February 2008 Archives

Time is a logical progression of single slices of consciousness. One instance builds upon the previous slice and bridges itself to the next. It is a way for the human mind to try and place order upon its surroundings by evaluating instances and developing a pattern of how things occur and then try to put meaning to them. The problem is that the human mind also likes to put things in nice little containers where everything fits neatly together. The universe on the other hand has other ideas. It is a constant ebbing and flowing of matter through space meaning that there are no constants that can act as boundaries around the definition of time. As a result man tries to describe a changing environment with a static measurement. So while we attempt to define the measurement of time within our neat little boxes of calendar days there always seems to be a little left over. The result of this rounding error is that before long the remainders begin to add up to a significant value. Presently that number reaches significance every four years. So to compensate for this dilemma we add a day to the year to get everything back on track at least for another four years. I always wondered why they picked February to tack on that extra day. I suppose it is because February is already suffering from a inferiority complex being the runt of the calendar with only 28 days. This gives February the opportunity to at least think he's growing and will someday be able to play with the big months. We all know that will never happen but it at least makes February feel better and it's important that all the months have good self-esteem.

Mark Reynolds was the feel-good story of 2007 for the Arizona Diamondbacks. Here was a kid who began the year in Mobile Alabama playing for the Diamondbacks Double-A affiliate when he gets a call to the major league team in an emergency when Chad Tracy suffered an injury. Reynolds came to the parent club and began to light up major league pitching at a blistering pace. Soon pitchers began to realize that Reynolds could hit a fastball a country mile. Mark soon found himself receiving a steady diet of breaking balls and struggling mightily. Rather than demoting him, manager Bob Melvin showed a lot of confidence in the youngster. That confidence seemed well placed as Reynolds bounced back from his struggles and as the season ended Mark was again lighting up major league pitchers.

During the off-season many of the Arizona Diamondbacks took some well deserved time off to regroup and get ready for the 2008 season. Some of the players returned to their home countries and started their second season. For a lot of players especially from Latin America it becomes a matter of national pride to play winter ball for their country. Diamondbacks catcher Miguel Montero is one such player. Miguel returned to Venezuela to play for Bravos de Margarita. Montero was putting up decent numbers hitting .258 in 23 games. His defense was progressing nicely with several people commenting on the young catcher's ability to call a game.

There are a few things in this world that I just can't stand. The top three in no particular order are the gyrating moves of Rally Sally in the upper deck, the "great Troy Tulowitzki", and going to the dentist. The first two on this list I can at some point tolerate. Oh sure I am still hopeful that someone will sit behind Rally Sally and give her a gently nudge off the upper deck or that she has changed her allegiance and has become a diehard Arizona Cardinals fan giving up baseball completely. And there is always a chance that the "great Troy Tulowitzki" will fade to mediocrity after suffering miserably in a prolonged sophomore slump. Two of the top three worst things in the world have the potential to fade off my list so I do have that working for me. The one remaining item though I'm afraid I will have to live with for the rest of my life.

Besides my invitation to Evening on the Diamond, I had one other piece of Sedona Red mail. This one seemed a lot more affordable, or so I thought. The Arizona Diamondbacks had previously announced on their web site that single game tickets for the 2008 regular season would go on sale at 9:00 AM on Saturday March 1. I had marked the calendar with a Sedona Red circle and hearts which interestingly enough looked just like Valentine's Day. But according to the postcard I received in the mail, Season Ticket Holders have an opportunity to purchase single game tickets before they go on sale to the general public and could actually begin placing orders today; just another benefit to being a Diamondbacks Season Ticket holder. This is the part of the blog entry where we pause for a brief advertising endorsement suggesting to everyone to rush over to the Arizona Diamondbacks web site and order your season tickets. So you don't forget order before midnight tonight. Now back to our regularly scheduled entry.

We have an interesting phenomenon that occurs in our house. Myself or one of the kids will go to the mailbox every day and retrieve the mail. We'll then walk back to the house and after removing the mail addressed to whoever picked up the mail the remainder will be deposited on the edge of the cupboard. On the surface you would think this would work out very well and be quite an efficient method of dealing with the postal mail. Unfortunately there is a small problem with this process. The person who retrieves the mail typically forgets to tell anyone that they had gotten the mail. This results in additional trips to the mail box which of course find it empty leaving the retriever with a false impression that the mail has not yet arrived or that we simply did not get mail that day. The second flaw is that everyone seems to forget to check the corner cupboard to see if the mail has been deposited there. This coupled with the fact that the kids also deposit their homework, school papers, and anything else they can find on the same cupboard means that the mail is quickly lost and forgotten. The pile of papers continues to accumulate until either someone gets frustrated with the stack of paper or there is a cave in from the paper causing a safety hazard whereby someone is trapped under the weight of a paper avalanche. After the rescue crews have safely cleared the avalanche there is a family meeting where we all promise to change the way we retrieve mail. The reminder of the weekend is spent going through the mountain of paper and dealing with the lost mail. Today was one of those days.

The starting rotation for the Arizona Diamondbacks has garnered a lot of attention this off season and rightfully so. It will definitely be a source of strength for the team entering the 2008 season and from top to bottom should be a force to be reckoned with. The fifth starter is typically someone who is good enough to start but is the person most likely to be skipped in order to keep the front line of the rotation on schedule. In the Diamondbacks case the fifth starter is someone who may not only be counted on for his arm but also with his bat. Micah Owings has drawn a substantial amount of press by winning a Silver Slugger award in his rookie season. His prowess with the lumber caused manager Bob Melvin to ponder aloud at the winter meetings wondering if perhaps Micah might take infield practice and play first base on occasion just to give him more at-bats. That notion was subsequently shot down when Spring Training opened as Melvin stated that Owings was going to be counted upon to contribute on the mound every 5 days. The front of the pitching staff has likewise found themselves as the center of attention.

Today was the first full day of workouts for the entire team. Everyone with the exception of Tony Pena is now in camp and ready to get going. Pena is still facing issues getting a visa that will allow him to enter the United States. Much of the problem stems from a case of mistaken identity where Pena played his first few of seasons under the name of his cousin Adriano Rosario. The Diamondbacks should find out in the next few days what the timeframe will be for when Pena will be able to get to Tucson. In the mean time drills will continue as players begin to prepare for the upcoming Cactus League season followed by the regular season. The case of the missing Pena was not the big news to come out of Diamondbacks camp though.

Going into the off-season after the 2007 season one of the biggest questions surrounding the Arizona Diamondbacks was how they were going to relieve the logjam they had at the corner infield positions. At times during the 2007 campaign Bob Melvin found himself with four very viable options for two positions. It is a decision that many managers would envy but it can be difficult especially of all four players deserve to be the starter. Part of the decision was in the hands of Tony Clark who was a free agent. He could choose to go to another franchise which would mean that the Diamondbacks would have three players for two spots which was the plan. Another option that the Diamondbacks explored was to trade Conor Jackson and resigning Tony Clark which again would give them options and adequate depth. Adequate depth is the key hear and unfortunately also the greatest unknown.

For the past 127 days, 11 hours and 43 minutes I have been pacing the floor waiting for this day to finally arrive. I suffered through 4 long games watching the "Great Troy Tulowitzki" and his cronies play in a World Series that should have included the Arizona Diamondbacks. I struggled as Major League Baseball announced Jake Peavy had beaten Brandon Webb in the Cy Young award voting even though Webb's number in 2007 were better than they were in 2008 when he won the award. I danced and cheered as Micah Owings won his Silver Slugger and Orlando Hudson won his second Gold Glove. But through it all my mind was squarely focused on this day.

Now that pitchers and catchers have begun reporting to Spring Training I was really hoping that the focus could get back between the foul lines. It has been a long off season filled with headlines surrounding the pharmaceutical side of baseball. Beginning with the Mitchell Report and continuing through the Brian McNamee / Roger Clemens war and now culminating with yet another round of Congressional hearings this has been a very dark time for baseball. And while Bud Selig and Donald Fehr proclaim that baseball is taking working measures to clean up the game; every day brings about more accusations and innuendo. Now it seems like no matter where you go, if you are identified as a baseball fan you are immediately questioned of how you feel about the usage of steroids and what it has done to the game.

As a kid growing up I remember February as a month of strange celebrations. It began on February 12 when we celebrated the birthday of Abraham Lincoln. That was followed shortly by Valentine's which taught us at a very early age that the best way to a girls heart was through a fancy card and some candy. This was of course augmented as we got older and had to add expensive jewelry to the list of things that women find romantic. Once Valentine's Day was over we moved on to February 22 when we celebrated George Washington's birthday. In school we made stove-pipe hats and wore fake beards to begin the month and ended wearing powdered wigs and making our teeth look wooden. It was an interesting month to say the least. At some point the powers that be decided that the United States had more than two presidents and hence there should be a federal holiday that would recognize all the accomplishments of the Executive branch of the government. This resulted in the establishment of President's Day. And in order for federal employees to be assured of a long weekend the holiday would always fall on the third Monday of February.

At Fan Fest the Arizona Diamondbacks described some of the activities they have planned for the upcoming season. The first weekend series in April has been identified as the Tenth Anniversary Celebration. For each of the games on Friday, Saturday, and Sunday the Diamondbacks have planned something special to recognize the team, the employees, and the fans who have helped define the first decade of Arizona Diamondbacks baseball. It's hard to believe that it will have been 10 years since the Diamondbacks began play on March 31, 1998 against the Colorado Rockies. A little research last year found that there were only two active players remaining of those who saw action during that inaugural game; one with the Arizona Diamondbacks and one with the Colorado Rockies. The Rockies representative is still with Colorado and still playing the same position. He has been the face of the Rockies for a long time, Mr. Todd Helton. The Diamondbacks player who is still active is no longer with Arizona but was a Diamondback on two separate occasions. Last season he played for the St. Louis Cardinals posting an 8-1 record with a 2.18 ERA; he is Russell Paul Springer.

You would think that today would be one of those days where you begin to channel Uncle Remus from the Disney Movie Song of the South. I fully expected to get up, put on my best work clothes and head out the door and begin singing Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Da whereby Mr. Blue Bird would perch on my shoulder and together we musically account for a "wonderful day". I mean this is the day I had been waiting for since October. Pitchers and catchers are now in Tucson and at the Kino Sports Park you would be hearing the crack of leather as they began the first day of drills to open the 2008 season. Why then am I not jumping up and down with excitement? Well there are probably two reasons for that.

Happy Webbruary! There is nothing more rewarding that when you finally get to turn the page to the calendar and realize that the year has flown by and you are now in the month of Webbruary. What is that, your calendar doesn't have a Webbruary? Well it sounds to me like you got yourself a defective calendar and I would place the blame squarely on the Hallmark Corporation because we all know they are the evil geniuses behind all calendar conspiracies. I say that because Hallmark has more to gain by changing the calendar than any other organization in the world. If you don't believe me I challenge you to go into a Hallmark store and see how many different greeting cards they make and for what occasions. The last time I was in a Hallmark store looking for a card I would have sworn I found one congratulating my dog for successfully completing obedience training. I had no idea Dog Obedience Training Day was even a holiday but according to Hallmark it is. But I think in the case of Webbruary even the Hallmark people were surprised.

A few days ago I happened to walk past the side of the refrigerator where we normally keep the calendar. There scrawled across various days are the activities we need to be aware of. With four kids at home it is usually a logistical nightmare to try and manage everyone's schedule. To Trina's credit she is a mastermind at keeping track of what everyone is doing and where they need to be at any given moment. The calendar of course has been updated to reflect all the Diamondbacks games both home and away so that Trina and the kids know whether I will be home (away games) or away (home games). Usually I don't pay much attention to the calendar as I am pretty oblivious to what is going on with regards to the kids lives. It is not that I am a neglectful father; quite the contrary I like to be involved with the kids activities (unless there is a game of course). That is usually the problem (the problem is not that there are games, the problem is that I like to be involved). The family usually cringes whenever I get involved as something usually goes unexplainably wrong and I swear it isn't my fault. Well, not completely my fault. I will admit, I am single-handedly responsible for being banned from the science fair. But really who would have expected that I could possibly have gotten an entire grade of school children to believe that the earth is flat just by using a quarter? That's a different subject and much too little baseball to be discussed here; let's get back to the subject.

When the Hollywood writers went on strike several months ago there were many who thought that it would be extremely detrimental to the country as networks would scramble to find programming that would fill the airwaves with shows that would be entertaining and interesting to the general public. I too wondered what would happen. Outside of baseball I don't really watch that much television so I wasn't sure how much a writer's strike would have on me personally but my family on the other hand was a different story. We've had satellite television for nearly our entire marriage. The satellite dish era began when we lived in Idaho where without such a device you were able to tune exactly two stations in. Now I would describe the area as isolated and rural but growing up there we lived in the second largest city in Idaho with a population of 40,000. Hard to believe that the entire population of that town would fit within Chase Field and still have enough room that Rally Sally could dance with her flags in the upper deck. In those days satellite television was a necessity if you wanted any programming choices. Of course this was in the golden age of satellite before paid programming and scrambling. Not only were you able to find shows to watch but at the times you wanted to watch them. You were also seeing the feeds as they were being shot without editing which always made for great entertainment as you watched a national newscaster picking his nose or a female anchor adjusting herself so she did not look so lopsided on camera.

A sure sign that baseball is nearly ready to begin is the frequency in which I hear from the Arizona Diamondbacks. During the dark off-season there may be weeks or months between communications with the team. With each passing day counting down the time when pitchers and catchers report, I hear from the team more and more often whether it be via e-mail or postal mail. Take today for example, I actually received both an email and a letter. The email arrived in my inbox to let me know that the Diamondbacks on-line team shop was having a sale on batting practice jerseys and hats. This was extremely important since the Diamondbacks batting practice jersey is also their Spring Training jersey. Any fan worth their weight in peanuts and Crackerjack is going to want to be dressed appropriately when attending a Cactus League game. I already have one of the Cool Base jerseys and I love it. It is soft and very comfortable. So comfortable that I made it my pajama top. There is just something comforting about putting on a Diamondbacks jersey before sliding into bed. You are pretty much guaranteed a night filled with great dreams about post season success and World Series championships. I initially tried using a batting practice hat as a sleeping attire accessory but Trina complained that when I rolled over the bill of my cap kept smacking her in the head. It didn't wake me up so I wasn't exactly sure what the problem was but after yet another ultimatum by my wife and a lecture about how I love the Diamondbacks more than her, I relented and now take the hat off prior to her coming to bed.

It has been said that there must be opposition in all things otherwise we would be incapable of feeling. It is not possible for us to know happiness unless we have experienced pain. We cannot have joy without knowing sorrow. We would not know darkness unless we have first been exposed to light. The depths of our emotions are directly correlated to the polar limits we have experienced. Someone who lives their live in the middle of the road first will probably life a very short life since the middle of the road is not the safest place I have ever heard of living. Secondly and probably more applicable, someone who is emotionally in the center will not have much joy since they have not experienced much sorrow with which to compare it against. This is the philosophical premise that I have patterned my life against. There are both positive and negative aspects of such a pattern.

Yesterday was one of those days that you have every now and again where everything just seems right with the world. You are able to somehow combine the things that you love with the ones that you love. After spending several hours at Chase Field at the Arizona Diamondbacks Fan Fest it was time for us to bid farewell to the stadium that we won't see for another 7 weeks (that pains me just typing that). Trina and the kids had a difficult time pulling me away from the Chase Field concourse. Trina firmly believes that the team will have some repair work to do since she is convinced that I left fingernail marks along the floor as the family forcefully dragged me out of the stadium. I think she is exaggerating just a little, I cut my fingernails so they could not have left a mark. I did notice that the ends of my fingers are sore today and I seem to have cement burns on the tops of my fingers. And suggestions that I cried like a baby when we left are exaggerated. I wasn't crying I just had something in my eye. But as we were walking across the Gila River Casino Plaza something interesting happened.

At 3 AM I found myself lying in bed staring at the ceiling. At least I think it was the ceiling; it was dark so I can't be sure. It was obvious that I wasn't going to be able to get back to sleep I was way too excited. I've been looking forward to this day for quite a while and there was just no way I was going to go back to sleep and potentially sleep through the 3 alarm clocks that I had set around the room. No, I was better off getting out of bed and just starting my day a little earlier. I went downstairs and while I was waiting for my hot chocolate to actually get hot I decided to check my email and the web. Maybe there was an update to the Diamondbacks Fan Fest schedule that I needed to account for. Besides, I still needed to print out my map so I knew where to go and what time to be there. That sounds so funny; I need a map to Chase Field so I know where to go. That's like saying I need to print out the instructions that tell me how to breathe. I am not positive but I think that after 10 years of trips to the ballpark my body is conditioned to the point that I could probably do it in my sleep. I'll never actually be able to test that theory but I do have a degree of confidence that it could occur.

I am not exactly sure what it is about my personality but for whatever reason I seem to be fascinated with numbers and countdowns. At any given moment I have identified some sort of event and I am counting down towards it. When I was a kid I counted down the hours on Independence Day until I could light fireworks. I counted down the number of days until Santa Claus arrived on Christmas Eve. I counted down the seconds until the big mirrored ball fell on television at Times Square. I counted down the days until school was over and summer vacation would arrive. As I have gotten older I figured I would outgrow this obsession with countdowns but the fascination has persisted. All that has really changed is the event I am counting down.

Ever since Derrick Hall took over the reigns as president of the Arizona Diamondbacks he has made himself very accessible to the fans. Whether it be approaching him at the ballpark with a question or comment to making his email and phone number available so that anyone could contact him. The results of this openness is that the fan's feel a stronger connection to the organization and that they have a vested interested in the molding their experience at the game. One of the more unique ways that Mr. Hall has provided for fans to ask questions is through his monthly chat on the Diamondbacks web site. This is always a good place to hang out and get a read on the pulse of the Diamondbacks fans and what is important to them. The chat is scheduled for the first Thursday of every month which according to my calendar is today.

You know it's kind of funny. When we moved to Arizona one of the big things that everyone told us was how great the school systems were and that we would be amazed at the level of education that our kids would receive. And the best part was that it was free! Wow, free school I bet that is what every kid dreams of. Why couldn't it be free cotton candy or free baseball tickets now that would be something you could get kids excited about. But free school, I don't think so. With the exception of my bookworm daughter there is probably not another kid on the planet who would be jumping for joy if you told them they could have all the school they wanted and it would not cost them a penny. I have to admit though I feel a little bit like a victim of a snake oil salesman. That's not to say I don't think my kids have gotten a good education; quite the contrary I think they have become educated well beyond my expectations. I thoroughly believed one daughter was destined to be a mainstay in the expedited food industry and now she is two semesters away from a college education majoring in a foreign language (which by the way I remind her that the foreign language would serve her well at any of the fast-food establishments immediately vaulting her to the level of assistant to the assistant manager). No, I have no qualms with the Arizona education system but I do have to take issue with the term "free education".

It's always a great day when you get a letter from home. In this day and age we seem to have lost the significance that a card or letter delivered to our postal mail box can have on someone's life. I know for me it is so much easier to send an e-mail or make a phone call than it is to take the time to sit down and write something out, find an envelope and stamp, and make a trip to the post office. That being said, I find it amazing how important my daily trek to the mail box is. When I get home from work; one of the first things I ask Trina and the kids is whether anyone has gotten the mail or not. If the answer is no (and it generally is), I will retrieve the mail key and make my daily hike down the street to the mail box. Each day as I am walking down to the box I go through the same thought process wondering at what point delivering mail got so painful that we as a society decided that we would be better served by having a single mail station in our subdivision rather than individual mail boxes attached to our house. I remember as a kid following the mailman from house to house as he delivered mail to all of our neighbors. Come to think about it at that time I wondered why we insisted on having individual mail boxes as it would seem much more efficient to have a centralized box to deliver our mail to. I'm not sure but I think I am in a thought-process infinite loop. Today at the end of that march I reached the mail box and retrieved its contents. Hidden among the junk mail and bill envelopes was a most pleasant surprise.

Do you ever have one of those weeks where nothing seems to go right? You know one where you can't find your favorite Arizona Diamondbacks Sedona Red pajamas and you have to decide do you resort to having to wear your Arizona Diamondbacks Classic purple and teal pajamas or do you sleep without pajamas? That might seem like a no-brainer as Trina would say but I have definitely seen a difference in my sleep patterns when I am wearing purple and teal pajamas in a post-Sedona Red era. It's not just the pajamas though. There was more bizarreness that is normal in my life. That is saying a lot since Trina has long proclaimed that on a normal day for me I already peg the weirdness level for most of the population.

When we first moved to Arizona I was amazed to finally be living in what I considered a major sports city. My definition of "major sports city" left something to be desired I have to admit. This was a basketball town that was for sure. The Phoenix Suns were a season removed from a heartbreaking loss to the Michael Jordan-led Chicago Bulls and we were in the midst of Charles Barkley mania. The round mound of rebound was everywhere; on the radio, at the airport, in shopping centers and restaurants. You couldn't go anywhere in the valley without hearing about a Barkley sighting. The NBA was not the only game in town, there was also the Arizona Cardinals of the National Football League. Of course you would get an argument from many in the valley that the Cardinals did not classify as a major sport and barely classified as an NFL franchise. Not being a football fan I really couldn't come up with a valid argument that they truly were "major sport" worthy.

One of my all-time favorite movies is the 1993 classic Groundhog Day starring Bill Murray. For those of you who have been trapped in a burrow hibernating and have not heard of this movie let me give you a brief synopsis. The premise is that a egotistical self-centered weather man finds himself trapped in Punxsutawney Pennsylvania where he relives the same day over and over and over. The day of course is Groundhog Day where a furry rodent is retrieved from his den and comes out to see if he can see his shadow. Legend has it that if a groundhog spots his shadow it will mean 6 more weeks of winter. Here in Phoenix that could mean that we will have 42 more days of temperatures in the low-60's and sunshine. If the groundhog does not see its shadow it foretells an early spring which in Phoenix means 42 days of temperatures in the mid-70's and sunshine. You can therefore see how important this holiday is to the inhabitants of Arizona after all we are getting kind of tired being bundled up and running those seat warmers that came as an over-priced option on our cars. I don't mind it so much as it is the one month that I can justify buying that car that had seat warmers. It is extremely difficult to explain that buying decision in July when temperatures are hovering at the 114-degree level.

For the past 108 days 8 hours and 53 minutes I have been without Arizona Diamondbacks baseball with the exception of a few games that are nearly worn out that were recorded on my Tivo from last season. That may not seem like a big deal but to a diehard Diamondbacks fan that seems like an eternity. January is an especially brutal month for baseball fans. For most of the country it is the coldest month of the year and also seems as though it drags on forever. I have to keep checking the calendar to make sure that someone at the Hallmark Corporation has not somehow added a few extra days into the first month of the year. I have long maintained that Hallmark is secretly the brains behind all calendars. I came to this conclusion after realizing there is no other explanation for why there are greeting cards available for pretty much every day of the year. If Hallmark could somehow find a way to sneak another day onto the calendar it would mean more profits in their pockets. I refer to this as the "great Calendar Conspiracy", it is one of many conspiracies that I have concocted over the years.