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Baseball is our Moral Compass!

6/28/2015

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What I love about baseball is that it’s a lesson in moral compass. [Wait for it, wait for it…] Baseball is the epitome of sportsmanship. There are written rules. There are unwritten rules. And there are actions you take when rules are broken, most of those actions being unwritten. And, like chaos theory in science, everything eventually comes back into balance on its own—to a peaceful, balanced state.

This is the case even when you are on a tear and winning everyday (nice problem, wish we had it). Fans caution themselves to not “jinx.” Players do the same and stay away from pitchers in the dugout who have a no-no in progress. (Mad-Max Scherzer is getting lonely these days.) No one wants to disrupt physics, disrupt the energy. No matter how chaotic the internal action is at a given time, physics tells us that energy circles round to come to a resting, peaceful place. When this happens, our moral compass is headed due north, and we feel better about ourselves. [Stay with me folks, it’s Sunday, which—in my tradition—is a spiritual day.]

So what do we do when we are just downright angry and want to rip the “Straight outta Kauffman” shirts right off KC fans’ non-PC backs? What do we do when there’s been a bean-ball war that violated the Code in April and we still want revenge, even though if we really think about it we know that the April weekend is ‘done’ according to the Code? What do we do when we see Vogter take a shot to the wrist area on Friday night, imagine a fracture, flash to Phegley running the base paths and flashback to 240+ pound Jeremy Brown and emotionally wonder if it’s intentional? [Even though we know deep in our gut that it wasn’t intentional, but we want to think it is so we can retaliate against the KC Strut.] What do we do?

We breathe. We refrain from trying to castrate Sogard for going 0-4 in the leadoff role Friday night; we trust that Melvin had a good reason for putting him there even though it didn’t work out. We remember a lot didn’t work Friday night. We also refrain from unleashing the mean “Country Breakfast” jokes because Billy Butler is 0-10 in the last 7 days. We don’t start ringing our hands over the potential trade of Scott Kazmir. We don’t go to the rulebook on balks and try to write a Dear-Mr.-Hampton letter (movie reference: White Chicks, Wayan brothers at their best). We breathe.

We align our moral compass and if we can’t find that compass, we align ourselves with the stars. We look at the stats to keep calm: Vogt (53RBI’s), Lawrie (16 doubles and 7 homeruns), Gray (9-3 with a 2.09 ERA and an SO9 of 8.1), Burns (3.22 BA and 15 stolen bases), Reddick (SLG of 4.67 and 45 RBI’s).

And worse case scenario, we say, “Ah what the hell, it’s baseball, it’s Sunday, and winter is a long way off.” We align our compass to the love of the game. Get a beer or a Pepsi and think life-is-good-cause-it’s-baseball-season! Here’s to baseball. Here’s to June. Here’s to us having each other to get through the season and swirl to a resting place of non-chaos and peace. Here’s to our boys in green and gold! Go A’s. Kick some KC fanny!

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Will there be bean-ball tonight at O.Co?

6/26/2015

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Given today's monumental Supreme Court Decision, it's hard to get worked up about the A's/Royals love loss; it just kind of pales in comparison. That said, here is how I see it: If there is retaliation by the A's because of the final act of Herrera throwing behind Lawrie's head on day three of the tumult, it will not be the result of the Code. It will be because they are human and their emotions are over-ruling their heads. According to the Code, this should be done. Lawrie slid into Infante; Lawrie got beaned in the ribs; score is even; an accidental pitch hits a KC foot--not a place you hit someone under the Code; Herrera throws behind Lawrie's head because he's emotional; the Code then says the Kansas City players take control and get it done in the Clubhouse. They reprimand Herrera for putting himself above the Code and acting unprofessionally. The A's need to trust that the Royals followed the code. Period. So if the A's erupt today, it's pure hot-headed emotion. I don't believe it will happen. If this erupts by the Royals, then we start enforcing the Code again. New day and new Code enforcement. Unlike some, I LOVE the Code. It's chaos theory in science where all chaos comes to rest eventually because of the laws of the universe. Energy finds it's way to rest. That's what should happen today. This should be done.

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Pre-Game A's Versus Angels: June 21, 2005

6/21/2015

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I hope a lot of you are reading this pregame at the ballpark. Yesterday I was fortunate enough to go to the game, see a great win, and take a Sonny Gray Garden Gnome home. I'm not much of a gnome person, but it's still fun.

It's sure nice to be playing today's game with 30 wins in our pocket. Something feels different today doesn't it? When the Angels show 35 wins and we have 30? Doesn't it feel like we are in the hunt? That the 500 mark is just around the corner? Yep it's a good day to be at the park and a good day to win another series!

Scott Kazmir (3-4 with a 2.84 ERA) takes on Garrett Richards (7-4, 3.59 ERA) for today’s rubber match on Father’s Day. Some A’s changes in today’s lineup from yesterday include Sogard sitting out today and Ben Zobrist moving to 2nd. Canha replaces Vogt at DH, and Vogt is behind the plate today. Sam Fuld is batting ninth and in left today.

And let’s talk about Father’s Day. Did anyone have a catch on the field today with their father or son? If so, drop a comment below about the experience. Baseball is in my blood because of my father. I grew up listening to baseball on the radio, keeping score sometime around age 6, and having my own Oakland A’s Booster membership thanks to my dad. I watched Reggie and Campy, Rudi and Bando, Fingers and Hunter. We’d go to the Coliseum as often as we could afford, living only 15 minutes away, but most of my baseball was on the radio. There was no cable back then, so TV was rarely an option. Radio helped me see the game. We’d often cross the bridge to pick up my Granny in San Francisco, both an A’s and Giants fan who kept score in her rocker and changed caps depending on the team she was listening to. She loved to go see the A’s as well as Charlie-O, the mule, making his way around the warning track. Like the scene from Fever Pitch when the young boy sees Fenway’s field for the first time, I had that same awe every time I walked into the Coliseum as a kid. I STILL smell that stadium; it smelled different back then. Of course, it was brand new back then!

As a female, I don’t know that my experience is the common memory for women of my generation; it was more Dad’s and their boys as the norm when it came to instilling the love of the game. You sure see a lot more girls and their dads at the park in this era. It’s fantastic! My dad played catch with me daily if I asked, taking a break from his wood working. It seemed to take forever for those breaks—a whopping 20 minutes or so; time is different when you’re a kid, especially as a kid in love with baseball. I remember the glove I started with, one my brother had used that belonged to my dad. I still have it. It’s classic. Back then girls couldn’t play baseball in little league, and there was no softball league. So I used that glove with the boys in the neighborhood. And I used my Reggie Jackson bat given at “Bat Day” in those sand lot games—now wishing I’d preserved it.

I pulled weeds out of the lawn with my dad just to listen to the games through the summer. To this day, baseball is best on the radio for me. This is my 9th Father’s Day without my dad, and threading for Athletics Nation seems so fitting on this day. Thanks AN. And thanks Dad!

Now let’s go, A’s. Let’s do this!

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Barry Zito Named PCL Pitcher of the Week: May 25-31, 2015

6/2/2015

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Barry Zito has been on fire in Tennessee right now. Not Tennessee moonshine fire…Not Johnny Cash “Ring of Fire.” Flat-out, Nashville Sounds fire!

After throwing 14 shutout innings and picking up two wins last week, Zito has been named the PCL Pitcher of the Week. A former River Cat (and former winner of this award in 2000), Zito scalded the newly moved-in Sacramento Giants by throwing 6 scoreless innings, racking up five strikeouts and giving up three hits against the River Cats. (There must be some metaphor about attaching a firecracker to a cat’s tail that we could insert here.)

On Sunday, he gave a repeat performance that had the Las Vegas 51’s thinking they were aliens from Mars as he burned up their atmosphere over 8 innings at First Tennessee Park. He gave up only two hits and took down 6 batters on strikes while throwing 103 pitches.

Zito is currently 3-4 this season with a 4.12 ERA. He’s tied for the most starts for the league (11) and third with the most innings (63.1).

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First Annual A's Pride Night: June 17th, 2015.

6/1/2015

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Baseball is our Moral Compass!

Will there be bean-ball tonight at O.Co?

Pre-Game A's Versus Angels: June 21, 2005

Barry Zito Named PCL Pitcher of the Week: May 25-31, 2015

First Annual A's Pride Night: June 17th, 2015.

by Peggy Raun-Linde

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