From today's
Ottawa Sun (just be sure to read to the end):
For love of game
All heart and some talent, our Baines joins hopefuls giving it their all at Rapidz tryouts
by Tim Baines
The baseball, laces spinning, looks like a beachball as it nears the plate.
I cock my elbow and lunge forward, clutching a 34-inch, 31-oz. piece of lumber.
As I grit my teeth, the count at two balls and a strike, the ball sinks a foot below my bat, landing in the catcher's mitt with a thud. Strike two. There are chuckles from around the batting cage.
With a runner on third, I need to put the ball in play.
Catcher Eitan Maoz gives the sign (and I'm thinking it's a mercy call for me since he recently played on my son's team). The pitcher kicks and goes into his motion. My eyes light up as I see the ball nearing the plate. After a mighty whoosh, the ball rises off my bat, into the outfield where it nestles into the centre fielder's glove. The runner on third trots home. It's an RBI!
It isn't enough to save me. On a day when 70 baseball players show up to try out for the Ottawa Rapidz, an expansion team in the independent Can-Am League, I am not among the cream of the crop. Not even close.
I corner Rapidz manager Ed Nottle.
"So, do you plan on cutting me later?" I ask.
"We don't have to wait. I'll cut you now," he says, with a hint of a smile.
Sometimes life is cruel. Julio Franco played in the majors until he was 49. Hell, I'm only 48.
- - -
Since I was knee-high to a grasshopper, I've loved baseball. I actually grew up playing fastball (with the pitcher windmilling his throw underhand), an awkward kid with a good glove. Well into my teens, I muscled up a bit and became a big bopper with a bit of speed (though now I have a hard time seeing past my belly when I look down and I certainly have a hard time convincing my legs to move at anything more than a leisurely stroll). I might have parked 18 over the fence one summer in a little more than 200 at-bats (but the number and length of those shots seems to be skewed as I get older). One day, I hit two homers and a triple in my first three at-bats. The coach pulled me. He said he didn't want my head to swell. I wanted to play Major League Baseball. One problem ... I wasn't good enough.
- - -
Mathieu Audet is 29. He made the eight-hour drive, stopping overnight in Montreal, from St- Prime, Que., a village of 2,000. He's a knuckleballer and a guy who clings to his baseball dream despite not having played much since he was 16.
"I've been training for this for a month," he says. "It's always been my favourite sport."
- - -
Time for some full disclosure. Before going to the tryout, I "borrow" cleats, a batting glove and a glove. The Rapidz provide me with a pair of extra-large baseball pants. One problem. The latches won't/can't stay attached. My belly is pushing them open. Is there such a thing as a Big and Tall Baseball Pants Store?
- - -
Outfielder Greg Dumouchel dreams about playing baseball. At 22, he's both young and good.
Dumouchel grew up in Ottawa, but lives in Edmonton. He played in Australia, where he won a hitting award. He's already been with the Edmonton Cracker Cats and in the Arizona Winter League.
"It's been a long struggle," he says. "Especially as a Canadian, when you have to go through things like getting a visa.
"I've been working hard. I do yoga three days a week, weights six days a week and cardio-dryland training four days a week. And then you have to do your work in the batting cage."
Also a hockey player and curler, he gave it all up for baseball while he was a student at Osgoode Township High School.
"I've been to so many of these (tryout camps)," he says. "It's hit and miss. Some days are bad, some are good.
"It's not about the money for me, it's about the passion, the love for baseball."
- - -
I know all about that passion. In high school, I wrote away to baseball academies in Florida. I want to improve my hitting, I would say. And the reply would come: "We'll make you a better hitter. Just send us $750." I guess I didn't have that much passion.
My Rapidz tryout gets off to a rocky start when they ask us to run. Sixty metres (okay, it may have been 50, but it seemed more like a mile). And the starter stole my joke. I was lining up and I hear this: "Uh, we might need a calendar to time this one." Okay, so I rumble across the finish line in 6.34 seconds. I can confirm without a doubt there are slower runners (and I emphasize the plural, runners). Then there is the throwing test. Centre field to third base, then home. My freakin' arm isn't what it used to be. The throws get there, eventually. On a couple of hops.
- - -
Ominous clouds roll overhead. There's a brisk wind blowing through the stadium, where 10,000 fans jammed in to see the Triple-A Lynx in the early to mid-1990s.
This is Ottawa's Field of Dreams, where so many future major-leaguers have played. On game nights, the smell of hot dogs fills the air. Walk up to the dugout and you can see a revolting reminder that baseball players still chew and spit tobacco. There's just something about the mystique of baseball -- its tradition and intricacies. It's that something that keeps players coming back for more, pursuing their dream.
- - -
"I found David Palmer at a camp in Burlington, Vt., and Joe Siddall at a camp in Windsor," says seasoned baseball man Bill McKenzie, who's been a scout, talent evaluator and everything in between for Baseball Canada, the Montreal Expos, Colorado Rockies and Detroit Tigers.
"Most of these guys know deep down inside they're not going to succeed here, but they come out and try. You never know what you're going to get at these open camps. Maybe there's a kid who got missed in the draft, maybe he played at a small school ... this is an opportunity to be seen."
- - -
Yaliesky Alinagro drove from Montreal. He had a much longer trip four months ago when he moved from Cuba to get married.
"This is what I've done all my life. Play baseball," says Alinagro, 30. "In Cuba, everybody plays baseball, it's the national sport. When I come to the park, I feel young again."
- - -
Joe Prokopec played college baseball and football at Queen's. The 27-year-old left-handed pitcher, a teacher at Ottawa Tech, says his students pushed him to attend yesterday's tryout.
"The kids saw the movie, The Rookie, and they wanted me to give it a shot," he says. "The kids are more excited about this than I am ... wait, that's a lie, I'm pretty excited too.
"If I could play for this team, there'd be 100 extra fans, the kids, in the stands every game."
Prokopec, who got married a week ago, is wearing the jersey of Ottawa Tech's captain, Mike Samaroo.
"I told him I wanted a little bit of Ottawa Tech with me," says Prokopec.
- - -
I grab a bat, add a weighted donut, and start swinging. Waiting for my turn in BP (baseball jargon for batting practice). I step into the batter's box, set my feet and tap the outside of the plate twice. I'm ready. The first pitch sails over my head, the second behind my back, the third's a wicked curve. Scare the old guy. I laugh. I won't be intimidated. I'm anxious, maybe a bit nervous. I sky a couple, then launch a sizzler down the third-base line. A nice line drive over second base is followed by another couple of fly ball outs.
From somewhere behind the batting cage, a raspy voice barks: "Run the next one out." I hit a rocket to centre field and jog to first base. That same voice growls: "What, you don't want to run it out, you should have turned first and maybe you get a double?" "Yeah, but I'm old."
I'm tempted to snap back. In life, we can't always hit homers ... sometimes we have to settle for singles.
- - -
Matt Leahy lives in Rochester, N.Y. The 24-year-old pitcher, who throws from a sidearm angle, got home from work at an indoor complex at 10:30 Wednesday night. He left for Ottawa at 4 yesterday morning.
"The reality is a desk job sucks," says Leahy, who has played independent baseball and has been the bullpen catcher for Triple-A ball in both Rochester and Syracuse. "I've been around and worked with 90 guys who've gone to the big leagues. It's what I want to do.
"This is probably my eighth or ninth camp. But I keep going. I've been to Indiana, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Michigan ... my 2004 Ford Explorer had 57,000 miles on it a year ago February, now it has 86,000.
"I do it because you always remember that one guy who said you sucked, that said you wouldn't make it. That gives me the fire to try and keep trying."
The boxscore will show that Leahy gave up an earned run yesterday on a RBI flyout ... by Tim Baines. Thanks, Matt.
- - -
"They always told us to keep playing until they take the uniform away," says Rapidz pitcher/pitching coach Mike Kuswiewicz. I see Mike eyeing my uniform, perhaps wanting to tug it away from me.
"I'm going into my 14th season of pro ball. I've been extremely lucky," says Kuswiewicz. "I know I'm not going to make the big leagues. I've moved onto my new dream, teaching. Most of these guys will never make it, but it never hurts to dream."
- - -
A baseball career is not for everybody. Being able to throw, catch or hit a baseball isn't enough.
"Sometimes they've got to step back and re-evaluate their abilities," says Nottle, who's been around for baseball for 48 years. "If any team in our league based its roster on a tryout camp, it wouldn't have much of a team. I love the fact that these guys love the game. But that love isn't enough to make them good enough to play baseball (for a living)."
- - -
Nottle gathers the hopefuls into a semi-circle near the batting cage. The wind has settled down. The sun peeks through the clouds.
The players listen as Nottle lowers the boom. Just two, Dumouchel and catcher Rudy Vallejas, are invited to the team's main camp, which begins tomorrow.
There are no tears, but a couple of players hang their heads as they head to the dugout, slowly removing their gear.
There'll be another camp. Another chance. The dream never dies.
Eating a $1 hot dog. They even have "all you can eat" nights. Can I count on you to come out here and make them lose money on the deal, Patrick?
PLEASE release me from the clutches of this woman!
See, Sara? Sam does wear Brayden's clothes.
Sam's crazy face:
Caroline adores her Little People animals:
We'll have to see how long it lasts.
Here's some video of Sam in the best giggle mode that we've recorded
Dada also got Caroline a flower. Do you like her "princess dress"? I think it's quite the fashion statement. Especially paired with the jeans, sneakers and Red Wings jersey.
