You know Ryno covers
A lot of ground and
Plays the game the way
It’s supposed to be played:
He knows how to turn a DP;
He lays down a sweet sacrifice bunt;
He hits for a solid average and with power;
And he respects the old-timers.
Mark my word,
That young fella
Is going to the
Hall of Fame.
This poem adds line breaks to a reflection by Ernie, a character in Dr. Oza’s upcoming novel, Double Play on the Red Line.
A’s rookie Kurtz went six for six,
And baseball fans scored a Nick fix.
His four home runs made for a glorious night;
To behold history-making was a memorable sight.
When the kid hit Home-Run-One,
I recalled the team’s Philly origin.
Memory’s ball flew east back to 1901-1954,
With Connie Mack’s Hall of Famers galore.
After the kid slammed Home-Run-Two,
I recalled KC grooming a leadership crew.
Memory’s ball moved Midwest back to 1955-1967,
Whitey, Tony*, Tommy, Dick 1 & 2 now in managerial heaven.
After the kid clobbered Home-Run-Three,
I recalled Oakland names which were poetry.
Memory’s ball flew west back to 1968-2024,
Blue Moon, Catfish, Campy, Rollie, Vida and Mr. October.
After the kid crashed Home-Run-Four,
I couldn’t recall anything anymore.
Memory’s ball flew away, a wild pitch in 2025.
Sacramento to Vegas, the A’s barely alive.
Although young Nick collected 19 total bases,
His team is one of MLB’s sad sack homeless cases.
Like America’s forgotten underhoused population,
The nomadic Athletics don’t have a home in this nation.
*Whitey Herzog, Tony LaRussa, Tommy Lasorda, Dick Howser, and Dick Williams were all former Kansas City Athletics players and future World Series managers. Only LaRussa is still living.
“That’s one small step for [a] man. . .”
On July 21, 1969, under the light of the moon,
I looked to the sky in the shadow of Apollo’s men.
It was a balmy, childhood summer night.
Up above, NASA fielded three astronaut All-Stars:
Aldrin, Armstrong and Collins.
Two touched the lunar surface; one stayed back to pilot.
Just days later, in RFK Memorial Stadium,
The Cubs bettered NASA’s trio by a couple All-Stars:
Banks, Beckert, Hundley, Kessinger and Santo.
Two started between second and third, three on the bench.
Memory has crater-sized holes in my infield of dreams.
Around the horn were Cubbies I’ve immortalized in fiction:
Ernie watched Randy throw the ball to Ron,
Then to Glenn, onward to Don, and finally back to the pitcher.
Had all of Wrigley Field’s fan favorites
Made it to RFK via a Mayor-Daley-style stuffed ballot box,
Outfielders Billy and Jim would’ve joined the constellation,
And the NL manager would’ve started Fergie on the mound.
It was professional baseball’s centennial.
Players, coaches and managers selected July’s stars;
Richard Nixon and Bowie Kuhn leeched off their glory.
The following year, once again fans would vote for their heroes.
In 1970, I held a perforated MLB ballot up to the Chicago sky.
The punched-out holes looked like stars, all stars.
“. . .one giant [Santo-esque click-of-the-heels] leap for [Cubs]kind.”
Here’s the “starting lineup” of characters in Dr. Oza’s novel Double Play on the Red Line: Donna, Glenn, Billy, Ron, Ernie, Dr. Randi, Gentleman Jim, A. G. Donald, and Judge Ferguson. It will be published later this year by Third World Press.
I prefer BI to AI:
Baseball Intelligence is field-earned;
Artificial Intelligence is machine-learned.
Even an abacus can count to twenty-seven,
But only humans can feel thisclose to perfection.
C’mon now, where’s the charm
In Hawk-Eye’s robotic arm
Calling balls and strikes?
Gimme Bruce Froemming
Blowing Milt Pappas’ fling
With a perfect game.
It was 1972:
Behind home plate was Froemming in blue.
The modern era’s version of pitcher heaven
Had only witnessed such hurlers seven:
Cy Young, Addie Jones and Charlie Robertson;
Don Larsen was a perfect World Series top gun;
Jim Bunning, Sandy Koufax and Catfish Hunter.
Pappas would have been number eight, but for Froemming’s blunder.
Top of the ninth. Yo!
Only three outs to go.
A line drive to left. One out.
A grounder to short. Two out.
The count went to three and two.
Immortality needed one strike more.
Instead, Froemming called, “Ball four.”
Along with a few choice words (too blue to print here)
Pappas might’ve said, “A robot woulda’ got it right.”
But baseball aficionados know, it ain’t so black and white.
Why is perfection so rare?
Because each human actor
Plays a crucial factor
In twenty-seven up
And twenty-seven down.
This poem’s title is from Gertrude Stein’s “Sacred Emily.” The quotes in the poem are from A. Bartlett Giamatti’s A Great and Glorious Game.
“It breaks your heart.
It is designed to break your heart.”
Yes, I’m Commissioner Giamatti,
Baseball’s renaissance Bart.
“The game begins in the spring,
when everything else begins again.”
Young Petey didn’t begin playing ball
In some Little League gambler’s den.
“And it blossoms in the summer,
Filling the afternoons and evenings.”
With playful innocence and integrity,
He played Rookie of the Year innings.
“And then as soon as the chill rains come,
It stops and leaves you to face the fall alone.”
As a fading star and manager,
Peter Edward Rose bet on his own.
“You count on it,
Rely on it to buffer the passage of time.”
Fans counted on me, depended on MLB,
To call the betting a crime.
“To keep the memory of sunshine
And high skies alive.”
The bloom was off the Rose;
I banned him from baseball for life.
“And then just when the days are all twilight,
When you need it most, it stops.”
His Hall of Fame creds were extinct,
The man a triceratops.
“Of course, there are those who learn after the first few times.
They grow out of sports.”
Sure, Charlie tried to hustle me,
Appealing to the courts.
“And there are others who were born
With the wisdom to know that nothing lasts.”
Trump’s lackey, Manfred, litigated
My ban, dimming the game’s glorious past.
“These are the truly tough among us, the ones who can live without illusion,
Or without even the hope of illusion.”
Now Cooperstown must confront
Its Veterans Committee’s voting confusion.
“I am not that grown-up
Or up-to-date.”
So, childlike, I ponder,
What should be Pete’s fate?
“I am a simpler creature,
Tied to more primitive patterns and cycles.”
The book of baseball bylaws
Is verily one of my bibles.
“I need to think something lasts forever,
And it might as well be that state of being that is a game.”
My ballot? No, Mr. Rose, no.
For you, only the Hall of Shame.
“It might as well be that,
In a green field, in the sun.”
I’m on the wrong side of history.
Grifters and gamblers have—this day—won.
Cubs’ Pete Crow-Armstrong:
Grand-slammed pole as the crow flies;
Arm-stronged first homer.
On May 25, 2020, in the middle of a pandemic, head pressed onto a Minneapolis street, George Floyd died not of Covid but of a different virus: a blue knee to a Black neck.
1B George Sisler
2B Jorge Orta
SS George Davis
3B George Brett
LF Cliff Floyd
CF Curt Flood
RF Floyd Robinson
C Jorge Posada
LHP Floyd Bannister
RHP Floyd Youmans
MGR George Bamberger
MVP Harmon “Killer” Killebrew (for his genuine Minnesota kindness)
On a warm May eve in 2025, the ghost of Mordecai Brown
Returned to his playing field on the North Side of old Chi-Town.
At Addison he stepped out of a rumbling El train.
And then he mumbled while jangling his rusty chain:
“Mordecai. More to come. One, two, three.”
Leaning on a cane, he tried to get into Wrigley with a dollar in hand.
The ticket taker said, “A buck won’t get you anywhere across this land.”
Brown’s gnarled three fingers reached into a hole in his pockets.
He grumbled about the owner, bottom-line Tom Ricketts:
“Mordecai. More to come. Four, five, six.”
Back in 1916, Wrigley Field was called Weeghman Park;
The final year of his lifetime 2.06 ERA that left a pitching mark.
Today, the Cubs could’ve used his knuckle curve against the Giants;
The boys from SF scored too many runs in extra innings of defiance:
“Mordecai. More to come. Seven, eight, nine.”
The smoke was white.
Like the W flag, it signaled a victory
For Chicagoans.
Some say that Wrigley Field
Is a cathedral for those who
Believe in baseball as their religion.
Older Cubs fans lionized one Leo:
Durocher — manager, gambler, and author of
Nice Guys Finish Last.
Now we celebrate a more spiritual Leo.
The Vatican City’s conclave elected
Robert Francis Prevost as pope.
Residents of St. Louis say he was a Cardinal.
He grew up on Chicago’s South Side,
So, maybe he cheers for the White Sox.
He’s the first American leader of the Catholic Church,
So, a wag in the Bronx would be excused for saying,
“Lemme tell ya, Doc, da Pope’s a Yankee!”
But given that he roots for the world’s underdogs,
Pope Leo surely is a Cubs fan whose faith knows that
Nice Guys Finish First.
Borrowing “May the Force be with you” from George Lucas’ “Star Wars”, this poem was written on May 4, a few days after Eugenio Suárez’s four-home-run game.
Lou Gehrig wore the number 4.
And he batted fourth in the Yankees lineup.
Columbia Lou was the first in baseball’s
Modern Era to hit four home runs in a game.
Star Wars: A slugger in such a zone.
If ever someone deserved four more decades,
It was The Iron Horse, who died too young.
Imagine how many more innings he would’ve played
If ALS hadn’t stopped his consecutive games at 2,130.
Star Wars: A stalwart in such a streak.
On July 4, 1939, in Yankee Stadium,
At the close of Lou Gehrig Appreciation Day,
The Quiet Hero declared himself the
“Luckiest Man on the Face of the Earth.”
Star Wars: A baseball saint in such a state.
