Life in the Minors
Brendan Sagara
It’s freezing here
in heaven, but the game
always goes on
THE past two months have taught me one thing for sure, as Sheryl Crow put it, everyday is a winding road.Following a criss-crossed course that took me from Hawaii, to Mississippi, to Arizona, back to Hawaii, and now to Kenosha, Wis., I have to lay still in bed when I wake everyday so I have time to gather my thoughts and figure out just where the heck I am.
When I think of all the towns I've been through in the past eight weeks -- Los Angeles, San Francisco, Fort Worth, Texas, Chicago, Jackson, Miss., Phoenix, Salt Lake City, Shreveport, La., Honolulu, Denver -- I just can't believe the long and winding road I've taken to end up here in Kenosha.
Standing in the first base coach's box at Simmons Field, former home of the Minnesota Twins' Single-A Midwest League affiliate, leaves me a little time to collect some thoughts, and exhale.
Having no base runners gives me little else to do. Besides, it is freezing, and anything to take my mind off of the fact that it's only the second inning and my toes are numb, is a welcome distraction.
It has got to be like 20 degrees here or something. Okay, so that may be a slight exageration, but hey, after a week and a half in the 90-degree, soaking-wet humidity of Jackson, Miss., a month and a half in the 110-degree oven that is Scottsdale, Ariz., and another week in the climactic perfection of home in the islands, this middle of June, freezing my butt off stuff has got to stop.
Over the past 56 days I have gone from being a minor league pitcher for the Jackson Senators, to unemployed and looking for a job in baseball and the meaning of life in Arizona, to back home in Hawaii watching way too much daytime TV, before finally "settling" here in the upper midwest with the Kenosha Mammoths of the independent professional Frontier League.
And I do use the term "settling" rather loosely in this case. With about 40 more road games -- about 70 total -- remaining in the league's regular-season, I don't want to get too comfortable just yet.
Back to the cold ... well it's now the fifth inning, and I can feel every athletic injury I have ever incurred.
The right knee I had reconstructed in college. The severly sprained right ankle I injured, also in college. Heck, I can even feel the residuals from the ankle I broke in the summer before third grade. My shins from my years of soccer hurt too. Hah!
I'm sure the entire dugout is wondering why I've got a huge grin on even though we have barely managed a base runner to this point, but I think the delirium is kicking in. Man it's so cold. It's June 19, and the fans are huddled up under flannel blankets and winter coats. Wow.
While bouncing around the country and being unemployed for a couple of months may have been one of the worst and most frustrating periods of my life, it did lead me to the conclusion that I do have great friends.
My buddy and former college teammate Ryan Arasato, caught my off-season bullpens, and then took care of me, keeping my sprits up and keeping me on my workout schedule as I sought a job as a pitcher in independent professional baseball during my stay in Arizona.
My pal Rick Kuwahara, a high school basketball player back in his days at Mililani High School -- bless his heart -- sacrificed his general well-being against his better judgement to catch my off-season long toss sessions at Mid-Pacific Institute thanks to the permission of Dunn Muramaru. This usually consisted of me throwing from the outfield fence to Rick, who stood in front of the third base dugout. Rick would send the ball back to me by sprinting about 30-yards and heaving the ball back toward me with all of his might...getting the ball back to me on a couple of hops or so.
On bullpen days that Ryan wasn't available, Rick would stand alongside a hitter's toss net we set up at home plate, and wait until I emptied my bucket of fastballs and breakers before retrieving the balls and sending it back to me.
Well, I guess the baseball gods are showing me tonight that I should watch what I ask for. During my two months without a gig in pro ball, I made many appeals and requests to the powers that be to get me back into baseball this summer. Now in the 10th inning of our barn-freezing scoreless deadlock with the Richmond Roosters, I'm thinking maybe I should have asked for warm weather, too. Hah!
Back to my friends. Greg Tagert. Great guy. Played for him, coached with him for the past two seasons and won two division titles, and here I am coaching for him again. With a coaching position open on his staff and me looking for a job, he invited me to make the trip back to the midwest and back to professional baseball.
And then there's my buddy Darryl Arata, the pride of the Sacramento Kings' front office and the consumate optimist who always picked up the phone when I called him, thinking that I had some good news coming.
Making our way into the bottom of the 12th inning, we are now down 2-0, with three outs to make a run. By now, I've stopped complaining of the cold, because, well, to be honest, I think my entire body's numb.
The good news is, that I am back in pro ball and loving it. The bad news. I think there's a snowman playing first base.
Brendan Sagara, a former University of Hawaii-Hilo
pitcher, is in his second year as pitching coach for
the Dubois County (Ind.) Dragons.