Dear Mom and Dad,

Hi and sorry it has been so long since I have written. The Major League schedule is pretty hectic and even within that context, it has been a very eventful week for your son the pitcher.

I speculate you may have heard by now something of my exploits here in the United States. […]

OK, Dae-Sung Koo can have his name back.

In fact, after today it seems overly familiar to address him that way, since he's said he'd like to be known as Mister Koo. So be it. In fact, why stop there? After his ambush of Randy Johnson and the Yankees, he's Sir Koo to me if he […]

Victor Zambrano is slower than slow death. In fact, the slow death store called to tell Victor Zambrano that they're out of him.

It occurred to me Friday night that for just about every one of Vaporous Victor's starts this year, I've been busy doing something else — working, traveling, napping (especially napping) — and that […]

I should feel more disappointed. What's wrong with me?

I dunno. Is it that we all figured that between Brown and Zambrano, we and they would take turns cringing at the sight of our starter? Was it that while we played horrible baseball, they played only slightly less horrible baseball? Was it the momentary cheer from […]

Does it seem to you that every “innovation” baseball has come up with over the past decade or so has done us very little good? They realigned divisions in time to give us the endless Braves (who would've made for better company pre-1991 than the Cubs, Cards or Bucs did at precisely the wrong moments); […]

I wish you could've been inside my head last Saturday afternoon. For the first four innings before I left the house, I made so many in-game deals with the gods and censored so many between-pitches thoughts that you would've assumed I was carrying the fate of the free world in my consciousness. Or that the […]

People ask me what I do on an off-day when there's no baseball. I'll tell you what I do. I stare out the window and wait for later in the spring. *

Off-days suck. They suck anytime. You've lost three of five, you've lost nine straight, you've finished the season having lost 90+ games and nobody […]

Didja see the Mets game Tuesday night?

Yeah.

Who won?

Mets did.

Great! Who pitched?

Kaz…

Cuz I wanna know. Who pitched?

Kaz…

Like I said, cuz I wanna know.

You're not listening closely. Kaz!

Cuz I wanna know!

Kaz…he pitched.

Cuz who pitched?

Kaz!

Cuz without knowing who pitched, I don't really know what happened.

I know this is a stretch, but the pitcher's name was Kaz. Kaz Ishii.

Oh. […]

Good night to be a Kaz. Ishii was good and Matsui was better, writing a storybook finish.

I shouldn't feel so confident so soon after losing five of seven, but I went about various household chores waiting more or less calmly for us to come back and grab this one. Maybe it was just not […]

Don't stand pat. Look smart! Have the answer to any given problem. “Say, you know how our second baseman isn't quite up to snuff at the moment? I have the solution that isn't right in front of your nose!”

Thus the recurring theme of Bring Up Schmendrick! — or Keppinger or Bell or Wright or whoever […]