by Jim Siergey
Bag of Tricks
by James Finn Garner
RIP Octavio Dotel (1973-2025), who died last week after a roof collapsed at a concert he was attending in Santo Domingo, DR.
New York. Houston. Oakland.
When they called
New York Yankees.
(and they kept calling)
Kansas City. Atlanta. Chicago.
I picked up my stuff and left.
Pittsburgh. LA. Denver.
(they still kept calling)
Toronto. St. Louis. Detroit.
My bag of tricks.
By the last season
someone guessed I’d played
with 25 percent of the active players
One out of every four
A lot of friends
Maybe some enemies?
A lot of stops
A lot of life
¡Salud!
How Hard is Hitting?
by Ted Kluszewski
How hard is hitting?
You ever walk
into a pitch-black room
full of furniture
that you’ve never been in before
and try
to walk
through it
without bumping into anything?
Well,
it’s harder than that.
In a Good Winter
by Richie Hebner
In a good winter,
I’ll dig 50 graves.
It’s good work.
I get 25 bucks a grave.
If it has snowed, you just use a pick and shovel, scoop away the snow, the ground is good and soft.
But if it hasn’t snowed, the ground might be frozen two feet down.
You have to use a pneumatic drill.
One time last winter, the ground was so hard and the weather was so cold I said,
“Ah, that’s deep enough.”
There’s a law that a grave’s got to be so deep,
five feet or something,
And the Rabbi says,
“That’s not deep enough.”
“Did you ever see one get out?”
I asked him.
h/t to Jim Koenigsberger and his great Twitter account, @Jimfrombaseball
The Final Frames are Finished
by James Finn Garner
The season’s done, the nights grow cold,
The best and worst of us grow old,
The Dodgers exult, the White Sox are hiring,
So let’s salute those players retiring.
Kyle Hendricks, beloved Cub
Now joins Denny’s Breakfast Club.
Joey Votto will still spread joy
Like a precocious, Pepsi-fueled boy.
Andrew McCutchen, with graceful ease,
Can now sleep in whenever he please.
In ’16 Jason Heyward got his ring,
Now he can orate on any old thing.
And old Rich Hill now takes the pill
Solely for his aches and ills.
Thank you, men, for the sounds and sights
That helped us pass our summer nights.
When the Hot Stove League convenes with friends,
We can say we saw you when.