Third baseman Andy LaRoche, after he’d been summoned, walked into manager Lorenzo Bundy’s hotel room with apprehension. For, thus far he’d been having an unspectacular road series against the Fresno Grizzlies, adversaries of the Las Vegas 51s in their Pacific Coast League, and by and large LaRoche had been foundering in the slumps of a poor season. Compared, at least, to his previous season with the 51s, and to his underlying potential as a baseball player. And so when he entered manager Bundy’s hotel room he asked if he had done something wrong.
He hadn’t. In fact, Bundy was, like a messenger from heaven, about to deliver LaRoche the good news which every minor league baseball player yearns to hear, and which countless young boys across the world dream of: He was going to The Show. The major leagues. The Los Angeles Dodgers.
That is, he had been called up by Dodgers management, who own the 51s, to play professional baseball—America’s pastime—where players make the big bucks, and, according to those who’ve been there, live the nice life.
The thing was, however, LaRoche wasn’t even the best player on his team. Nor was he having a better season than even half of his fellow starters on the Triple-A ball club.
“I think Andy was kind of surprised himself,” says Bundy, a man who’s been in the game just long enough to have seen it all. “But making the majors is all about timing.”
It’s true. In many ways, making the major leagues is a crapshoot. For once a player succeeds in climbing his way up to Triple-A, the doorstep of The Show, he knocks and knocks on the front door of the big leagues until chance lets him in. In LaRoche’s case, it was the poor play of the Dodgers’ third baseman. And so despite his .235 batting average this season, with just three home runs and 11 RBIs, and despite his team’s last place standing in the PCL, LaRoche, who does indeed possess a world of talent, was given a slot on the Dodgers’ lineup. Which is a scarcity these days, due to the fact that the Dodgers are in first place in their division, the National League West, and do not want to tinker with a team that seems to be clicking.
It’s all about timing. Which is why Tony Abreu, a middle infielder who took over LaRoche’s place at third base after he went up to the big leagues, has not yet been called up, despite his current .352 average and league-leading 50 hits. He has shined at every level of the Dodgers’ system so far, and baseball analysts call him a can’t-miss prospect, but there is no room for him right now on the Dodgers. And so he waits, ready.
Timing. Which is why Mitch Jones, an explosive power hitter, and a man his teammates say is ready to hit many home runs in the big leagues, remains with the 51s. His position—first base—is presently occupied on the Dodgers by Nomar Garciaparra, a former all-star with a superstar’s salary, and so Jones waits, ready.
The waiting can be difficult, says pitcher D.J. Houlton, who had experienced the satisfaction of playing in the major leagues before returning to the minors with the 51s. “The food’s not as good, the hotels are not as nice, and you have to get used to waking up at five in the morning and traveling by bus,” he says of the minor league life.
It’s a transient one, for sure. Players get shifted without warning among the organization’s hierarchy of teams: Single-A ball in Midland, Michigan, Double-A ball in Jacksonville, Florida, and Triple-A in Las Vegas, where several players rent out apartments in Summerlin, uncertain how long they will remain with the 51s. Players like Abreu make a blue-collar salary, four to five thousand a month. And at times Las Vegas makes the life tougher. Like on Friday, May 11, before the 51s’ game with the Oklahoma Red Hawks (the Texas Rangers’ organization), when the players took batting practice in heat exceeding 101 degrees.
“The old saying goes, if you don’t like the minor league life, play better,” says manager Bundy.
But the reality is, playing better doesn’t always lead to a call-up. James Loney, a prodigy who played—and played well—with the Dodgers for a span of 48 games early last season, says that while it’s quite important to prepare yourself every day, to work hard, to be consistent—that is, to be a professional—a lot of what it takes to making the major leagues is plain and simple luck. “You’re always an injury or a trade away from being called,” he says. “So you have to be ready.”
Because when you’re on the Las Vegas 51s, knocking on the door of your childhood dream, The Show, there’s no telling when manager Bundy will summon you to deliver the good news.
Ready, set, go fight crime! Are rookie cops ready to jump out of the academy and into the fire?
The good thing about closed mouths is they prevent you from making the kinds of come-back-to-bite-you-in-the-ass statements like the one uttered recentlyby Sheriff Douglas Gillespie.
Last month, he told the Review-Journal that Metro probably won’t need the second half of the money from 2005’s voter-approved quarter-cent sales tax to hire 1,200 additional cops.
The tax has generated $169 million and produced 226 cops; sixty-five cadets entered the police academy last month, and another 150 cops are expected to join the department next year (Henderson and North Las Vegas police departments have added 97 and 75 cops, respectively). So Gotham is safe.
Please. When’s the last time you heard a big-city police chief say he couldn’t use more cops? Here’s a better question: Do you feel safer?
Even with the new crop of coppers, Metro, at 1.7 cops per 1,000 residents, still lags the national average of cops to residents, 2.3 per; and that gap will undoubtedly grow as the local population continues to expand. (Metro officials didn’t have current data on which beats the rooks were headed to.)
Summer’s certainly not the time to skimp on law enforcement—school’s out, and crime generally goes up. The last two summers have seen increases in gang-related violence. In troubled areas like West Las Vegas, cops began enforcing nighttime and weekend curfews.
Methinks Gillespie is counting his cadets before they hit their beats. –Damon Hodge