The Boys of Winter

Opening Day: home; Fort Myers Sun Sox vs. Pompano Gold Coast Suns at Terry Park.

It is two hours before our inaugural game in Florida's Senior Professional Baseball Association. I am watching Luis Tiant, who is grinning like a kid in his blue Gold Coast uniform, clearly enjoying his first opening day in seven years.

But more than his mood is buoyant. Exchanging barbs with his teammates, Tiant duck-walks to the fence and begins to dispense his morning coffee through the chain link, the rakish sweep of his hips adding flair to his voiding. One of the ground-crew guys reminds Tiant that there are rest rooms available, just like in the major leagues. But Tiant only waves him closer and begins to charm him with the story of how, when playing for the Red Sox, he once placed this pinga of his in a bun, covered it with condiments, confronted his manager and said, "You call any more morning meetings, Skip, 1 give you a bite of this!"

Sitting in the dugout with manager Earl Weaver, Tiant watched the Sun Sox defeat his club 13--0. Commissioner Curt Flood helped welcome the crowd of 2300, while Connie Mack, Jr., son of the baseball legend, threw out the first ball--which, the announcer said, would be immediately jetted to Cooperstown for enshrinement in the Hall of Fame. (A month later, the ball still had not arrived at Cooperstown. As registrar Peter Clark observed, "If we had it, we might actually use it, but you can't display what you don't have.")

This same announcer, perhaps unnerved by so much history, then introduced the Sun Sox as the Sun Sets, a blooper that only those of us sitting in the Fort Myers bull pen seemed to catch. "That's us, boys, the Sun Sets," said outfielder Rick Manning. "Now, let's totter out there and knock their knobs in the dirt." His words nicely mirrored the competitive attitude not only of Manning but of the 216 other players, managers and coaches in the eight-team league who were taking to fields around the state that day.

In Orlando, Orlando Juice's U. L. Washington drove in two runs to beat Clete Boyer's Bradenton Explorers 3--1. In Winter Haven, the St. Petersburg Pelicans beat the Super Sox 9--2, despite the stratagems of Bill Lee, 42-year-old manager, pitcher, outfielder and designated Lao-tzu spokesman. In West Palm Beach, Dick Williams' Tropics beat Graig Nettles' St. Lucie Legends 8--1. And in Fort Myers, pitchers Dennis Leonard, Steve Luebber and Don Hood shared the shutout, while teammates such as Dan Driessen, Marty Castillo, Amos Otis and Tim Ireland combined for 14 hits; the first of their 13 runs italicized by a directive to Tiant from the Sun Sets' bull pen: "Bite that, Louie! Bite that!"

What most fans thought they saw that opening day were pitchers throwing 80-to-90-mile-per-hour fastballs, infielders performing with the sweet deliberation of snipers and outfielders making diving catches despite pulled hamstrings. But many sportscasters and reporters saw things differently, taking strange refuge, perhaps, in the sacred aphorisms of baseball's establishment: If the idea is new, it can't be good; if the players are old, they must be bad. A reporter from Baltimore said the quality of play was far inferior to that of the major leagues, then took the dichotomous route, adding that, still, it was amusing to watch 38-year-old outfielder Cesar Cedeño throw the ball 300 feet on a line to home plate. About the players, a reporter from Boston concluded, "Their participation shows a disrespect for the game they're supposed to love."

It could be argued that these reporters communicated what they expected to see rather than what they actually saw but for a lone derisive thread: lack of foot speed on the field. As one person in the press box put it, "They're hobbling around out there like old men." Which was true. But rather than serving as evidence that the league was a joke, it was precisely this odd, hobbling gait that was the key indicator that something extraordinary was taking place on the playing fields of Florida's old Grapefruit League.

•

These guys had had only two weeks to get in shape, and nearly half of the position players had gone into their first games with pulled hamstrings; yet they continued to play with an intensity unexpected in light of their injuries and the relatively low pay--$6000 to $36,000 for the season.

They had returned to the very fields upon which most of them, as young men, had proven themselves worthy of the major leagues; the same fields that, in later spring-training games, were party to their banishment. Now they had been given an opportunity to take a second shot at the game that had, over the years, taken so many shots at them.

Curiously, the media focused venom on the players' lack of speed rather than seeing the significance of their refusal to brake. As one reporter said, "Just about any ex--high school player over the age of thirty-five, who has stayed in shape, done some running, could play in this league. It's strictly amateur class."

Although I had been with the Sun Sets only a short time, no one was better qualified to judge how absurdly wrong that reporter was, and no one had more reason to wish that he was at least a little right--because, unknown to him, the would-be player he described was me.

When Jim Morley, the founder of the Senior Professional Baseball Association (S.P.B.A.), and his fellow investors sat down to draw up the bylaws, they left a loophole those of us never gifted enough to play pro ball could have driven a nocut contract through: "Each team can have up to three non--former major-leaguers on its regular roster." That made eligible an entire generation of middle-aged, weak-armed former high school jocks, few of whom were actually dull enough to think they had a shot at making one of the eight S.P.B.A. teams. I take pride in having tried anyway.

The day I heard that nonprofessionals could play in the over-35 league was the day I began calling for a tryout. My rationale, though flawed, was simple: Judging from old-timers games, few major-leaguers exited into civilian life as fitness freaks, nor did many of them appear prissy about weight control. It seemed plausible that I could do now what I had been unable to do 20 years ago: beat one of them out of a position.

I ended up speaking with Pat Dobson, manager of the Fort Myers Sun Sox and also the pitching coach for the Padres. Dobson looks like a manager designed in Hollywood: tall, articulate, lean, with the Clint Eastwood habit of lowering his head slightly when he talks, so that he peers up and out at you. In that first meeting in the clubhouse, though, he did little peering at me; he seemed preoccupied until I mentioned that when not trying out for baseball teams, I made my living as a fishing guide. Suddenly, I had his attention. Light-tackle fishing guide? Yes, I told him, for 12 years. Dobson, it turned out, was a passionate fisherman and, after a discussion of tides and baits, decided maybe I could have my tryout after all. Which is why, for 29 games, I was able to join the team--if not as an actual member, then at least as a peripheral participant who was able to dress out, catch in the bull pen and, on those occasions when Dobson remembered that I was not around just to talk about the habits of littoral fish, take B.P.--batting practice.

It would be inaccurate to suggest that I had a chance of making the 24-man list of activated players--a fact obvious even to me after my first day on the field. That partition of chain-link screen, I quickly learned, does more than separate the diamond from the bleachers; it separates, as well, the fantasies of the stands from the more strident realities of the playing field. For a time, I nursed slim hopes of making the taxi squad as an emergency catcher. But as those hopes also faded, I contented myself with hanging with the team as long as I could, enjoying the cramped bus rides, the motel beer sessions and sitting in the bull pen during the games, filling five memo books with notes on life in the not-so-big leagues.

•

First week: home; St. Lucie Legends vs. Fort Myers Sun Sets at Terry Park.

Terry Park is one of the few remaining antique ball yards in the old Grapefruit League, and its infield is tended like an Augusta putting green. Almost every spring since 1923, major-league baseball has come to this small stadium, with its green bleachers tiered beneath a tin rain roof. From 1923 to 1935, the Philadelphia Athletics trained here, followed by the Cleveland Indians, the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Kansas City Royals. Along with those teams came a glorious entourage of baseball legends, teenage phenoms and big-city news jocks. The base paths, laid down nearly 70 years ago, have carried Cobb, Speaker, Ruth, DiMaggio and Mantle, Clemente, Yastrzemski, Brett and Bo.

On my first day with the team, I arrived five hours before game time--not only because I was eager to get on the field but because I didn't want to go in when the clubhouse was full and have to react to what I feared would be 27 faces staring silently at me, wondering who in the hell this new guy was. Even though game time was far off, the clubhouse was already more than half full, with guys lounging around in sliding shorts, reading the paper. Instead of stares, I got brief smiles in greeting.

As I found my locker and began to change, Tom Spencer, a former Indians outfielder, came up to me and asked, "Do you play?" For a moment, I thought he was asking if I played baseball; it seemed extraordinary that they could spot me as a fraud so quickly. But then he added, "Bridge, I mean. We need a fourth." At a table behind him, catcher Castillo and pitcher Rick Waits looked on as I said I didn't know anything about bridge. This admission caused Castillo to grimace, and he said, "Oh, great. So now we've got another guy not worth a shit. Who the (continued on page 91)Boys of Winter(continued fron page 88) hell's in charge of acquisitions around here?"

That was my introduction to the Fort Myers Sun Sets. Never once was I asked where I had played ball or even if I had played--though that all came out later in conversations in the bull pen. To men who spent much of their professional lives moving from team to team, and who were accustomed to arriving at the clubhouse to find a teammate's locker cleaned out, with a different name taped above it, eno unfamiliar face was a surprise, nor even cause for much curiosity. I would be the new guy for a few days. Then I would become one of the guys. And then, when management decided it didn't need me, I'd become the guy who was here for a while but didn't make it, the one who didn't play bridge.

In a business that is essentially nomadic, the only constants are the game itself and life in the clubhouse, which is perhaps why many of these once-retired players are to be found in the clubhouse far earlier than required--some even on off days. As outfielder Larry Harlow told me, "On game days, you don't have time to really do much at home, so you might as well come in early. And on off days--well, I hate off days. I've had too many of those already."

•

The St. Lucie Legends are in town with their list of big-name players: Graig Nettles, Bobby Bonds, George Foster, Jerry Grote and Vida Blue, but they come in without a win. The Sun Sets are 2--0 after sweeping Earl Weaver's Gold Coast Suns. After catching batting practice, I hang around the cage to watch the Legends hit; Nettles and Bonds both loft home runs over Terry Park's distant outfield fence (360 feet down each line). Something catches my eye through the nearly empty bleachers, so I walk to the exit nearest the visitors' locker room and investigate. There, on the empty practice diamond, Vida Blue is sliding.

Sliding?

Yep, no doubt about it. He slides into second, then slides into third. Each time, he pauses to inspect the dirt accumulating on his game pants. A ground crewman is also watching, and I wonder aloud why a pitcher would practice base running. The ground--crew guy grins and says, "Because Vida just wiped pine tar all over his leg. Now he's covering it up with dirt. But I'm not supposed to say anything, because Vida said at this level, it's not cheating, it's just getting an edge."

With occasional visits to the pine tar on his slide--savaged pants, plus his 90-mph fastball, Blue gives up only one run in five innings with the help of two circus catches by Juan Beniquez in center. We lose 8--1. Afterward, the normally cheerful clubhouse is grim. The sound of cleats echoes off the cement floor and guys limp toward the showers wordlessly--most of them with huge bruises on their thighs, the black badges of pulled hamstrings. Even Dan Driessen, who seems always to be smiling, is subdued. For the first time, I realize how seriously these guys are taking their return to baseball and how much they hate to lose.

The second game of the series goes our way, though. Sitting in the bull pen with Marty Castillo (who has a night off from catching) and pitchers Don Hood, Eric Rasmussen, Doug Bird, Dennis Leonard, Dick Drago and Dave LaRoche, we watch Amos Otis hit a three-run homer in the first. Then Rick Manning and Tim Ireland each drive in runs in the second. Our designated hitter, Pat Putnam, is hitting ropes on his way to a three-for-four night, Wayne Garland pitches five no-hit innings and our third baseman, Ron Jackson, backhands and barehands balls, throws off his right foot, makes it look easy.

By the sixth inning, we have a 9--1 lead and the mood in the bull pen, always relaxed, relaxes even more. Bird and Leonard begin to talk about a famous American League ground keeper. "Remember when those guys started peeing in the rain gauge? Man, they just about drove the ground keeper nuts. He would come to the park and find four or five inches in the rain gauge every single morning. He'd look at that thing and scratch his head, then look at the parking lot to see if there were any puddles. No puddles. Then he'd carry the gauge around, show it to us and say, 'You know, it musta rained cats and dogs last night, but this dang field didn't hold a drop! Not a drop!' We'd just pull away, like 'Get that thing out of my face,' and say, 'You're doing a great job. You're magic, man.'"

Which reminds one of the coaches of a joke played on Cleveland's Sam McDowell, the Indians' pitching ace of the Sixties. "We took the hinges off Sam's hotel door one night, and he comes back after a long party, rams the key in the hole and the whole door gives way. He falls into his room face first, right on top of the door, and just lies there groaning. Then he jumps up, goes straight to the phone and calls the police. We're out in the hall, and we can hear him talking. 'This the police? Hey, somebody busted into my room. Yeah, no shit. I think they took my gun, too. A big gun.' The moment Sam mentions his gun, we clear out. We knew nobody had touched his gun.

"Next morning, Sam goes for a swim in the hotel pool and drops a big log right there. People all around, and Sam drops a massive floater. Then he tries to blame it on some kid. I mean, the log's as big as the kid's leg, and he's trying to blame this eight-year-old. That night, Sam goes out and throws, like, a two-hitter; this was back when he threw gas. But in the clubhouse, he's still bitching about this kid he says dropped the big log."

As they talk, Larry Harlow makes a long run and a diving catch, thudding shoulder first and skidding on his face past the foul line right in front of us. Castillo yells, "Way to hustle, Hawk; way to give it up!" then to the bull pen observes, "That's a tough way to get sober. I tried it in high school once."

We win 11--2. We win the next night, too, with solid defensive play from Harlow, Castillo, Driessen and utility man Kim Allen. Walking from the bull pen to the locker room, Drago studies the scoreboard, admiring the team's total of 17 hits, and says, with an appreciation that could be felt only by a pitcher, "My God, and we haven't even had time to cork our bats yet."

•

Life at middle age may be essentially serious, but life in the Senior League, especially during a bus trip, is not. There are 33 of us sitting shoulder to shoulder on this air-conditioned motor coach; 33 grown men who are respected in their communities, some of whom haven't ridden a team bus in more than ten years. There is a reunion atmosphere in which time appears as warped as the humor.

In a seat ahead of me, a former Yankee pitcher is telling a story about Lou Piniella: "We were on the bus outside Yankee Stadium, getting ready to go to the airport, when this girl jumps on, drops her pants and wants all of us to autograph her butt...."

From the back of the bus, pitcher Steve McCatty interrupts, groaning, "Aw, no, Hose just cut the cheese."

To which catcher Tim Hosley replies, "No, sir, it wasn't me, man! It was Catty. He's the one who smelled it first."

But the Piniella story continues: "Well, that sort of thing happens in The Show, but we're gentlemen about it, and we all sign this girl's backside as she moves down the aisle...."

McCatty, who looks like a muscular Captain Kangaroo, is moaning, "Aw, Hose, something crawled up you and died" and Dan Driessen is spraying a can (continued on oage 147)Boys of Winter(continued from page 92) of Right Guard as air freshener, yet the story progresses: "So Steinbrenner hears about this chick later, and he jumps us about it in the clubhouse, really pissed off...."

Infielder Pepe Frias, who has the strange habit of repeating nearly everything he says three times, yells to Hosley in support, "Hose, man, you can fart, you can fart, you can fart!" and the Piniella story ends: "So Piniella listens to this bullshit until he can't take it anymore and says to Steinbrenner, 'Aw, George, if you'da been on the bus, you'da signed her ass, too.'"

Sitting next to me is Rick SaBell, the only player without major--league experience to make the team. SaBell played one season of Class A ball before the Pirates released him to his current career as a flight attendant. He has taken a leave of absence from his job with Continental Airlines, he says, not just because it's a chance to redeem what he perceives as his failure to make it in baseball but because it's an opportunity to be part of a team again. He points out, correctly, that those of us on the bus have a generational tie: We all played little league and high school ball about the same time, but only those with exceptional gifts went on to play in the major leagues, leaving the rest of us behind.

"Just being on the taxi squad," he tells me, "it's an honor to be on the same field with these guys. At first, I was worried I wouldn't be accepted because I never made it out of A ball. But they've been great to me; there's no snobbery at all, even from the big--name guys. There's nothing fake about it, no bullshit. They're just happy to have a chance to play again."

Not only has SaBell been accepted; in many ways, he is a pivotal figure in our team unity. Because he is not tall (5'7"), looks like beer pitchman Joe Piscopo and is a flight steward, many jokes revolve around him. From the back of the bus, McCatty calls out, "Hey, stewardess, we need more Diet Coke back here." Then: "Heads up, you guys, Piscopo's going for Coke. Get your knees out of the aisle or you'll break his nose."

Grinning, SaBell yells back, "Get your own Coke, you big dumb shit."

McCatty, who is also a color commentator for the Oakland A's, rises: "It's Mr. Big Dumb Shit to you."

•

Second week: away; Fort Myers Sun Sets vs. Pompano Gold Coast Suns at Municipal Stadium.

We lost last night 7--6, despite a ninth-inning three-run homer by Otis, and this morning, coach Tony Torchia has brought us early to this bleak old field for optional hitting. I hit first, then go to put on the catching gear, but Tbrchia surprises me by telling me to pitch instead.

I like pitching, but the other guys seem to enjoy it even more, teeing off on my flat fastballs, hitting these screaming shots, some of which would surely kill me were it not for the protective screen in front of me. The fourth or fifth hitter is Pepe Frias ("You can pitch, you can pitch, you can pitch!"), but his cuts are interrupted by someone yelling from the home team's dugout, "What the fuck are you doing out here?"

I look to see a small man in a Gold Coast uniform marching toward me, and he says again, "What the fuck are you doing out here?"

Clearly, he is yelling at me, and in the confusion of the moment, I wonder if he is one of my disgruntled fishing clients. But then I realize he is Earl Weaver and assume he has spotted me as a nonpro player. He stops at the mound and, wagging his finger at me, demands, "What are you guys doing out here so fucking early? We take B.P. first."

Adding to the mayhem is a Spanish--accented voice, yelling, "Give me a peech, man! Just one peech!" I look to see 54-year-old former Yankee Pedro Ramos, standing next to the batting cage and begging for one of my flat fastballs.

Weaver says, "You guys aren't fucking supposed to be out here yet!"

I can't tell if Weaver is actually angry, but just in case, I point to Frias and say, "It was his idea--talk to him," figuring that Frias will tell Weaver to bite it, bite it, bite it. As Weaver walks toward Frias, Ramos is still calling, "Just one peech, man. Just one peech!"

To me, Weaver yells over his shoulder, "Christ, just throw him the fucking ball. It's the only thing that'll shut him up."

•

Standing at the batting cage, I watch a new pitcher trying out for Gold Coast. He is throwing to Paul Blair, and Weaver is calling to the pitcher, "Just toss it in nice 'n' easy, Jim. This is just B.P., doesn't mean shit. This ain't your tryout." Blair hits a half dozen screamers and Weaver yells, "OK, Jim, now try a few curves. Just spin it up there; don't worry about it breaking. This doesn't mean diddley." Blair knocks the next two off the wall in left center, and Weaver turns to the man standing next to him and confides, "Christ, this guy Jim can't throw a fucking curve ball, either."

•

At night, this ragged Pompano field glows with the strange fluorescence of a deserted bus station. Before nearly empty stands (attendance 400), with palm trees rattling in a gusting sea wind, we beat Gold Coast 14--4, with Amos Otis hitting his second and third consecutive three-run homers. Otis, 42, is having the best start of his professional career, hitting .455 with 17 R.B.I.s in only seven games, and the baseball-card collectors are waiting for him as he exits the locker room. But Otis' attention immediately turns toward three little-league-age boys who are at the park late and alone, still carrying their school-books. He says to them, "You guys shouldn't be up so late. Your homework done? Open those books and let me see your homework. You better head straight home and get this work done--then get to bed!"

Otis' paternalism is not uncommon on a team, or in a league, where nearly every player is a father. But as I sit next to him on the darkened bus, he begins to talk about his relationship with his youngest son, Cory, 15. His concern for those ball-park kids comes into sharper focus.

"My last year in baseball, 'eighty-four, I was with the Pirates, hitting about .160, no home runs, and they released me midway through the season. Cory was just ten, but he remembers how it was. The Pirates told me I was released when I was at the airport, getting ready to board for an away series. Seventeen years in the majors and they tell me like that, with my bags packed. So the last five years, the only baseball I played was with Cory. We'd play catch in the yard, and he'd tell me, year in, year out, I could still play. I'd say, 'Naw, Cory, I can't play no more.'

"When I got the opportunity to play here, I wanted to do good. That last season with the Pirates has always kind of been a thorn in my side; I just hated going out like that. Thing is, I had no idea how I'd do on the field now. I didn't want to embarrass myself, but mostly, I didn't want to embarrass my family. I think it was like that with a lot of guys." He grins. "So far, though, things are working out. Last night, I called home and Cory answered. He didn't say, 'Hello, how ya doin'?' nothing. All he says is, 'I told you you could still play, Dad, I told you.'"

•

One falls easily into the routine of baseball life on the road. After mornings spent jogging or giving Tony Torchia fly-casting lessons, the bus carries us to the park, where we take B.P, stretch, play long toss, then take infield. Because we arrive so far in advance of the game, there's plenty of idle time for the running jokes that are part of the fabric of this team and probably all teams. Tim Hosley, who is fearless on the field, has a horror of insects, so it is not unusual to see him being stalked by someone palming a freshly caught grasshopper. Marty Castillo enjoys lunging for throws, slapping his glove to your head and acting as if he has saved your life, a stunt he pulls on me almost daily now. "That woulda knocked your damn side doors off," he always says. It has gotten to the point where, if Castillo is near and the shadow of a bird passes by, I instinctively duck, fearing for my side doors. This afternoon, I watch him sneaking up on Putnam, who, just before being attacked, jogged off smiling as if Castillo did not exist. Castillo turned toward me, hands on hips, and said, "Crap, now I've lost my Indian skills, too," in clear reference to the early media criticism the players took.

It is my impression that, while skill parity may be judged from the bleachers, the tools that make up those skills can be appreciated only on the field itself. Castillo holds up a ball, says, "Let's play some," and we begin to back away, throwing easily, until we are about 50 yards apart. Castillo probably has the best arm on the team, perhaps the best arm in the league; and as he begins to throw harder, I am puzzled, as I have always been, by this strange phenomenon, the major-league arm.

Castillo and I are about the same size and build, yet when he turns the ball loose, it jumps from his hand and rises, seeming to gather velocity. It's the same playing catch with outfielders Larry Harlow, Bobby Jones or Champ Summers. It's as if there is some elemental transfer of power when they throw; as if, through some blessing at birth, their hands are conductors in a weird kinetic process by which the ball is infused with energy and nearly glows with a voltaic if temporary energy. For those of us who do not have the gift, it is a real pisser.

Castillo's throw jumps toward me and my glove pops, emitting a slight searing sound, the whine of leather. I throw the ball back, hard, but it seems suffocated by friction, its trajectory collapsing as if a tiny parachute has been pulled.

Amos Otis yells to me, "Hey, man, put some color in that rainbow!"

Kim Allen walks by, listening to Gospel music on his cassette player. "You're choking the ball," he says. "Hold it higher in your fingers. Get on top of it."

My next throw seems better: The ball appears to rise slightly; there is a brief flicker of life. I call to Castillo, "Did that move any?"

Castillo grins and answers, "Yeah, it moved--from you to me," and guns the ball back.

Castillo, who played for Detroit from 1981 to 1985, was a hitting star in the 1984 World Series but spent most of his career playing behind Lance Parrish. At the age of 32, the minimum age for catchers in the S.RB.A., Castillo is beginning to make even members of the press wonder why he is not still in the big leagues. As Glenn Miller, a reporter who covers baseball for Gannett News Service, told me, "Not only could he play in the majors, he's better than a lot of catchers there now."

Although tempted to ask Castillo about it, I have learned that discussing the circumstances of a player's release evokes a momentary uneasiness, a reaction of near embarrassment more commonly associated with the discussion of a failed marriage. In a game built on pitiful margins of success--one hit in three at-bats for the best hitters, six wins in ten games for the best teams--the notion of failure is repressed. Even so, a sense of having failed, ultimately, seems to be the inescapable terminus that binds all careers in pro baseball.After being released from the Tigers, Castillo started a profitable business but still found time to play ball in a semipro league for no pay. "For the California Earthquakes," he tells me, "because my brother was manager and I knew I'd get to start every game."

•

We won last night 2-1, beating the St. Lucie Legends, behind outstanding pitching from Rich Gale and Eric Rasmussen. Tonight, though, we lost 10-9, yet it was an extraordinary game, a pleasure to watch. Pepe Frias, Tim Ireland and Ron Pruitt made all the sweet plays, and the hitting was even better. Otis homered in the first, the third and the ninth, but Legends catcher Jerry Grote, 47, homered in the second and in the bottom of the ninth to win it. As Grote rounded the bases, people in the stands took up the chant--"Jerry! Jerry! Jerry!"--which was the most extraordinary thing of all. Although official attendance was listed at just over 400, I counted fewer than 200 faces in this huge Mets spring-training complex, and their voices made a wild sound, echoing off the naked cement stands before thinning in the night wind.

On the bus trip home, though, there is no talk of low attendance--indeed, players seem unconcerned that, on this road trip, the average attendance was closer to 500 than to the 2500 team owners say they need for the league to survive. The players seem focused only on the game; little else matters. This purity of purpose explains, at least in part, some of the great baseball I have seen these past three weeks. Magical plays are being made each night on the field, yet few fans are in the stands to witness them. Weeks later, speaking with Bill Lee (known as Spaceman when he pitched for Boston), he would liken these games to a Zen discipline in which artists perform in an empty room.

Behind me on the bus, I hear snatches of conversations, soft one-liners:

"Catty, did you see Grote's shoes? Christ, he musta pulled them out of the basement or something. They had cobwebs on them. They were fucking old Wilson Kangaroos!"

"To be a manager in the minors, you have to know at least twenty-seven four-letter words, and those twenty-seven have to include 'horse's ass' and 'you egg-sucking mother dog.'"

"Somebody dumped greenies into the coffee, but nobody knew it. Even the coaches were banging around the dugout like a bunch of Chinamen gone loony."

"Piscopo, hurry up in there, man! I gotta pee, gotta pee, gotta pee!"

"A soldier boy is a hitter who just stands there with a bat on his shoulder. And a Baseball Jones--that's what we are."

"Rasmussen's right. You have to be Bob Newhart to be a pitching coach in The Show, because the league is filled with Mr. Carlins."

Ahead of me, pitcher Jim Slaton sits with his son Jon, 14, their heads together and laughing, traveling in their own private orb. I rise to get another beer and Doug Bird holds up his empty can, saying, as I take it, "Man, it seems weird, doesn't it? Riding a bus again after all these years...."

•

Third week: away; Fort Myers Sun Sets vs. St. Petersburg Pelicans at Al Lang Stadium.

St. Petersburg, sometimes called Cathetersburg by people who know it only as a retirement center, is one of the best baseball towns in Florida. Players who seemed not to notice the empty stands of Pompano and St. Lucie now seem caught in the party atmosphere of the Sixties rock and roll being played over the PA. and of stands already filling an hour before game time.

Wild thing, you make my heart sing....

Steve McCatty, who is using a fungo bat in the bull pen to give Tim Hosley chipping lessons, looks up briefly and says to Rick Waits, "Man, don't you hate it when they play that song before you pitch?"

Waits just grins as the Troggs sing on: You make everything ... groovy.

Beyond the lights of the stadium, the sky is iridescent: A moon rind rides a fading sunset, with Venus, a bright-blue shard, suspended above. Above the moon, I see a bird gliding on straight wings and holler to Don Hood, "Hey, Hoody--an eagle!"

Hood, who is a serious amateur naturalist, stands beside me, watching, and says, "Great night to be at the ball yard, huh?" At that instant, a half dozen feral parrots scream past us, tumbling into the fronds of a palm tree. Pepe Frias sees the parrots and beams; to him, they must carry the scent of home.

Frias was born in the Dominican Republic village of Consuelo near San Pedro de Macoris, "the place where all the baseball players come from," he says. One of 14 children, he slept on the floor in his parents' house and quit school after the second grade to help support the family. But Frias had the gift of speed and the hands of a natural shortstop. At the age of 16, he was chosen to play on his country's national team, and in 1967, he signed with the Giants for $1500--money he gave to his parents before packing his clothes in a sack and leaving for spring training in the United States. But early in his first season, he broke his leg so badly that the Giants gave him an unconditional release, and he returned to the Dominican Republic, thinking his baseball career was over. He was not yet 19. But then his mother hired a voodoo shaman to pray over his leg.

"Three times she pray," he says. "After she pray three times, my foot, it was healed. Three times, like magic."

For 12 years, Frias played professional baseball in the United States. Released by the world-champion Dodgers in 1981, he traveled to the Mexican League, where he played and coached.

As I pick up my glove and head toward the bull pen, Frias yells after me, in triplicate, as usual, "Hey, Rand! You can catch, you can catch, you can catch!"

•

Catching is what I like to do--though I am clearly out of my league with the Sun Sets. They have Castillo, who is superb, plus Pruitt and Hosley, who, as Dobson says, "know how to win." That sounded like one of those meaningless baseball chestnuts ("He came to play") until I talked with Putnam one day. After realizing, to our mutual surprise, that I had caught him in an amateur-league game more than 15 years ago, Putnam went on to list the places he had played since: minor-league ball, winter ball, eight years in the majors, then two years in Japan. I tried to calculate the approximate number of games we had played since little league. I figured my total to be about 300, while his came to around 4000. The latter figure would be roughly the same, we decided, for most pro players in the league. Counting practices, 4000 games translates into tens of thousands of ground balls, fly balls, cuts at the plate and complex game situations that, to these men, must no longer seem complex. The game of baseball, which to most of us seems a wonderful randomness caged between two foul lines, must to them reduce the world to its very sharpest focus. On the field, the options are obvious, and Dobson is right: They know what must be done to win.

I like catching batting practice. I like the way the mask tunnels the vision so that all that exists is the pitcher's eyes and the spinning ball. I like watching these guys hit, taking outside pitches to the opposite field, taking inside pitches deep, laughing and joking as they demonstrate a level of craftsmanship even they don't appreciate.

Better than B.P., though, is catching in the bull pen. My first day, the pitchers seemed wary and made sure I heard their stories about pitching to enthusiastic amateurs: grim tales of split noses and broken teeth. We use no mask in the Sun Sets bull pen, but my face survived--probably because of the extraordinary control these guys have. Everything is in a box, knees to belt, the nasty curve balls, the sliders and the fork balls, with their weird spin. After a few games, left-hander Dave LaRoche would tell me, "The other pitchers and I were talking. You do a good job back there." This ego boost was soon felled by Castillo, who a few nights later said, "Yeah, Randy, you might get a chance to play--if there's a real bad bus crash."

•

Waits, who has allowed only one earned run in the past 23 innings, is pitching shutout baseball for us tonight, and everybody in the bull pen settles back. Waiters is after a complete game, and it looks as if he will get it. The fans are really into it, yelling at the players, screaming at the umpires, making such a noise that people even ten blocks away must certainly know that a competitive sport is being played here.

In the bull pen, one of the pitchers is saying, "Two a.m., and my wife and I would hear this banging on our door. I'd open it, and there'd be Piniella standing in nothing but his underwear, holding a baseball bat. He'd say, 'Hey, check out this stance. You see what I'm doing here? Tell me if it helps me get my hands out quicker....'"

Steve Luebber, who has been pitching very well in relief, follows my gaze to the statuesque ball girl just down the foul line from us. We look at her, we look at each other, then look at her again. "My gosh," says Luebber, "looks like she stepped on an air hose, doesn't it?"

On the field, infielders who have supposedly lost their skills are putting on a fielding clinic, and hitters who have lost their eye are hitting ropes. More importantly, the fans are on every pitch, having a great time.

At night, a crowded baseball stadium takes on a life separate from the world around it. This could be Wrigley or Candlestick or Fenway or Ebbets, but it's not, and it doesn't matter. Not only is the game being played here, it is being played well; so well, in fact, that more and more people are agreeing that the Senior League was badly named. It should have been called the Masters.

In the weeks that followed, attendance picked up (though the league's future is still uncertain). Rick SaBell was released (though another former Class A player, pitcher Steve Strickland, made the team). Tim Ireland, who never got much of a chance in the majors, went on a 24-game hitting tear and finally proved just how good he was by winning the league batting title. Frias became a home-crowd favorite, Otis continued hitting and Dobson and Torchia, both gifted managers, became acknowledged major-league prospects. Yet the Sun Sets, plagued by pitching-staff injuries, began a losing streak that did not end for days and days.

On this balmy November night in St. Petersburg, though, with Waits pitching a shutout and the fans wild with purpose, all of that is weeks away. Castillo, who has the night off, tosses me his catcher's glove and says, "There's no way Putnam has a better knuckle ball than me." We go to the bull pen, where he begins to throw that strange pitch that brings the ball to life, drifting and diving, and my concentration is absolute.

We win again, 7-0.

"We win 11-2. Dick Drago says, 'My God, and we haven't even had time to cork our bats yet.'"

"Piniella says to Steinbrenner, "Aw, George, if you'da been on the bus, you'da signed her ass, too.'"