by Fred Lovato
No worries, Shohei
you won free agent jackpot
bank account’s healthy
Fred reports from Okinawa: “TV shows are already reporting from Dodgers’ training camp about Shohei’s every move.”
MLB All-Jingle-Bells Team
By Dr. Rajesh C. Oza and James Finn Garner
1B Josh Bell
2B Juan Bell
SS Les Bell
3B Buddy Bell
LF George Bell
CF Cool Papa Bell
RF Beau Bell
C Herman Bell, Terry Bell
LHP Chad Bell, Eric Bell, Fred Bell, Lefty Bell, Ralph Bell
RHP Bill “Ding Dong” Bell, Cliff Bell, Gary Bell, George Bell, Heath Bell, Hi Bell, Rob Bell, Trevor Bell
MGR Jayce Tingley
Mantle and Mays
by Peter G. Mladinic
If I could touch what touches everything,
if I could talk to the animals, if I could
remember the Bronx of 1953 as well as you,
the Polo Grounds would be my memory, one
we shared, you in stands, the Say Hey Kid
in center, across the river, in center Mick.
His glove like Willie’s catches the high pop.
I think of base paths, a batter’s box, a dash
third to home. Mantle for speed, power,
Mays for all-around everything in the Polo
Grounds, you remember sitting in stands
and I vaguely seeing Mantle but more so
an old man’s eye bloodied by a line drive
hit off, say, Brooks Robinson’s bat that day
the Yanks hosted Baltimore, Mick figurine-
small way out in center, but step into
the batter’s box, cousin, as the Mick did
and the Say Hey Kid, to touch the width
and breadth of what touches all, everything.
New York at Mantle’s fingertips, New York
in the pocket of the glove of a kid, Willie
Mays from cotton-field Alabama, Mick
from dustbowl Oklahoma, and you from
greenery of Dumont, the country it was
then, to ride in a Buick across the GW,
step into shadows tall brick walls, courtyard
guarded by stone lions and gargoyles
on ledges and with strength of your eight
year old arms open thick, black-glossed
double doors, high on a hill. So many
cobbled hills, down to the wide Concourse,
sprawl of shops on Fordham, canopies,
the RKO marquee, all the while brick walls
burnished red, brown, light tan of five-,
six-story buildings. The hand sets a potted
begonia on a fire escape, no more than dust
today, that in ‘53 when baseball was king,
joined its other hand to clap a storm
for Mays or Mantle. Look at the tiny curls
of blond hairs on his powerful forearm!
A child might have said to himself to herself,
I love Mickey Mantle, or Willie knocks it
out of the park for me, every time. To come
from whatever he was seeing, cotton under
a big sky, Stars Fell on Alabama, uphill,
and in broad light feel something like God’s
hand (if I could touch what touches
everything) on his shoulder and hear a voice
say Willie, or Mick, this is yours, all of it.
Peter Mladinic’s fifth book of poems, Voices from the Past, is due out in November 2023 from Better Than Starbucks Publications. An animal rights advocate, he lives in Hobbs, New Mexico.
Bruce “Cooperstown” Bochy
by Rajesh C. Oza
Lost more than he won
But Bruce won when it mattered
Managed October
RETURN OF THE MACK
In the first three installments of this satirical short tall tale (links here—Part I, Part II, Part III), the re-animated Philadelphia A’s owner-manager Connie Mack (b.1862- ???) has hitchhiked to Oakland and hired a lawyer to lay claim to his former team. Baseball Commissar Roi Mangled and neglectful A’s owner Joe Fissure were getting mercy-ruled in the PR battle, and it seems that with a flood of GoFundMe dough, Oakland fan groups just might have a toehold on the revolving door vortex that’s been sucking their squads to the desert. Rocky Balboa ain’t got nothing on Connie Mack—he’s the ultimate underdog from six feet under. (illustration: Gary Lucy – IG: @instagarylucy)
FINALE – Part IV:
“What Color Is Your Parachute (Pants)?”
When the “Nightline” camera crew is snickering at your ass, you know that any semblance of dignity has left your building. MLB Commissar Roi Mangled had just been humiliated by an undead icon who pointed out that he shouldn’t be afraid of zombie ownership, since he himself had brought “ghost runners” to the game.
Mangled tried to climb off the canvas and score points by reminding folks that Mr. Mack’s nose had fallen off recently. How could he possibly keep it together as owner, if he couldn’t keep it together, period?
But body-shaming a zombie will get you nowhere, fast. Howard Gumption, the mercurial Oakland lawyer, cut in and said that his client had recently undergone a procedure by celebrity plastic surgeon Brad Chiselder to take care of “that little schnoz issue,” and flippantly added that there were many current owners who might want to upgrade various drooping appendages of their own as well.
Message boards had his back. Fans pointed out that with such a stinky on-field product, maybe Mr. Mack was just being sensorially sensible.
It got to the point where the Oakland players, already surprisingly vocal about their dismay with management’s plans, rose up and took their civil disobedience next level. It was impossible to tell if longtime infielder Stoney Camp planned to rip his pants when he slid into second on a double, but the fact that it revealed green underwear with “Sell” lovingly embroidered on the backside sealed the deal. Plus, it earned him a standing ovation from the Green Moon Odom posse out in left.
But the real capper was in Sunday’s home finale. When closer Tremayne Vork was warming up in the 9th, his usual thunderous rock-and-roll prelude suddenly switched to Johnny Paycheck’s “Take This Job and Shove It.” With that, Vork strode off the mound, unfolding a piece of paper from his back pocket that simply said, “Bye Bye Billionaire!” He moseyed past the protective netting down the right field line, climbed into the stands, and exited the stadium, high-fiving delirious fans on his way out. The “Norma Rae”-meets-Lou Gehrig moment was the sport’s first in-game retirement. Vork later confirmed his decision on a podcast but reiterated that he would happily come back if Mr. Mack was in charge.
Public opinion polls were overwhelmingly in favor of Mr. Mack being able to purchase his team back. The “contract” he’d produced, an agreement scrawled on a cocktail napkin from a Waldorf-Astoria owners’ meeting in the 1950s, seemed to be growing sturdier by the day.
While the grand jury was being seated, cascades of currency flowed into the GoFundMe, eventually landing at over $3 billion, more than double the franchise’s estimated value. Despite it all, owner Joe Fissure, the scion of an acid-washed jeans empire, told the Las Vegas Review-Journal that he had “zero interest in selling the A’s, as they are a treasured folder in my family’s portfolio.”
The very next day, Green Moon Odom had printed out “Treasured Folders” to pass out at the team’s last home series. Zelda Gumption interviewed fans outside the gates for her skyrocketing TikTok account, asking “What’s in your family’s portfolio?” The answers ranged from the vague to the vulgar, but the consensus was clear.