I originally wrote this on July 28th after an amazing victory by the Dodgers during a run that would lead them to the playoffs which begin for them today in Atlanta. I cleaned it up a bit for my blog. I hope you enjoy. It's about my passion for Baseball, and the amazing stories that come from following Sports. I also give my respect to the incomparable Vin Scully.
Puig takes the ball deep for a walk-off home run on an 0-1 count on a Sunday. It was a beautiful summer day when the race for the pennant was getting hotter. Baseball is just mesmerizing to me. It is a hypnotic and mesmerizing game. It is to me a picture of perfection. The score that day was nothing-nothing for 11 innings playing out like nothing had happened. The pitching though was as solid as the hitting was not solid. In Baseball, good pitching is sometimes rendered invisible by strikeouts and undisciplined swings and “what could-have beens” like a deep fly ball dying at the warning track.
Reading the score on my phone, I expressed muted joy at Costco. “They won again!”, I yelped to my adoring significant other. And somehow I knew this would happen. I knew it years ago as I grew up hanging on to every rhythm of the National Pastime. I was born from a French mother and a Moroccan father and Baseball was the last game that they thought about teaching me. After 25 years of me being glued to the television set watching my Dodgers, my dad still doesn't understand the concept of an "out". I used Baseball to identify myself as an American kid in Arleta, located in the east San Fernando Valley off the I-5 Freeway exit of Van Nuys Boulevard. I used to beg for time to accelerate so I could sit down in front of the TV—my little slice of joy where Vin graces the airwaves with incomparable elegance. It feels now like I always knew a day like yesterday would come.
Puig is a star today, an unknown yesterday, a question mark tomorrow like hope for a happy eternity. Baseball is one of a kind as the clock is finally shut off. Baseball just happens slowly but with significant crashes like a judge’s mallet. I thought it was a 2-0 count not 0-1 as I recounted the story to my sweetie. I would tell this to her but she would laugh at the idea that this meant anything to her. The pitch was such a bad pitch to throw in that count. It was tailor-made to be walloped with glee. How can a game so filled with zeroes end so easily? It ended on a nothing pitch that only a beleaguered reliever could throw.
Baseball as a game is a "head-scratcher" full of second-guessing, of sizing up, of repetition and agonizing frustrations. In the "Majors", the players all have a gift unlike any other. It’s a game where a lazy fly ball can be plucked from the sky with such ease it makes the recipient look like they never worked a moment in their lives to get where they were.
It is almost like he was born on the outfield grass born to play the game. In Puig’s maiden game, he unleashed a throw that still has Baseball fans buzzing. He screamed that he will be grabbing your attention exactly at that moment and if you haven’t stopped what you were doing you better re-prioritize your life in that instant. The Dodger season was woeful - a dreadful carcass - before Puig’s star was newly born. He had the bat, speed, and strength of an ox, a cheetah, a bear all tied into one Cuban young man. Even if his career or season for that matter does not end magnificently, we will always talk about his mythic first several weeks in the pros.
I threw down my computer bag, and unpacked my computer. “He’s been through a lot lately”, I thought and followed it up with, “Haven’t we all!” I thumbed my password and logged onto my spotty work internet connection. “Lots to do today”, I thought, “but I haven’t yet seen the highlight of Puig’s walk-off” as I spent my Sunday doing what families do - maintaining a household full of love, food, and dishwasher soap. My email had a link to the homer so I clicked as if my fingers were feverish.
Vin calls the play “and a high drive into deep left field...and that will do it for Puig!” Puig flipped his bat, paused with swagger, and ran through the bases knowing that the game had ended with the Dodgers on top because of a meatball of a pitch that he ate with gusto. He slid into home causing bellyaches across the country. There will be more days like this: people will talk and talk about Puig and his laser throws, his uncanny eye, and his mighty muscle. They will talk about this moment one day out of the blue: "Remember when Puig came up and the Dodgers went from last place to first place". They will talk about his swagger and errors too. They will talk about him sliding instead of standing and standing instead of sliding. They will talk about what he should have done until he does the unbelievable like on that one Sunday afternoon.
Baseball is always filled with intrigue in that there is no clock. The count changes continuously but time is not a factor unless you're counting the seconds off a stop watch to measure someone's speed around the bases. Baseball is filled with situations that just come up out of the blue while you were breathing in the air from the atmosphere. Puig is a household name today: a star Dodger right fielder for hopefully a long, long time for Dodger fans. I clicked on the highlight over and over again incredulous at the thought that a long, scoreless game can just go away at the flick of the wrist. I watched the highlight over and over until I believed it, and relished it. And there I realized a few things. It was an 0-1 count, not 2-0. This is important for a pitcher as he selects his pitch. I realized that the Dodgers will drive home happy and filled with happiness. This game may or may not lead them to the World Series but it will be frozen in time as an unbelievable feat. The game of Baseball goes on while we daydream of walk-offs and roaring cheers.
Puig takes the ball deep for a walk-off home run on an 0-1 count on a Sunday. It was a beautiful summer day when the race for the pennant was getting hotter. Baseball is just mesmerizing to me. It is a hypnotic and mesmerizing game. It is to me a picture of perfection. The score that day was nothing-nothing for 11 innings playing out like nothing had happened. The pitching though was as solid as the hitting was not solid. In Baseball, good pitching is sometimes rendered invisible by strikeouts and undisciplined swings and “what could-have beens” like a deep fly ball dying at the warning track.
Reading the score on my phone, I expressed muted joy at Costco. “They won again!”, I yelped to my adoring significant other. And somehow I knew this would happen. I knew it years ago as I grew up hanging on to every rhythm of the National Pastime. I was born from a French mother and a Moroccan father and Baseball was the last game that they thought about teaching me. After 25 years of me being glued to the television set watching my Dodgers, my dad still doesn't understand the concept of an "out". I used Baseball to identify myself as an American kid in Arleta, located in the east San Fernando Valley off the I-5 Freeway exit of Van Nuys Boulevard. I used to beg for time to accelerate so I could sit down in front of the TV—my little slice of joy where Vin graces the airwaves with incomparable elegance. It feels now like I always knew a day like yesterday would come.
Puig is a star today, an unknown yesterday, a question mark tomorrow like hope for a happy eternity. Baseball is one of a kind as the clock is finally shut off. Baseball just happens slowly but with significant crashes like a judge’s mallet. I thought it was a 2-0 count not 0-1 as I recounted the story to my sweetie. I would tell this to her but she would laugh at the idea that this meant anything to her. The pitch was such a bad pitch to throw in that count. It was tailor-made to be walloped with glee. How can a game so filled with zeroes end so easily? It ended on a nothing pitch that only a beleaguered reliever could throw.
Baseball as a game is a "head-scratcher" full of second-guessing, of sizing up, of repetition and agonizing frustrations. In the "Majors", the players all have a gift unlike any other. It’s a game where a lazy fly ball can be plucked from the sky with such ease it makes the recipient look like they never worked a moment in their lives to get where they were.
It is almost like he was born on the outfield grass born to play the game. In Puig’s maiden game, he unleashed a throw that still has Baseball fans buzzing. He screamed that he will be grabbing your attention exactly at that moment and if you haven’t stopped what you were doing you better re-prioritize your life in that instant. The Dodger season was woeful - a dreadful carcass - before Puig’s star was newly born. He had the bat, speed, and strength of an ox, a cheetah, a bear all tied into one Cuban young man. Even if his career or season for that matter does not end magnificently, we will always talk about his mythic first several weeks in the pros.
I threw down my computer bag, and unpacked my computer. “He’s been through a lot lately”, I thought and followed it up with, “Haven’t we all!” I thumbed my password and logged onto my spotty work internet connection. “Lots to do today”, I thought, “but I haven’t yet seen the highlight of Puig’s walk-off” as I spent my Sunday doing what families do - maintaining a household full of love, food, and dishwasher soap. My email had a link to the homer so I clicked as if my fingers were feverish.
Vin calls the play “and a high drive into deep left field...and that will do it for Puig!” Puig flipped his bat, paused with swagger, and ran through the bases knowing that the game had ended with the Dodgers on top because of a meatball of a pitch that he ate with gusto. He slid into home causing bellyaches across the country. There will be more days like this: people will talk and talk about Puig and his laser throws, his uncanny eye, and his mighty muscle. They will talk about this moment one day out of the blue: "Remember when Puig came up and the Dodgers went from last place to first place". They will talk about his swagger and errors too. They will talk about him sliding instead of standing and standing instead of sliding. They will talk about what he should have done until he does the unbelievable like on that one Sunday afternoon.
Baseball is always filled with intrigue in that there is no clock. The count changes continuously but time is not a factor unless you're counting the seconds off a stop watch to measure someone's speed around the bases. Baseball is filled with situations that just come up out of the blue while you were breathing in the air from the atmosphere. Puig is a household name today: a star Dodger right fielder for hopefully a long, long time for Dodger fans. I clicked on the highlight over and over again incredulous at the thought that a long, scoreless game can just go away at the flick of the wrist. I watched the highlight over and over until I believed it, and relished it. And there I realized a few things. It was an 0-1 count, not 2-0. This is important for a pitcher as he selects his pitch. I realized that the Dodgers will drive home happy and filled with happiness. This game may or may not lead them to the World Series but it will be frozen in time as an unbelievable feat. The game of Baseball goes on while we daydream of walk-offs and roaring cheers.
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