Jeterian

Waking up this morning I was curious to see how Jeter's Oscar-winning performance last night when he pretended to get hit by a pitch (on the hand, where there's like a million bones, and yet he was fine by the time he was told to take first base) would go over, and it turned out I had guessed correctly in assuming the media would be doing a slow-clap re: Jeter being "the ultimate competitor, doing anything to give his team an edge!!!" Of course, if A-Rod had done it the Earth would've spun off it's axis by reporters screaming that A-Rod was corrupting the youth of America and the integrity of the game and probably had shot JFK, but Jeter is the ultimate team player.

TB manager Joe Madden's quote also jogged my memory about something:

“I was just trying to present logic because none of them could tell me that they knew the ball had hit his hand, but everybody could have told me that the ball did hit the bat. So for me, it was a ground ball back to the pitcher. I thought that was pretty obvious.”

My very first ever varsity at-bat (earlier in the game I got yanked from center field in the middle of an inning) the pitcher let one fly, and it was coming right at my head so at the last moment I fell out of the batter's box. Coming to a second later and getting back into my stance, I saw the ball rolling back to the pitcher. "Why did the catcher roll the ball back instead of throwing it?" I wondered. Then the pitcher tossed the ball over to first base. "Why is he throwing the ball to first?" I wondered. Hmm.

Settling back in, I wondered "Why are the catcher and umpire standing straight up and looking at me?"

Finally the umpire said "son, you're out."

I was shocked. "What?" Clever, I know.

"Go sit down," he told me.

Walking back to the dugout I started thinking "Why does my hand all of a sudden feel like it got hit by a sledgehammer?"