The Bullpen Gospels (11 page)

On buses like this, there are certain seats that can be removed and modular tables put in their place. These particular seats offer a few more inches of legroom as a side effect of their dual-purpose architecture. It’s hardly perceptible by those who don’t spend weeks of their life aboard buses, but I know it’s the best seat in the house, and every bit of leg comfort counts.

I placed my backpack down on the seat closest to the window, emptied my pockets of my cell phone and wallet, feeding them to one of my pack’s many outside pouches. Then I sat next to the pack in the seat closest to the aisle, stretched my legs out and kicked my feet up onto the armrest of the seat in front of me, and waited. The bus wasn’t going to move for another half hour, and I was the first person on it.

Prime seating was the reason I arrived so early. The only good reason I had. Even now, the urge to get up and get off this bus was still hard to resist. I could be on a plane right now. The Padres owed me my last year of college via our contract, and I would finally have time to get that degree in communications studies, which, I admit, was something almost as useless as the five fruitless years in the minors were shaping up to be. If I got up right now, I could go home—home, yeah, right. That was the reason I got on this bus.

Sanchy, a Spanish catching prospect and this year’s starting catcher for Lake Elsinore, boarded after me. He sat his pack down, unloaded a few travel items, and seated himself.

Catcher is the only position that has to worry about mound-side manner. A good catcher is one who can handle a pitcher well even if it means treating him as if he were the second coming when he’s on the mound or handing him crayons because he’s too stupid to read a coloring book. Catchers have to have a way with encouraging words. Sanchy dug into his pack and produced the book
Ingles Para Dummies
—so much for that idea.

Two more players, gangly pitcher types, galloped onto the bus. They squeezed Sanchy’s shoulders in place of hello then proceeded farther into the bus. Chatting as they came toward me, the lead looked back to his partner and said, “So then he says, ‘No, it’s not gay, he was sucking
my
dick.’ Can you believe that?”

I knew the speaker from playing with him last year in Lake Elsinore. Rosco, an easygoing right-handed reliever, was my former road roommate—I chose him because he was affable, well tempered, and didn’t snore. The guy behind him was not a new face, but someone I didn’t know. I saw a lot of him during the spring because he was part of a band of guys always horsing around near my locker. They were hilarious to watch, even though I didn’t know what was going on, like right now, for example. Their in-jokes reminded me that I was on the outside of the loop, and worried about making a good first impression. The pair made their way back toward my seat and parked. Rosco looked at me and said, “Dirky.”

“Rosco,” I responded. The other gentleman reached out his hand and introduced himself as Pickles.

“He’s got a big one,” Rosco said, commenting on Pickles.

“Umm, that’s great,” I said, shaking Pickles’ hand and then wiping my own on my leg. By the time the bus was done filling, I wouldn’t know most of the people on it. All my friends were off to San Antonio, and the few people I did know on this team, like Brent and Frenchy, had found other rides. They worked out arrangements to drive with other players. Lake Elsinore is the only minor league team location that players can drive to in the Padres organization. All the other affiliate cities were flights. The busing service was provided for those who didn’t have cars. Maybe I could have found a ride, but since my roster change was on such short notice, I was out of luck for an open seat.

Just as well. The bus would have ten people on board, if that. It would be relatively quiet and relaxed. I could throw my headphones on while we drove and listen to Bono or Dylan or some other great lyricist to help me make sense of what I’m doing with my life from the sanctity of the bus’s rear.

Next to board the bus was a broad-shouldered, aloof-looking guy who seemed so mellow and pleased, you could mistake him for stoned. Behind him sprung an animated character sporting a polo shirt with its collar messed up, wrinkled khaki shorts, and flip-flops. As relaxed as the first gentleman was, the second one seemed just as tightly wound.

A horn honked outside the bus, and the excitable guy pressed his head against the bus window, immediately flicking off the car driving by. “Yeah, fuck you, guys!” he screamed.

Pickles greeted our excitable new friend with, “What’s the matter now, Slappy?”

“False friends is what. Don’t worry Pickles, you don’t need to know,” said Slappy who instantly stopped the conversation by starting another, telling Sanchy, “Attaboy Sanchy! English—mucho bueno!”

“What’s got Slap-nuts all wound up now?” Rosco asked.

“Slappy is pissed because he thinks the other guys set him up. He says they lied to him about giving him a ride just to break his heart,” the stoned-looking fellow said. He was like Slappy’s missing half, cool and collected, almost lethargic in comparison.

“Pshhh…. Fuck.
No Maddog
. Why would you say broken hearted? I mean,…look I’m just saying…” Slappy spoke in rapid, spasmodic fire—recovery breath, finger point, continue. “I’m just saying, you don’t tell people you’re going to give them a ride, then say, ‘Oh no, wait, we would rather take this guy with us, even though we told you we’d take you.’”

“What are you saying, Slap? You don’t want to ride with us?” Rosco said.

“Yeah, what’s wrong with us? Not good enough?” Pickles echoed.

“What? No.
Come on
. Actually”—finger point—“that’s exactly how I felt!” He was an emotional bell curve. “But you guys don’t really feel that way, which is why I don’t feel bad about telling you, ’cause you’re understanding. You’re real friends, not like those false ones out there.” Slappy looked out the window with a hopeful face as if those he christened assholes might still return to pick him up. “You know I love you. You guys are my boys.”

“We do have big ones,” Rosco said.

“Big ones!” Pickles repeated in a singsong voice.

“I know you got big ones. Guys with big ones don’t tell a person you’re going to give them a ride, then”—he put his hands up to his head and made quotations while switching to a mocking voice—“
suddenly forget you offered one
. You just don’t do that to a friend, right?”

“They did it on purpose Slap. Those bastards,” Maddog said, stirring the pot while smiling at Slappy like a big, contented dog.

“I know, right? Those fuckers!” He looked out the window again.

“What’s Slappy bitching about now?” Tiny Mexicali asked, having gotten on while the conversation was in motion. Tiny hopped around the system quite a bit last year, and I knew him from spending overlapping days on teams. He spent the bulk of his time with the crew already on board the USS
Lake Elsinore
and entered the conversation with ease. He was a big guy, who seemed to thrive on slamming Slappy.

“Slappy says there’s a conspiracy to screw him out of a ride to Lake Elsinore,” Rosco said.

“No, no, no, I didn’t say conspiracy, I said—”

“You would say that Slap. Jesus, you’re such a baby.” Tiny wasted no time, coming on to the scene like a sledgehammer.

“Me?
Oh,
okay. You were the guy crying about how you’re friends weren’t really friends because they didn’t offer you a ride at all.”

“Yeah, but I’m not throwing a fit about it now, am I?”

“I’m not throwing a…who is throwing a…what? You wouldn’t even know…fucking Maddog,” Slappy moaned, jerking around at Maddog who sat placidly as if nothing were wrong.

“Look at you, you’re a mess. Grow up Slappy,” Tiny continued hammering, passing out a mischievous grin to the rest of the audience, their cue to join in.

“Whatever, you fat Aztec Eskimo. You just don’t have any friends,” Slappy countered. Group laughter bloomed from the remark, even from Tiny, who actually did look a tad Aztec and Eskimo.

“Whoa, that’s just mean spirited, Slappy.” Tiny feigned real pain, then started to squeeze his love handles, just to check.

“Wow, Slap, wow. You’re destroying this team before game one,” Rosco said, hissing the words. “You’re a cancer.”

“Me? I’m destroying…what? No, no, no.” His finger shot up again. “The cancers are the false friends who promise rides but then show how fake they are by forgetting.”

“Those bastards,” Maddog strummed.

“I know, right? Fuck them!” Slappy turned and nodded at Maddog who looked exactly the same.

“They don’t have big ones, that’s for damn sure.”

“Heck no, they don’t.” Pickles and Rosco high-fived.

“Still bro, calling me fat and a racial slur? That’s harsh. I’ve got a fragile ego, I don’t know if I can pitch at one hundred percent knowing my relievers feel that way about me. I can’t help the way God made me.”

“Well, sorry about your luck. Should have thought about those sensitive feelings before you started dishing out what you can’t take, fatty.”

“But I’m not fat, I’m big boned. No, seriously guys, I am. I have big bone density. I swear dude, a doctor told me that.”

There was a pause in the conversation while everyone assessed whether Tiny was kidding. He continued squeezing his sides, indicating he was not.

“See what false friends do? Tiny’s fat now because I didn’t get a ride, which is okay, me being here that is, because I’m with real friends now, who would never lie to me.”

“Those bastards.”

“I know, right?”

“Screw that Slap-nuts, I wouldn’t give you a ride. Six hours in a car with you would make me drive off a fucking cliff.” This from yet another new voice that belonged to a muscular-looking guy who just boarded. He wore a designer brand T-shirt, jeans, and sunglasses like Magnum P.I. and stood with one leg up on one of the bus’s front seats, staring at the pack of us like a parent watching kids get their good clothes dirty. “Sanchy! English! Attaboy!” he finished.

“Easy for you to say, Seth, you’re on the bus like me,” Slappy retorted.

“Even if I could drive, I wouldn’t give you a ride because you’re a fucking douche bag.”

Slappy laughed hard, like a stiff wind bent him over backward as he bellowed. “That’s such a position player thing to say. So predictable. You’ve been waiting all this time to call me a douche bag, haven’t you? Did you stay up all night to think of that?”

“I don’t have to wait to call you a douche bag, douche bag.”

Let’s be clear, Slappy wasn’t the target. He was the lead singer of this band, even though he was getting beat on like a drum. It was all play fighting as everyone had a smile on his face. I learned a long time ago that the boys on a baseball team chewed on the people they liked, almost like how lion cubs wrestled and chewed on each other, but no one got hurt or cried to mommy. Playful, vulgar, personal at times, but no one took offense. Indeed, it was a form of team chemistry, everyone adding his own personal contribution. Well, almost everyone.

“Why’s Slappy a douche bag?” a new player asked. Everyone turned to see who had spoken. He deflated upon eye contact. The party stopper stood in the bus aisle with an unassuming smile like Forrest Gump, except with a massive underbite and the face of Michael Phelps. It was as if everyone was listening to a joke about a minority and that particular minority just walked in.

“Uh.”

“Yeah…”

“Oh, you know…”

“I was just saying that false friends are the reason for most of the world’s evils.”

“Those bastards.”

“It’s why Tiny is fat,” Slappy continued.

“Big boned, bro.”

“It’s why Seth’s a douche bag.” Seth, who had taken a seat toward the front of the bus, didn’t turn around, instead nonchalantly threw up his middle finger in response.

“And why this team’s already got cancer before we even leave Phoenix.”

The newcomer stood with the same slack look on his face, searching for answers where there were never meant to be any. Rosco and Pickles looked out the window. Seth put on his headphones. Maddog looked laid back in his seat with a spectator’s grin, and Slappy sat down as if everything made perfect sense upon his explanation. There was a stretch of silence while the new fish tried to make sense of it all. Someone coughed; Sanchy tried to pronounce a new phrase in English.

“Yeah, false friends are bad, huh? Totally.” the new fish said.

“Yeah.”

“Mmmm, hmmm.”

“…”

Crickets. Conversation killed.

“Have you guys ever seen the movie
Layer Cake
?” the new face asked. Everyone moaned, as if this topic had been broached several times before. “What? It’s a good movie.”

“No Daigle, we haven’t seen it for fuck’s sake.”

“Well it’s good. We should watch it on this bus trip.”

“We are not watching fucking
Layer Cake
.”

“I’m telling you, it’s not what you think. It’s a rich, complex tale of—”

“I don’t care, I don’t care how rich it is! We are not watching it!”

“Fine, sheesh, you guys don’t have to get bent out of shape over it. It was just a suggestion.” On that, Daigle, who may have been the nicest, most well-meaning one in the group, turned around and made his way back toward the middle of the bus like a whipped puppy, curling up somewhere between Seth and the crew in the back near me.

“Some guys just don’t know when to quit, huh?” the group of lion cubs mumbled.

“So where were we?”

“I have a question,” Pickles said. “If a guy sucks
your
dick, does that make you gay?”

“Absolutely.”

“That’s what I thought.”

I followed Maddog’s example, reclined my chair, and kicked my feet up with a grin on my face. Not only was this free entertainment, but it looked as if it could go on all day. And to think, I was worried about making a good first impression.

“This is just great,” Slappy said. “We got Hayhurst with Triple-A time, seventeen fucking prospects and high-round picks and superstars on this team—I’m never going to pitch!”

It didn’t seem as if Slappy was the kind of guy who received many compliments. “Relax Slap-nuts,” Rosco said, sitting on his knees facing back toward me, with his head popped over the seat back of his chair like a prairie dog. “They’ll need someone like you around to fill in innings between when the studs throw.”

“I think that’s my job, actually,” I said, inducing a polite, if not merciful chuckle.

The bus was settled, and we were rolling now. Having made each other’s acquaintances, sorted out the histories of our respective careers, and made an orientation ruling on oral sex, we did our best to deduce who would be in what role this season: starters, relievers, closer, and all the guys in between. Seth and Sanchy stayed up front. Daigle refrained from participation. The rest of the clan settled around me in the back and talked shop.

I was the oldest of the group. Having some higher-level time, I was treated as if I knew more about the game than I actually did. If anything, at this point, I knew less than ever.

“Seriously, what is your job?” Tiny asked. “Are you starting?”

“I don’t know. They didn’t tell me,” I said.

“I’ll bet you’re starting. I’ll bet the rotation is you, me, Frenchy, Brent, Daigle, Buschmann—oh, wait, that’s six guys.”

“I don’t think I’m starting. I think I’m long relief.”

“No, that’s Pickles.” Pickles smiled, and mouthed the words
big one
.

“Well, then I’m the bullpen coach. Hell, I don’t know. All I can say is I’m not starting.”

“You started in Triple-A though, right?” Tiny asked.

I was honestly sick of hearing about what I did in Triple-A. “I did, but it wasn’t all that spectacu—”

“Holy shit, you started in Triple-A and now you’re down here in the bullpen. Wow, that really blows, huh?” Slappy blurted.

“Jesus Slappy—” Rosco put his hand to his forehead.

“What? I didn’t mean that as a knock against Hayhurst. I’m just saying. That blows.”

“No offense taken.” I had nothing left to offend.

“See? We’re cool.”

“So, you think they are just sending you here to get you some innings?” Rosco asked.

“They didn’t say. The only thing I can tell you is, I’m not a priority.”

“I’ll bet you were pretty pissed when they told you that, huh?”

“Well, I wasn’t thrilled about it, but…” I let the answer slip away.

“So what are you going to do?” Tiny pressed.

I looked out the window. The desert rolled by. The sun was starting to set, painting the skyline in oranges and purples. How many days of my life have I spent on buses like this? How much longer until the sun sets on my career?

“Not much I can do, bro. Keep pitching is all. As long as you got a jersey, you got a chance,” I robotically regurgitated.

Tiny scratched his head. “Well, if they would have told that stuff to me, I would have…” Off he went, doing what all players do in situations where they vicariously live the life of a player they believed was screwed. They do what I told myself I was going to do a million times before I went into that office. They talk big about how they’d tell the brass to shove it up their collective asses, get their licks in, and be big men who don’t take shit from anyone. When I think back to how I humbly accepted the demotion, even though, inside me, I was screaming the same ideas Tiny was grandstanding right now.

“I still can’t believe you went from starting in Triple-A to no role in the pen here,” Slappy mumbled.

“Look, Triple-A is just more of the same, okay. The hitters are a little better because they’re older and a few have big-league time. I got my ass kicked up there because I spent too much time obsessing over how I was in Triple-A to do my job. I pitched terrible. If you can pitch, if you can execute, you can do well at any level because it’s all the same game. I was so afraid of blowing it that that’s exactly what I did. Don’t let anyone tell you it’s something it isn’t or tell you you’re something you’re not. You guys are all more talented than I am, and if you do your job, you could be up there before the year is out.” My words caught me off guard. I’d never been that honest before. It was just too much work to be dishonest about it anymore. Funny, being honest actually sounded strong. It made me realize how fearful and fragile it sounds when all a person does is cover up the truth or talk about how good they are. I don’t think I could’ve spoken that way even a week before.

No one had time to digest the words as Slappy interrupted with, “Hey, you guys want in on this?” and produced a bottle of vodka from some mysterious location. Maddog countered with a bottle of Sprite.

That wasn’t supposed to be on the bus, but then again, there were no coaches on board for this trip. What the management didn’t know wouldn’t hurt them. Hell, even when they did know, as long as they didn’t see it, they didn’t say anything. This generation of players were definitely not the first generation to booze their way through a long bus trip.

This bus was heading toward the Lake Elsinore Hotel and Casino, so if you were a player doing the math on whether this was a safe trip to drink on, it was relatively risk free. Once we got off the bus, we’d be checking into a hotel, not driving around under the influence. The coaches wouldn’t be there when we got out, and since this was a minor league squad, there wouldn’t be a horde of fans awaiting our arrival. If you had any concern about the image we would present to the hotel operators—wait until you see the place.

“I’ll jump on that,” Rosco said. He guzzled the water remaining is his bottle and handed it over to Slappy, who used it to mix up some time-travel tonic. Pickles handed his over next.

“How strong do you like it, Pickles?”

“Strong enough to put hair on my chest.”

Slappy played bartender, and mixed up stiff ones for Pickles, Tiny, Maddog, Seth, and himself.

“You want to hit this Hay?”

“No, I’m good, thanks.”

“You sure?”

“Yeah, I’m sure, more for you.”

“I like where your head is at Hay!”

One hour and several refills later, we were out of vodka and Sprite. Slappy was passed out. Maddog watched the scenery pass by on the highway—his head hitting the seat back as he followed it. Rosco drunk dialed folks in his cell phone contacts. Pickles was glued to
Layer Cake
, watching it over the shoulder of Daigle, who had it playing on his laptop. Tiny was talking to me, or at me, rather, forcing me to practice in drunk psychiatry.

“Yeah bro, and then she was like,
I just wanna be friends
. How can we be friends after that man? Am I supposed to forget it, I mean, we have it on film, bro.” I’d give you the details, but it would be $2.99 for the first minute and $1.99 for each additional. Suffice to say, it was a situation in which all I could offer was, “Women, what can you do?”

“I know man, I fucking know. Women!” He took another slug of his drink to emphasize his point, then slapped a heavy, big-boned arm around me. “What about you, bro? Let it out man, I’m here for you. You know you can trust me.”

I smiled at Tiny. He was right, I could totally trust him because in his current state there was no way he would remember anything I said.

“I don’t know, Tiny. I don’t know what I’m feeling.”

“Dude, I can totally relate to that.”

“Yeah, well, I’m a little angry and I’m a little sad, but mostly I just feel lost.”

“Yeah. Lost. Like you woke up naked and there was a camera and you don’t know how you got there.”

“Um…not like that, exactly.”

“My bad, dude, my bad, I’m drunk.” He made a motion as if he were zipping his lips.

“It’s okay. It’s just,”—I took another long look out the window—“I’ve been telling myself for the longest time this game had answers. It was going to give me worth as a person. That a jersey would make me somebody. I was going to make something of myself in this sport, and everyone would treat me like a superstar.” Tiny exaggeratedly bobbed his head up and down as I spoke. “I can’t even make it out of A-ball!” I tossed my hands up and let them fall.

“I guess it’s my own fault. I believed it all. I believed that if I won enough, I would be changed into something larger than life. Like I could fix the bad things in my life if I was super successful. I could fix the way I looked at myself. I could fix my family. I could fix everything. But baseball results don’t fix anything….”

“You know what I think,” I declared, “I think if we spend years of our lives playing this game and the only thing we have to show for it when we are done is a beat-up jersey and a string of numbers next to our name, then it was a hell of a waste of time. There has got to be more to this than just living and dying for the opportunity to wear the uniform. If that’s all there is, then, I hate to say it, but professional baseball is a waste.

“You know, the best part of my baseball career didn’t even have anything to do with baseball. I met a homeless guy in a shelter this off-season and gave him the shoes off my feet. He almost wept, dude, wept over a pair of shoes. I didn’t have to be a superstar to do that; I just had to be me. In fact, I tried to be a superstar first, and it was as if I just separated us further. I’ve never seen a person react that way to anything I’ve ever done in baseball. God, it just makes me wonder if I’m going about this right….”

Tiny looked at me real hard, it seemed as if the conversation sobered him. His eyes looked down and then back up to me, a deep thought forming on his brow, “Do you think I should get her some shoes, bro?”

I stared at him for a second or two. “Yes Tiny, that’s exactly what I’m saying.”