WHY I’M NOT TIM LINCECUM

I’ve heard it said that men spend most of their time thinking about their work and women spend most of their time thinking about their relationship.
Now that I don’t have work to think about I can devote most of my thinking to that other really important male pursuit; namely, sports.
And like a lot of other Bay Area sports fans, I spent all of my September and October fascinated by the San Francisco Giants. Having lived in the SF area my entire life, their victory in the World Series seemed to salve some deeply rooted angst. As the final out was recorded in Game 5, I turned to my wife and said: “Now I can die happy.” And, sadly enough, I really meant it.
I felt a glow for the next couple of days, and I think others felt it too. When I said hi to strangers, whether at the coffee shop or strolling around Spring Lake, I always followed it with some comment about the Giants, and people invariably responded with smiles of satisfaction and delight. It is a good time to be a fan, and this selfless team with their quirky personalities has made me feel somehow more alive and appreciative of the great and diverse place we live.
My hometown of Santa Rosa, about 45 miles north of San Francisco, has a lot of open space and parks where I go on long runs, anywhere from 6 to 10 miles. Often I will take my one year old daughter in her BOB jogging stroller, and I’ll have our dog, Kebu, along as well, attached to my left arm via a red leash. Kebu is a female Akita; 90 lbs of fur and muscle, with a black face, pointy ears, white legs, curly white fluffy tail, and a coat of shifting grays and tans. She is a striking dog and people often stop and comment on her; some with alarmed expressions, as they think she is part wolf.
After loading this crew in the car, driving to a trailhead and then unloading and getting started, I turn on my IPOD and take off running. And then my mind takes off too, usually on some fantasy that will last me the next hour or longer.
Now, I am a shallow individual and so my fantasies revolve around my being exceptionally successful in some profession that brought fame, fortune, and glory. Oh, and groupies too.
Like I said, shallow.
And invariably over the past month I have fantasized that I am a San Francisco Giant, specifically Tim Lincecum. Now, I know this may sound foolish and maybe even childish, but, remember, I am a guy and my mind is deeply programmed to perseverate on achievement, keeping score, and winning. And, like I said, if I can’t have work to focus on, then it’s gonna be sports or some other magical endeavor where I can lose myself.
And besides, I have a lot in common with Tim Lincecum. When I was his age I too smoked a lot of dope and wore my hair long.
Only then it was called being a hippie.
So as I run I fantasize about how great it would be to be Timmy; striking out batters, winning games, being a part of a great team. And this carries me through my run and I feel fairly happy and complete. As opposed to a lot of the time when I feel confused and inadequate.
After the run, as I am loading all the crew -- panting dog, muddy stroller and a babbling, happy baby -- back into the Highlander, my mind brings me back to reality by calling up memories of my baseball career. And I come back to earth, realizing I could never be Tim Lincecum.
And here is why.
Baseball is played with a hardball. And the operative part of that word is HARD. I quickly realized as a lad that if a baseball, a hardball, struck any part of my tender young body it hurt me in a way that left me in tears and feeling offended.
My overly active imagination was terrified of two things while at practice and during actual games; ground balls while playing in the field, and getting struck by a pitched ball while batting. So, basically, I was scared stiff all the time I was on a ball field.
Because I was tall and I could catch balls thrown right to me without dropping them too often, I was placed at first base. Now, if you have to play the infield and you are terrified of ground balls, first place is just the place for you. Most balls hit my way came off the end of the bat of right handed hitters who had swung too late at the pitch, and therefore, these balls rolled slowly towards me.
This was just fine with me. ‘The slower the better’ was my motto as I stood in the field pretending to be into the game and with only the scant protection of a lousy leather mitt to cover my entire body.
I lived in constant fear of the dreaded ‘bad hop’. A bad hop was a grounder that was rolling along on a nice, even, predictable course, and then at the very last instant as the fielder bent over, glove extended, (basically in his most exposed position) the ball took a sudden leap and eluded the glove entirely, thereby skipping through the legs of said fielder (thus causing unceasing derision from his coaches and teammates) or, worse yet, leapt up and hit the fielder somewhere on his person.
The bad hop could bark your shin, leaving a nice shiny welt roughly the size and shape of, you guessed it, a hardball. Or it could hit you anywhere on the softer parts of your legs, arms or torso, again leaving a welt and stinging like bejeezus. And then, of course, there was catching one in the balls. As we got older we were required to wear cups that supposedly protected our privates, but I had seen enough guys catch one in the balls, cup or no cup, to know that there really was no foolproof protection. When you saw a player lying on the ground in the fetal position and mewing like a frenzied animal in its death throes, you didn’t have to ask, “Hey, what happened to him?” You just knew; right now that kid wished he’d never heard of baseball, much less tried to play it.
Nearly as bad as catching one in the balls, the bad hop could take a demon-like strike upward and hit you in the throat or face. As I manned my position at first base, crouched over as if anticipating, even relishing, a ground ball, my mind was slowly going over all the ways I could be maimed by a bad hop; I could have my Adam’s Apple crushed, and never speak again; the bad hop could hit me right in the mouth, knocking out my front teeth; it could break my nose, or hit me right in the eye and I’d spend the rest of my life with a patch over that useless eye.
And the pain, oh the pain!! I had been the recipient of enough bad hops to know that even the most innocuous nick from a hardball brought an unwarranted amount of physical pain with it.
I was in the field roughly half the time during any given game, the other half on the bench. But even there I couldn’t relax. We didn’t have protected dugouts; no, we sat on benches with peeling green paint, and if you weren’t careful you could get slivers. And, if you weren’t doubly careful, if you didn’t keep an eye on the game, a screaming foul ball could find you in the time it takes to bat your eye. And if it hit you in the head it would kill you right on the spot. So really, there was no relaxing, and even if I would have been foolish enough to enjoy my time on the bench, I was constantly aware of the progression of the batting order and when I was due up.
For if you thought playing in the field was the worst of it, think again, my friend. There was nothing quite as horrifying as stepping into the batter’s box against a ten year old pitcher who was going to heave a hardball in your general vicinity, but with no real idea of exactly where it was going to go.
This was before the invention of batting helmets, so we wore a leather get-up that covered the side and back of the head, with a canvas strap across the top to hold it in place. No one was kidding themselves that this was actually going to protect their cranium when they got brained. Yeah, we tugged the headgear on before we got into the box to hit, but it brought little solace as we faced our death; except now we couldn’t hear too well either.
So basically, you are standing there, deaf from the headgear, holding your older brother’s bat that weighs too much, your mouth dry, your guts churning, and with only one thought; let me out of here unscathed. Actually getting a base hit, driving in runs, hitting frozen ropes for doubles; that was for strong, coordinated and fearless boys, not a quaking coward like me.
I had seen bad things happen to people who swung the bat; foul tips that hit your foot or ankle; cracked bats that left your hands throbbing with an invisible fire for days afterward.
But worse than that of course was getting drilled by a wild pitch. And like I said above, young boys who throw baseballs only have a vague idea of where the ball is going. Yeah, they mean to throw it over the plate, but it’s not like they can do it every time.
I’d been hit by pitches. And I didn’t like it one bit. And every time I’d been hit by a pitch it only reinforced the belief that I never wanted to experience that again. Thus when I swung at a pitch I pulled my left foot towards 3rd base and did the classic ‘bail out’, thereby ensuring that I would never hit the pitch, but, and more importantly, that it would not hit me.
Then the coach would scream at me; “Finn, quit bailing out!!” and the other players would laugh at me and my dad in the stands would shake his head once more. And sure, I’d strike out and head back to the bench with a look of false determination that said I’d do better next time. But really I was just relieved to get out of that damned batter’s box untouched; lucky to be away from a place where erratic young boys threw hard, deadly objects in my vicinity. And maybe it was a coward’s victory, but then again, I wasn’t in the back of an ambulance, siren blaring while it careened to Mills Hospital where they would have to perform emergency surgery to relieve the swelling on my brain caused by……… you guessed it, a hardball.
And that’s why I’m not Tim Lincecum.