Reviving the Art of Baseball Doggerel
Brantley’s back, Yan Gomes’ knee,
And now Carrasco’s face.
A week into the season,
The curse runs fast apace.
Susan Petrone’s new novel is Throw Like a Woman. She blogs frequently about the Tribe at the website It’s Pronounced Lajaway.
From the late-night Belt
To the Ishikawa blast
(Leaving Matheny aghast)
From the Reverend Pence
Splat against the wall
Tongue lolling
To the champagne dance
We are LOLing
Champions together
#3in5
We might be Giants
Say Hey!
A three-ring cirque du soleil
With a dollop of brouillard
(That’s French for “fog”)
We go yard; we play hard
Olé
Cue Tony Bennett
#3in5
We’ve got Brandons galore
(Crawford, Hicks and Belt)
(And even a Dan — aaargh — Uggla)
An Angel-ic Pagán
And Morse Code tapping SOS and more!
Game-tying crash
Glove wizards Perez and Blanco
White Shark speeding, sailing, soaring
We are Champions
Hashtag World Series
Even years we adore
#3in5
We are Giants
Golden-Gated
Manhattan-transplanted
By Bums we are hated
Eight titles, calculated
Add them, elated
(Three, belated)
Call them banners or flags
Call them rings
Making our heartstrings sing
Forevermore
Demons exorcised
Passions exercised
#3in5
It is the dawning
Of the Age of J. Arias
And LOOGY Lopez too
Lincecum and Cain and Machi
Stricken Strickland
Adrianza, Susac and Sanchez, true
Don’t forget Romo of Sergio
Or long-man Petit
Nor Affeldt, rock-steady Jeremy
Or Duffy speeding homeward
And Posey, our Buster,
Batterymate anchor, aweigh
Awaiting The Hug
#3in5
We are guitar-pickin’, smart-pitchin’ Peavy
Gutsy Gutierrez, strong Vogelsong
Stoic saver Casilla
Cagey Hudson navigating age with grace
Madison Bumgarner, ace of aces
Big Country
Starter, saver, savior
Backed by The Flip
Panik to Crawford
Saving Game 7
Striking icons of history
Hoisting trophy and treasure
#3in5
Bochy the maestro
Baer and Sabean
Flannery, Kelly, Meulens
Righetti and Ron
And all the rest
Named and unnamed
We are Giants
Panda falling backward into eternity
Caught
Captured
Parading into paradise
#3in5
Paul Kocak is the author of Baseball’s Starry Night: Reliving Major League Baseball’s 2011 Wild Card Night of Shock and Awe, which Doris Kearns Goodwin called “a magical book about a magical night.” He followed this with World Serious: One San Francisco Giants Fan’s 2012 Pilgrimage. He is completing a memoir on his life as a Giants fan.
Major league-fastball-fast is fast.
Lose-a-gal-fast-before-you-
first-take-her-out is fast.
Folk-like-me-sold-on-the-steps-
of-the-St. Louis-Court House-fast
is fast but none of these fasts
is fast as darn fast.
Me finished before you start
that’s darn fast, that’s me.
Slow? Slow is how long it took me to tell Clara,
while we was out walkin’ after my game today,
how I got hit with my own hit ball
after I slid safe into second.
Darn slow? That was me with her tonight, guessin’
and guessin’ all the way back from hearin’ Henry Brown
at the Blue Flame until we stepped off the sidewalk,
outside the gas lights, and slipped under the shade trees
by her flat, before I could remember her favorite hymn
and she kissed me fast, in a slow way,
that made me feel like Lucky Lindy.
Like when I’m flyin’ around the bases
or runnin’ down flys or line drives
with eyes for the center field fence
and whole the ball park is movin’
slow as Missouri catfish in winter,
I didn’t feel nothin’ under my feet
all my way home where I
turned off the light and was in bed
before my room was dark.
William Tecku is a Witter Bynner Foundation for Poetry grant recipient, a six-time Arizona English Teachers Association “Teachers As Writers” award winner, a Lake Superior Writers Series award winner, and twice received the Mesa Public Schools Staff Writing Award. It’s Only a Dry Heat is his most recent collection of poetry and fiction. For more of his writing, visit his webpage, Road Reflections.
Already forgotten–
Last year’s season.
KC–like Rodney–
Gets no respect.
Maybe so, maybe so–
But even though
Only 4% of the season
Is already done,
KC alone is 7-0
And atop the division.
For the benefit of Mister I
The Tiges will give another try
At a Series ring
In the race four times before
Then they’re always shown the door
Damn, it stings
. But with Cabrera and two Martinez
. The hits should still be raining in Motown
. If God wills, Alex Avila doesn’t get hurt
Yeah, Max Scherzer hit the road
The Nationals can bear that load
(He will be missed)
David Price might have the stuff
But does the bullpen have enough?
Let’s check the list:
. Phil Coke is gone, and Rick Porcello,
. Which leaves Soria, Albuquerque and Nathan
. Climbing higher? Dumpster fire? Who the hell knows?
Castellanos will be there
We’ll marvel at Cespedes’ flair
In center field
Ian Kinsler leaps and spins
Let’s hope Iglesias’ pins
Have really healed
. Twisting the government ’round his fingers
. Is not enough for Detroit’s pizza king
. Which is why Mister I keeps spending his dough….