geoffrey kirkman's blog

What started as a request by Red Sox DH/first baseman David Ortiz to his teammates to put money in a shoebox in the clubhouse to be put towards relief efforts for the recent disastrous floods in the western Dominican Republic, turned into a much larger campaign to raise funds to send to the DR.  Red Sox owner John Henry himself chipped in $100,000 to go along with the $31,000 given by Red Sox fans between May 31 and June 14.  This latter figure was also matched by both the Red Sox Foundation and the Red Sox players, and corporate donations put the total over $200,000, along with 1,000 pairs of shorts and 1,200 t-shirts.

At the beginning of the disaster in late May, there were numerous stories out of the DR of problems in the distribution of aid, and chaos in the humanitarian relief efforts.  Hopefully this magnanimous effort by the fans, players, team and companies in Boston will be put to good use.

ESPN.com’s Jayson Stark mentions as a footnote to his “Rumblings and Grumblings” piece today that “

Four more Cuban players have defected in the last month — a list topped by the best young Cuban position player in years, 20-year-old first baseman Kendry Morales. But teams we’ve surveyed are a little unsure about the other three. So their agent, Bill Rego, has lined up a July 6-7 showcase for them in Torreon, Mexico.

Catcher-DH Barabaro Canizares — who once hit cleanup behind Morales for the Industriales team in Havana — is the biggest name. The others are first baseman Mitchel Abreu and pitcher Yosandy Ibanez. “

What a remarkable story about the reunion of New York pitcher Jose Contreras with his family after they successfully escaped from Cuba on a 31 foot boat on Monday.  Among those who arrived were Contreras’ wife and 11 and 3 year old daughters.  What an incredible distraction the plight of his family must have been over the past 21 months for Contreras, and what an extreme example of desperation on the part of his family to attempt the trip.  Contreras arriving in a black stretch SUV limousine is quite a contrast to the thought of 21 people crammed into a 31 foot boat with an uncertain future.

Watching /listening to tonight’s Red Sox – Dodgers game at Fenway Park tonight (well, I wasn’t actually at Fenway, but alternating between watching it on TV and listening to it on WEEI) and hearing a remark by a commentator about the matchup between Dodgers pitcher Odalis Perez and Red Sox slugger David Ortiz, both Dominican, I started thinking about all the history between batter and hitter, or any player and any other player, from levels below the Major Leagues.  Surely Perez and Ortiz had either faced each other in the Dominican Leagues or played together at some point in their past. Likewise, the memory and experience of many major leaguers of others they face (not to vouch for all) certainly extends into minor league, collegiate, school and sandlot ball.  We all remember many things about people we knew at earlier points in our lives, and it is often extremely difficult to divorce those impressions, experiences and feelings from current happenings.

Thus begins a disconnect between the official statistics of Major League Baseball and the real life experience of the players who are being documented.  Sure, for official statistical reasons there is a big difference between what happens at the Major League level and what happens in the neighborhood field at age 13, but to baseball players, what they have always been doing their entire lives is play baseball, and the CV of accomplishments flows well past those of most other professions.  For players with a long history of playing with/against one another or at least knowing each other (witness the recent often-remarked commentary about Nomar Garciaparra and Jay Payton’s friendship from Georgia Tech, or the ridiculously derided) , that time that some guy took another guy deep back in 8th grade in a summer league actually means something to both players. 

While it is easier to document the US players’ histories (by identifying where they went to school, as well as the better recordkeeping), it becomes more difficult and more vague to figure out how the foreign players fit in together. 

In any case, we often have no idea about the relationship between players on the field and how they relate to one another. This certainly isn’t something that is captured by statistics.  Memory and emotion are still-elusive qualities of sports but affect much on the field or the court.  But the official story and statistics of sports, much like the official story and statistics of many other things in the world, don’t paint the whole picture.