The trees are greening, lawns are getting lush, and those damn love bugs are starting to clog up air-filters all over south east Texas. And more importantly baseball is being played again.
Once again, an opening day is upon us, and for some reason, once again the Astros are starting a day late for no apparent reason. Sensing a trend, I was very tempted to post this a day late as well. But since I last shared one of these mishaps with the world about three-quarters of a year and one website ago, I figured that I was late enough as it is.
Anyway, when we last left the local nine they were wrapping up a winning, but largely disappointing season under new manager Jimy Williams. 2002 was built around a few suppositions: that Daryle Ward could neatly replace Moises Alou, offensively; that Jeff Bagwell wouldn?t be hampered significantly by shoulder woes; that Craig Biggio could still perform at an All-Star level; that Morgan Ensberg and Adam Everett could neatly fill in on the left side of the infield; that minister of non-information Williams could move the Astros to the next level; that 2001 was a fluke for Richard Hidalgo.
Flash forward to today, Ward is interviewing new dieticians at Chavez Ravine, Everett is looking for an apartment and some disinfectant in the Big Easy (at least I’d be stocking up on Lysol if I had to live in New Orleans…the whole town smells like urine), Biggio is learning a new position at 37 years old, Hidalgo is hoping that 2001 and 2002 were both flukes (the rest of us are leaning towards 2000 being headquarters to that myth), and Williams is still doing his best Grandpa Simpson imitation, talking about onions, Kaisers, and horses?most of the time, all at once.
But the great thing about Opening Day is that all teams, including the Astros, get to start with a clean slate. The same goes for the fans, thankfully. We get to continue traditions that have been going on as long as baseball has been around…bitching about how bad the team is, about how the owners and players conspire to screw the fans, about $6 beer and $5 hotdogs, about what Sheriff Blaylock did to your stomach, and about how whoever the 25th guy on the roster is this year (Ensberg or Chavez) is going to cost us the pennant.
And despite what opposing fans and pundits have to say, in Houston, the Astros have built up some traditions of their own in 41 years. We get to hope that this is the year the Astros finally win a playoff series every year. Come to think of it, that is the favorite and only tradition of Astros fans. That, and laughing at the Rangers.
As in the 29 years before, I’ll be attending the home opener for the Astros today, which is a little tradition of its own. And just like most of the last 29 or so seasons, I’m rushing to the park with great anticipation and optimism. I’m hoping it lasts until the All-star break. Soon, I’ll get to explain to my son (who is 7 months old) why I come back every year. I’ll get to teach him to be an Astros fan and all of the glorious quirks that can go with that. I’ll get to teach him how to keep score, ensuring he’ll be as geeky as I was as a boy. I’ll get to tell him why the DH is a horrid idea and why Jeff Kent could be considered a good guy this year, when last year he was a bad guy. I’ll get to explain to him why I spend a years worth of his future allowance on a beer and a dog several times in 3 hours. I’ll get to show him how to con me into buying him a souvenir every time we go to a game.
And I’ll get to teach him the concepts of starting over, clean slates and Opening Day every spring and why he always needs to have a little bit of him that hopes every year will be “the year” for his team.
Come back, Shane! On second thought, we’d rather you didn’t.
Here in Round Rock, I can’t hear the outcry or the outrage at the “treatment” of Shane Reynolds. I’m sure there are fans who are grousing aplenty about loyalty, budgets and JPLs (I just made that up. It stands for John P. Lopez and it’s short hand for “anything I want to pull out of my ass I can use in writing.” Feel free to use it.)
I’m having trouble seeing how a pitcher who had trouble throwing fastballs 82 mph serves any purpose on a Major League Roster. At that point they aren’t fast, not relative to a high school pitcher anyway. Especially if his out pitch, in this case a split-finger “fastball” has to be set up by that 82 mph number.
As far as the unfair treatment or whatever malarkey is shooting from Billy Wagner’s gob right about now, they just gave him one meellion dollars for being a good guy. I can’t see why else they would have given him that contract unless they were trying to treat him fairly. Does your employer hand out a million dollars to any of your co-workers because they’ve been there 13 years? Mine neither.
Good luck Shane, and wherever you end up, I hope you can put together one more season. For the rest of us, let’s not pretend that this was anything but a good personnel decision by Gerry Hunsicker and Jimy Williams.
Jacob Picks the Winners
Because every body loves babies, and everybody loves baseball, what could be more natural than combining the two? And of course I mean in a non-Dusty Baker’s Dugout Daycare sort of way. Instead I’m letting my son, Jacob, make the division predictions.
As usually goes for this kind of ridiculous prognostication, my wife left me to watch my son (mistake number 1). So I placed a bunch of team logos on the floor and which ever Jacob crawled to and tried to eat was declared the winner. It’s just as scientific as Fantasy Baseball.
So starting in the East, Jacob decided that the Phillies were the team to beat based on the fact that he can see red against white really easily and that the Braves logo got picked up by one of the dogs.
In the West, Jacob tried to pick the Phillies again, mainly because I forgot to take the logo away from him. He then settled down, regrouped and went with the Giants. I think this was due to the fact that again, the black was easy for him to see, and that he had a full diaper and was running out of patience with his daddy and the video camera. The Giants logo was the closest to him, and therefore the clear choice.
In the Central, Jacob took a nap. Since he likes to sleep with a maroon elephant and teddy bear that wears an Astros t-shirt, I’m gonna say that he picks the Astros, although he did mention that “the Cardinals had a really strong offensive lineup and if they stay healthy they’ll be hard to beat.” He added, “mrflpxfzzzzzzzzzzzzzz. Muh, da veeefzzzzzzzzzzzz.”
Andy Tomczeszyn is a father and husband first and an Astros fan like 1a. He promises that most of his columns this year will not be so geared towards his own son. If you’d like to ask any questions or leave any comments about this column or get pictures of Jacob, or have Jake pick your horses, please contact them at [email protected].
