dead letter office #13
with baseball - and perhaps more importantly *fantasy* baseball - season approaching, here's a piece that i wrote last fall. the first line was written by my friend BillM and served as the jumping off point for the story. the rest speaks for itself.
[slightly edited for taste and clarity]
> just don't forget about the bullpens - you never know what might happen.
prophetic words from a man who has seen his share of fantasy league battles. allow me to indulge a bit and paint yesterday's scene from my life for you:
i have been in fantasy baseball leagues since 1989. for those scoring at home, that means this was the 15th year of my fantasy baseball existence. the rest of my fantasy life shall remain private, but suffice to say, there are over 25 teams that i have captained in that time.
and i have never won it all. not once, not even tied, nothing. i have been in first place, but never on the final day. the past few years have been littered with 2nd place finishes, five or six in all, but i still could not get my name on a trophy.
which brings us to this year, and one of the 3 leagues in which i participate (in this league we use players only from the NL East and NL Central). to be brief, i was entrenched in first place from the get go, and stayed there until July when BillP passed me on the strength of his cadre of solid Braves - esp. Sheffield, Giles, Lopez, Ortiz, Smoltz, Hampton, etc. - and a lineup that was just crushing the ball. his trade for Al Lieter in May shored up his staff and set us up for a battle to the wire. and to the wire it went, down to the last week with mere points separating us from each other, and categories up for grabs - tied in Wins and Win%. i went ahead by 2 points one day only to lose my lead the next day.
cut to Sunday, I am on the couch for the 4th straight day recovering from my minor nose surgery (deviated septum). i have been waiting for this. i am 1 point behind, and we are tied in Wins. if i can pull ahead of him, i make up that point and we are tied. if Aaron can somehow manage 3 wins as well, then i could win it outright by half a point. i have one guy starting, Kip Wells. BillP has none with Leiter sitting the last day out. Aaron is supposed to have 3, but ends up with only 2 when the Astros bench Wade Miller for their meaningless finale.
on Aaron's team, Millwood gets behind early and Vargas only pitches 3 innings, so my hopes of an outright win are dashed early on. but Kip Wells is doing fine, and it's 2-2 in the top of the 7th. Jack Wilson (another proud member of Team Gloomtown) cracks a homer off Juan Cruz to make it 3-2, and I'm putting the champagne on ice in my kitchen - i can't drink it (antibiotics), but i can at least spray it at the dog in celebration.
after being distracted by football for a few minutes, Dan calls to ask if i'm watching this unfold. i am and we run through the possible scenarios that might get me a title (did Maddux pitch well enough to lower Mitch's WHIP under BillP's?). in the 9th inning, Tavarez gets the last out, and Wells has pulled it off for me, pushing me ahead in Wins. or has he? ESPN's graphic gives the win to Joe Beimel for some reason and my heart sinks. i call Dan and he gets online to find out what's going on. eventually it is sorted out that Wells was indeed the pitcher of record. sigh of relief. but while I have him on the phone, i ask Dan to make sure that BillP didn't get any wins. with no starters going, and 3 RP from losing Atlanta, it seems unlikely. Kyle Farnsworth didn't get into today's game, so that leaves only Ricky Stone. Ricky Fucking Stone.
somewhere in SE Texas, an official scorer decided that in the last game of the season, a game in which the starter went only three innings, the victory should be awarded to a man who entered the game in the 7th inning with a 6-2 lead and pitched 1 inning. mind you, two other relievers had come before him, but they had given up hits, walks and a run, while Stone pitched a perfect inning. when the starter doesn't go 5, but his team leads the whole way and wins, the scorer has the right to decide who to award the win to. so it was that Ricky Stone ran his record to 6-4 on the year, counteracting Mr. Wells' win and thereby relegating me to a 2nd place finish. no trophy, no big payday, no glory. just utter and abject disbelief and a deep gnawing pain that at least for a moment made me forget that my sinuses were completely congested with blood and snot. dan was sympathetic, but then decided it would be more fun to begin invoking comparisons to the Red Sox and chiding me for voting to keep Fielding% as a category, which helped provide the margin of victory for BillP. i couldn't blame him, i could only stare into the void trying to make sense of it all while yelling the odd obscenity as the dog and my fiance looked at me quizzically.
there is something to be said for the exquisite torture of being a Red Sox fan. it's the innocence of a child who believes in the Tooth Fairy mixed with the denial and co-dependence of the abuse victim who keeps going back to their abuser to repeat the same actions and patterns, while constantly trying to convince themsleves that *this* time it will be different. i was trying very hard not to think about my fantasy teams in the same terms, wanting to keep everything in context and not blame the intervention of a "curse" or a higher power. and i was beginning to buy into it, how next year would be different, how i would learn from my mistakes, how i would finally get my name on the trophy so i could gaze upon it proudly when i walked through the door from work each day. but in the middle of a hot shower that still failed to wash away the stench of another season of defeat, the intervention of larger forces became all too apparent and a cold shudder ran the length of my body. it was at this point that i remembered the small bit of information i had come across less than a month ago:
Ricky Stone was born on Friday, February 28, 1975. The same day as me.