. What was that about?"

"That was the most fun I've had coaching in years. Game on the line, nerves jangling and rattling, stomach in knots. All I could was think how lucky we were to be right here, right now."

He nodded understanding. "It was weird -- I was terrified and happy at the same time."

I offered my fist and we knocked knuckles. "Exactly. This is why we play, baybee. This is why we play."
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when the bullet hits the bone

So it's been three weeks since last I posted here.

Sue me.

Life has remained an insane cascade of competing events and obligations. Kid events, kid illness, dentists, Boy Scouts, Cub Scouts, end of year parties and school functions, dance recitals, yard work, birthday parties, prepping for birthday parties, cleaning up after birthday parties, plus the incredible time and energy spent on little league coaching... oy. I'm ready for some sort of break, but now I look up and realize that I have something like 9 days left in which to tie up the half-written bundle of words and ideas that is my current script project if I am to have ANY hope of getting it in to the contest for the Austin Film Festival.

Speaking of baseball, last night my guys got eliminated from the playoffs. I've always sworn I'll not whine and whimper in public about something as inconsequential as the results of a little league game, but it's been an incredibly frustrating season in many regards. On the one hand I was blessed with the most talented team I've ever had—might ever have—but on the other hand this team has also been subjected to some of the worst weather luck and a slew of the dumbest/laziest decisions by clumsy league officials... my guys hung tough throughout it, but eventually I knew there woiuld come a time when patience, endurance, and luck would all abandon us at the same time, and last night was that moment. In a game we should never have been scheduled to play, my guys played just badly enough at key moments to lose to a team that they outplayed and should have beaten easily.

Bottom line: season over, load lifted, life goes on.

Now I have to kick serious ass in teh writing department in order to realize some goals I set for myself at the start of the year, and after THAT series of goals is met I already have ANOTHER set lined up on the runway, idling and cleared for immediate takeoff. It's a tremendously exciting time, as I suddenly have something like a half dozen ideas and projects rumbling which all seem to have serious potential and interest and viability. The key issue will be time.

Austin Film Festival contest entry and festival reservations are due soon, and I'm already starting to get wound up by that. Old friends are making the return, and some friends are this year going to be in an unusual position: rather than in teh civilian audience, some will likely be badged as working pros, and I am already threatening them with the embarrassingly naive and inane and stupid questions I intend to subject them to.

Current project list and status:

LILYA — I still love this impossible project, as do most folks who've read it. I wish I could make some money off the number of times I've heard "love it, and wish I had 100 million to produce it." But I can't. Nor can I yet find an effective way to get the damned thing to the sorts of players who might be able to prove useful in pushing this beast a few feet closer to consideration for production.

AMAZON — after a year of no real action, this project has some minor spark of new life as we (the co-writers) reached an agreement whereby we're both now cleared to independently develop and submit our own versions of the story we came up with. I have little doubt that the two "competing" stories will soon be so different as to make comparisons moot, but I volunteered some solutions which should help preclude any overly easy comparisons and intereference between the eventual two versions. Bottom line, it seems a fair and amicable separation of property, and leaves us both free to do what we each feel is right and proper by the story. "We shall see."

[SPAGHETTI WESTERN THING] — An odd project which continues to haunt me. One day I love the strange forced mixing of two disparate genres, and other days I look at it and think "I'm building a project doomed on two fronts." What parts I have written I love, and what I deas I intened to roll in I also love, but for various reasons it might wind up again stored until I get a clearer sense of the "do-ability" of the thing.

[COMEDY HORROR THING] — yes, it has a title (and a good one, at that), and a tagline (and a fucking great one, at that), but still I keep this one shrouded in mystery as those elements are so much fun that to share them at all spoils the fun of the eventual reveal when the script is done. This is teh current #1 priority, and the one I am most eager to get ready to read as it has lots of those commercial sorts of elements that give a newbie spec work the best fighting chance for production. A few producers have sparked when pitched the premise, and I hope they enjoy the finished product in a few weeks.

[EPIC HISTORICAL POPCORN FLICK] — this one is on hold while the stink of a damnably semi-similar turd fades from memory. I still love the premise, the characters, and many many of teh cool moments I've imagined and outlined, and some great scenes have already been written, but given that this is another of those projects that would be too expensive for a newbie to seriously suggest be filmed, this one stays in the Dream Locker for that magical happy day when I have Credibility and Experience and Bankability and such. Yeah, sounds funny when I say it, too.

[BIZARRE FROM LEFT FIELD IDEA] — still no details to share other than "there is an intriguing opportunity requiring my participation" and "if it works, it could be instant entreé into the pro ranks." For various reasons the expected rush of creative work on this has been postponed for a few weeks (until other various components are free to be brought to bear... and yes that is cryptic but intentionally so), but work has been done, folks seem interested and ready to receive, and this will be a major issue of attention this summer.

[OTHER NEW OFFER] — a longtime pal suggested the kernel of a story to me which is, in a stretch, loosely inspired by some comments and experiences I've shared. It's not autobiographical in any sense, but more like "extrapolating upon a fanciful impossibly farfetched fairy tale of an idea" but one which could—if done well—have tremendous commercial appeal and bankability. Again, the two issues to watch are TIME and MY ABILITY TO WORK AND PLAY WELL WITH OTHERS. I have been known, on occasion, to have a "strong personality" of the sort that sometimes proves difficult for some folks to live with for extended periods of time. I'm not a bastard, per se, but I can be moody and cantankerous and bombastic and perhaps even a touch arrogant and off-putting, so we'll see how this goes.

Roll in a alf dozen other oddball ideas and dreams that always seem to drift through the scene and that pretty much brings you up to speed.

I'd say more, but I really oughta be working.
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