My open letter to John Danks

Dear Johnny D.,

I probably shouldn't address you in such a familiar way. We are not friends. I see you pretty regularly at The Cell, and I finally received confirmation from you that you recognize me. When I see you, whether it's throwing long toss pre-game, or pitching on the mound, my cheers for you are always calling you "Johnny D."

I remember when the White Sox traded for you, a young, handsome southern boy with a big smile and a heck of an arm. Everyone was so excited. You were the hope for the future. By 2008, you lived up to every word of the hype. You were outstanding. And then there was the Blackout Game. You destroyed my beloved Twins, who also played pretty well that day, and pitched 1-hit shutout baseball for 8 innings to win the division. You were everyone's hero.

You signed a big contract and then your shoulder blew up. People were mad. I never get why fans get mad at a player when he gets hurt, as if it doesn't kill you to sit the bench. As if it doesn't kill you to take your time getting well. As if it doesn't kill you to know that the choices you make for recovery can make or break your career.

As if it doesn't kill you to see that you can't do what you could do before.

As if you wouldn't do anything to fix it.

As if you don't work your tail off trying to be the pitcher you were and the pitcher you know you can be.

That's what makes the contracts important--you've put all your chips on this one talent, and if you don't make it...there's no way of knowing what comes next.

I guess the truth is, you were never the same. Is that traitorous for me to admit? I can say that because you know, just as I know I can't play the game the way I used to, but nothing is at stake for me, and everything is for you. Your fall from golden boy only made me cheer harder and louder. Everyone knew that I was a Johnny D fan. Some people, I admit, tried to talk me out of it, but they gave up. Most people agreed with me, although not quite so ardently as I. DJ and Farmer on the radio were two guys who always talked you up. I remember one home game when you left the game to a chorus of boos after giving up just two runs in 6 innings, they were talking about how it was a quality start, and how fans didn't get it. They were pulling for you, too. But cheers and encouragement is sometimes hard to hear when the boos are deafening and ignorant and mean.

You had moments where your talent shone as bright as anything. I don't know how you did it. I don't know how you dealt with the boorish fans booing you when you allowed even one run. And when you were good, you were SO good. Everyone cheered.

There was often talk of trading you. I hoped they wouldn't. I believed in you. I believed you would come back, because I'd seen it in you so many times. You didn't get traded, and I was relieved. That meant I still got to wave to you before games and sometimes talk to you. You were always so friendly and talked to me like I was a human, even though I had trouble acting like a human around you.

I became friends with Cisco, the parking lot security guard, because he saw that I was your fan. He was (still is) your fan, too. He told me that you were the most stand-up guy he knew, how when other guys were into shenanigans and doing things they weren't supposed to, you remained close to your morals. He talked about admiring your faith and that you were one of the best people he knew.

I remembered the game you pitched, when your brother Jordan drove in the winning run. What a cool memory to have with your brother!

You signed for me a lot. Any time you had a chance to sign, you always signed more pictures and cards for me than anyone, and I am hoarding all of them like a creepy miser. Every autograph and every picture represents a memory.

I will never forget Minnesota this year, when you tossed me the ball, then came over and signed some autographs for me and took a picture and talked. You only talked to me. You knew I'd come a long way and that I was a real fan. It made me feel special. It's a memory I will always treasure.

Today I received messages from various friends who know how much you mean to me. They all gave me the bad news that you were DFA. I was sad, but I am going to tell you something awful right now--I was also kind of relieved. I've grown weary of the booing. My stomach sinks and I feel so bad for you. And now I think, I KNOW, that you will sign with a new team. You will have a new environment, and you will have new fans and new coaches. You will go out there without the expectation that you will pitch like it is the last game of 2008 and it's win or die. You will simply be John Danks, pitcher, with a clean slate. You will thrive. I truly believe that.

And when you come to town, whether on the North Side of the South Side, I will be there at every game. You'll hear me. I'll be the one yelling "Johnny D!" at the top of my lungs. I will always cheer for you. I will always support you.

I've always had trouble separating the person from the player. I could never run a team. The GM sees business, but I see potential and friends, and I can never think of any of you guys in terms of dollars and wins. Especially you.

Thanks for all the memories and for the kindness and the thrills. You will always have a fan in me.

The death of a friend

I was driving home from work, stopped by a train, and was glancing through my e-mails. I saw the subject: "Ernie died!!!!"

Ernie? Ernie who?

And then I knew.

I've written before about the culture of us autographers  (http://baseballgirl23.blogspot.com/2013/08/my-secret-shame_7.html). We're a strange bunch. We see each other 6 months of the year, and we form alliances, much like you'd see on Survivor, and also, much like Survivor, we betray those alliances when we get a better offer. Graphing is all about us, how much we can get and who we can get. We hate when a guy signs for just one of us, unless we are the one, and then we gloat.

But really, I am not hardcore. I don't care enough. I pout when someone I really like passes me up. But I don't lose sleep over missing someone, even a big name. The guys I usually want the most are ex-Cubs or ex-Twins or someone I want to meet because he has a great beard. I don't care about the big names because I will never sell anything and because I have no one to brag to except the guys I graph with, and, really, they won't let me brag.

Most of the guys who do this don't like me. They humor me because they know I'll help them identify the players and bring the Twins players over and because sometimes the players only come over because they see the oddity of a woman standing amidst the grown men. But they talk about me behind my back and make fun of the way I squeal with delight and excitement when I see the players. Usually, unless I see one of my friends, I try to stay invisible, hiding behind the legs of Billy Williams, trying to see if a cab is coming.

There used to be another woman who came out with her autographs. Sheila was much older in an ambiguous way. Sometimes I thought she was 50. Sometimes I thought she was 90. She was unorganized but passionate. Sometimes she would limp up to a player, only to spill all of her cards out in a spectacular mess. But she knew almost every player and would trot after them in a way that was so pathetic that the players would often think twice about passing her up, double back, and sign for her. She talked and talked and talked, often to herself, sometimes to other people. She looked unshowered, unkempt. I don't think I ever spoke to her. Not because I'm snobby about that stuff, but because, with the exception of two people, I don't trust any of these guys. I didn't know if her homeless look was just a schtick or if she really was mentally ill. I didn't want to form an alliance with her.

About a year ago, at Cubs Convention, I heard Sheila died. She was a cashier at a grocery store, and she just dropped dead. It was shocking, but I suppose it shouldn't have been. She didn't look healthy ever. My friends teased me. "That's going to be you," they would say, and I laughed on the outside, but on the inside I was terrified. What if that was me? What if my death became the punch line for a group of graphers who had always made fun of me anyway? What if that was all I left behind?

I later heard about people buying cards from her "estate." It made my skin crawl, to think of strangers (or, maybe worse, those I'd stood collecting with) picking over my treasures, talking one of my siblings down in price.

The first time I saw Ernie, I was appalled. I know, I know, that's horrible, but I was trying to be invisible--remember? He was somehow both large and small at the same time, with just a few teeth, moving with a liquid slowness, the way a slug moves on the bottom of an aquarium. He talked loudly and incoherently, sharing stories of both success and rejection with the other old timers. His clothes were torn and stained and ill-fitting. I assumed he was homeless, or nearly so.

I saw him a lot, almost every time I was out. He was usually clutching just one baseball wrapped in a baggie and a blue pen. He didn't drive, just took the train to Wrigley or to the Cell, and usually sat outside the park waiting for the big names. He didn't care so much about all the little guys. There's a guy in Chicago, one of the biggest autograph dealers in the country, and he'd give Ernie 10-20 bucks if he bagged a big name. I didn't like that either, but then I started to think that the guy must be pretty hard up to stand outside all day for the possibility of 10-20 bucks.

He could be pretty aggressive, too. When a big name, like Jeter or McGwire, came by, he would press his way to the front. I think sometimes people stopped for him because they felt bad for him, but sometimes it was just his sheer wily nature, the way he would slip his baseball in deftly between two other people and get the autograph. One time he pressed up against my back to get Yu Darvish. I was so mad that I was seeing red. I didn't want this gross guy pressing up against me just to get a stupid autograph.

But when the crowd went down, he came up to me. "Hey, Alex," he said, and I was surprised he knew my name. "Did you get him?" He didn't ask in a mean way, or like he was annoyed. He seemed to genuinely care.

"Yes," I said, apprehensively, trying to figure out why he wanted to know.

"Oh, well, that's just great for you!" he said, and not sarcastically. Sincerely. "I missed him, but I guess I'll get him next time.'

After that, we were fast friends. For the next few years, he always greeted me at the park, always asked me before he asked any of the guys if I needed help getting an autograph. He always seemed glad to see me, not like he was annoyed that there was one more person out there to ruin his chances of success. He came to the park nearly every day. Some days, he just didn't look well, and he would find a place to sit in the shade, but usually he looked the way he always looked and stood around with us, angling for the best spot. Sometimes his adult son would come to the park and they would work together. They were nice people, really just nice to everyone.

I got used to seeing him, which is why it was so sad that he sat out the entire 2015 season after getting knee surgery. We all missed him and talked about him, saying he was on the DL for the season. We saw his wife, who was a vendor at Sox Park, and asked for updates.

"Oh, he's just so stubborn. Won't do his physical therapy." She told us he was always cranky because he was cooped up in the house. She spoke about saving her tips to buy him something, but I don't remember what. I knew they didn't have a lot of money.

His son came out to a lot of games as well, and we asked about Ernie. "Oh, you know Dad. He's always grilling me about who I got and telling me I should've gone for the big guys. I tell him, get better and come out there with me then."

Even though Ernie was gone, he was always with us. We talked and told stories. like the time Ernie was too lazy to walk inside the bar to use the bathroom and subsequently was fined for public urination. I think he talked his way out of it, but everyone told the story differently. We talked about the way he weasled in for autographs. We talked about how strange it was that he wasn't there.

I knew he had bad knees. I didn't know he had Stage 4 pancreatic cancer, but that's what took him.

My heart hurts. He was a good guy. No, I don't know much about his personal life, but he was part of my autograph family. He was the patriarch, or at least the weird uncle that everyone likes.

I hope he is not forgotten. But I know he won't be. His legend will live with all of us who graph and who knew him.

I scrolled through my thousands of pictures, and I don't have one single picture of him. I hope I find one and can add it to this post.

This one's for you, Ernie.

“He Is Not Dead"
by James Whitcomb Riley

I cannot say, and I will not say
That he is dead. He is just away.
With a cheery smile, and a wave of the hand,
He has wandered into an unknown land
And left us dreaming how very fair
It needs must be, since he lingers there.
And you—oh you, who the wildest yearn
For an old-time step, and the glad return,
Think of him faring on, as dear
In the love of There as the love of Here.
Think of him still as the same. I say,
He is not dead—he is just away.” 

James Russell is a good guy

Last night I met an 8-year-old girl. When she was 5, after many diffferent doctor visits and no answers except being told she was dying, she was diagnosed with a rare allergy to light. She's not simply allergic to the sun, but even lightbulbs. There is only one other person in the world who has this illness, a middle-aged man in England. Her doctor has made a sunscreen especially for her that she has to drink. This allows her to be in the sun for up to 10 minutes instead of the usual 2. She has to use a special umbrella at all times while outside. Most of her time in school, she has had to stay in one special room while the rest of her class went to art and P.E. and recess. For library time, they would ask what kinds of books she wanted and bring her a couple (However, her principal recently received a grant that paid for changes at school that now allow her to have much more movement around the building.). Exposure to light causes her organs to fail, and she literally begins burning from the inside out.

BUT during one of her particularly long and difficult hospital stays in Chicago, several players and coaches from the Chicago Cubs came and visited her. Most of them said hello and stayed for a few minutes and then left, but James Russell and Lester Strode stayed for a long time and played with the children. The little girl fell in love. From that moment on, she has referred to him as her "honey." He had been traded to the Braves for a short time, but when she learned he was back with the Cubs, she danced around the house and cheered.

She talked a great deal about him and was wearing his spring training jersey, which hung like a dress around her tiny body. A man in the front row next to the bullpen gave up his seat so she could watch him walk out and see him again. Her whole face glowed, as if all the light she had to avoid was shining right out of her at that moment. It was one of the most beautiful things I've ever seen, the way her face looked when she saw James.

He did a pretty small thing for a sick girl 3 years ago that she and her family will never forget. The cameras were gone. It wasn't about PR. It was just a kind thing to do.

Stories like this make me almost forget about the gross things in life. It's a small thing to be kind to people, but the results are incalculable.

 

 

 

In the lower right corner, you can see the top of the girl's umbrella, and the woman next to her is her mom. They're watching the bullpen boys.

Saying goodbye to someone I love

My phone just went off 3,000 times, and it was everyone who knows me telling me that Blake Parker was designated for assignment. I have to read these messages several times to understand. Blake Parker. Designated for assignment.

Maybe you don't know who Blake Parker is. If that is the case, it is surely your loss. But all I can do is sit here and re-read that Blake Parker was designated for assignment. I'm so sad, deep-in-the-pit-of-my-guts sad because I think what this could mean is that I will never see him again, and I don't think I can handle that.

You might be thinking, "Man, that girl is selfish. What about how he feels?" That is pretty much ALL I'm thinking about. I used to watch baseball strictly as a fan, and I would get ticked when guys I liked got traded, but I got over it fast because they were just faces on baseball cards and television. But then I became involved in baseball, as in, it became my life, and it became my home, and the players became almost another family for me. And then I began to see them as humans with gifts and insecurities and dreams and talents and families and flaws. And then when they would get traded and sent down to the minors and released as if they were nothing more than property, which, really, they ARE, I get emotionally involved and worry that they don't have a backup plan, and I wonder if their lives will be empty without that ball in their hands. I wonder if they will question why they worked so hard all their lives for a few seasons of on-and-off big league ball.

So I will tell you about Blake. Blake is, like pretty much every baseball player, breathtakingly handsome. He is, more importantly and rarely, kind in such a genuine way that you really do feel like you are his friend after talking to him a few times. He takes off his cap, bows his head, and prays before he pitches. His grandfather's initials are stitched in his glove. My friend Angela used to ask him for relationship advice--that's the kind of everyday guy he was. He was the kind of guy who wrote me a heartfelt message when I told him my dad died (my dad loved the guy and called me at work every time Blake pitched to tell me how the game went). He was the kind of guy who took time out on a very hot day to talk to my friend Matt's son Colin, and Colin became his fan that day and will always, ALWAYS remember the day a baseball player took time out for him. There are many young kids and swooning women and even several men who were starstruck because Blake Parker talked to them and looked them in the eyes and took pictures with them.

I can't tell you about his abilities as a player, except that he has the save record in Iowa and that he had one amazing  year where he was absolutely fantastic, but had some injuries and things changed. I can tell you for a fact that he is a better player than the majority of humanity or else he never would be in the major leagues, and that being a relief pitcher, especially a middle-reliever, is a thankless job because you are basically expected to be perfect every single time out, even if you walk into a bases-loaded, no-outs situation. But he is a person in addition to being a player, which is why I can't focus on the pitching. The year I was fired from a job I loved and wanted to do forever--that was the year I met Blake. That was the year I found something else to love and to hang on to. I was drowning in sadness and despair, and his kindness and affection and friendship made me feel like I mattered. He and Steve Clevenger (who was also taken away from me) gave me more than I could ever give back to them in platters of cookies and failed attempts at German Chocolate Cake and Strawberry Shortcake. He saved my life. He was something I talked to my dad about, and for that I owe him even more, because at the end of my dad's life, when he was lying in the hospice bed and didn't always remember me, he asked about Blake.

I remember the way Blake's face lit up when he saw me after not seeing me for a long time, and the way he tried a little bit to avoid me when I wanted a 87th picture that week. I remember Blake giving me his cleats and shirts and other game-used things and feeling like I was the luckiest person on earth. I remember talking to Blake one night after a game, and he was talking about a girl cheating on him, and I think of him now, so happy and in love (yes, it's creepy that I know that, but thank goodness for social media that lets me be in his life from afar), and I know that really he will be okay, I just don't think I will.

Maybe he'll stay on the Cubs (that happens a lot), or maybe he'll end up on another team (I hope he does). But I'm so scared he'll stop playing. I would like to tell him goodbye. I would like an autograph. I would like one of his trademark one-arm hugs (although I would probably force him to give me a real hug). I would tell him how much I will miss his beard, and his eyes that were greener than the Wrigley grass itself.

I would like to tell him not to give up and that I will always be grateful to him for treating me like an equal human being, instead of just a starstruck girl who annoyed a really cool athlete. I would tell him that I will love him forever, and that someday, I will write his story in a real book and everyone will know him. I just wish I could see him one more time to tell him that he did more to advance the love of the game of baseball in the hearts of Wrigley's children than Clark the Cub will ever do. I would tell him he is more than a name in a score box. I would tell him my heart hurts, but I know he'll be okay.

2015 at Wrigley: The Year of the Beard

The Cubs current 40-man roster, broken down by beardliness:

Players with a full beard commitment:


Jake Arrieta

Dallas Beeler:

Justin Grimm:

Jon Lester:

Jason Motte:

Joseph Ortiz:

Blake Parker:

Neil Ramirez:

Brian Schlitter:

Dan Straily:

Travis Wood:

Rafael Lopez:

Start of Something Wonderful:

Jason Hammel:

Eric Jokisch:

Zac Rosscup (more like 5 o'clock shadow, so he does need to work on this):

Jacob Turner, sporting the "It's Only 5 O'Clock Shadow, But I'll Try Harder Next Year" Beard:

Welington Castillo:

Miguel Montero:

Tommy La Stella:

Mike Olt:

Matt Szczur:

Something On The Chin (We'll Take It):


Felix Doubront

CJ Edwards:

Edwin Jackson:

Hector Rondon (it's there, pencil thin, but there):

Pedro Strop:

Arismendy Alcantara: 

Javier Baez:

Luis Valbuena:

Junior Lake; 

Jorge Soler: 

The Ones Who Don't Need It, But We Won't Complain If You Get it:



Kyle Hendricks, sporting the "I'm a Little Baby and This is the Most Beardly I Can Be!" Beard:

Tsuyoshi Wada, sporting the "I Don't Think a Beard Can Grow Here" Beard:

Anthony Rizzo, sporting the "I'm Anthony Rizzo and I Don't Need a Beard Because I'm Anthony Rizzo" Beard:

Chris Coghlan, sporting the "I May Be Clean Shaven, But the Hair on My Head is Curly and Interesting" Beard:

Ryan Sweeney, sporting the "Beardless Beard of Perfection" Beard:

TRY HARDER:

Mike Kickham, sporting the "I Came From the Giants So I Didn't Want to Grow a Beard and Be Associated with Their Beards, But I Will Grow One in Chicago!" Beard:

Starlin Castro, sporting the "I Have No Beard So Just Trade Me" Beard

Christian Villanueva, sporting the "I Know I Need to Try Harder" Beard: