Slaughterhouse 26

Slaughterhouse #26
START TIME: 9:46 PM
END TIME: 11:06 PM
WORD COUNT: 698

“So I was thinking, what if one of the best baseball prospects in the minors
was named Bartman and the Cubs had an option to sign him. Would they? What
position? Successful? Would he be on the team that actually took them to
and won a World Series? Would his decisive series play come in the same
game as the original Bartman incident? Would he have any relation to the
original Bartman?"

There were three people that popped into my head when I first saw this question.

The first was a young man named Jeffrey Maier, who was a 12-year-old Yankees fan who reached over the right field wall during Game 1 of the American League Championship Series in 1996 and deflected a ball into the stands. The play was called a home run for Derek Jeter and the Yankees went on to win the series. (Yes, this happened so long ago that the Orioles were actually contenders.)

So we have here a Bartmanesque character, though this one’s reach created a positive gain for the home team. The home run tied the game at 4 and the Yankees won in the 11th inning. The funny part was, there was some news drummed up in 2006, when he became the leading career hits leader in his university’s history and was featured on ESPN. Two sources reported Baltimore might draft him. This may be a match for the scenario described above.

The next person I thought of was last year’s Rookie of the Year, Evan Longoria. The guy hits 27 homers and bats .272 his rookie season with the Rays and they go to the World Series. Now, if his name was “Steve Longoria”, or hers was “Emily Longoria”, or even if she had the human compassion to change her FIRST name, rather than just tacking on Tony Parker’s surname, he wouldn’t have to hear a surfeit of jokes or awful Desperate Housewives puns. Anyone named Bartman would be better off pretending their middle name is their last name, and if there’s anyone by the name of Bartman playing in the majors now they have escaped the attention of Baseball Reference.

The third person was actor David Herman, who you probably know better as Michael Bolton in “Office Space,” who, when it was suggested he change his name, responded, “Why should I change it? He’s the one who sucks.”

So much of success in sport is based on confidence, and I would be willing to bet that anyone who could make it all the way up through the minors would have had to survive the inevitable, insufferable ESPN profile (you know Kenny Mayne is just licking his chops for the day something like this occurs), the jeers from fans, the night after night of the local sportscaster making leaden jokes, and still manage to overcome any of the million little things that affect an athlete would probably be a credit to whatever organization he wound up with.

I don’t think it could happen, though. I don’t think it could happen for the same reason that Joe DiMaggio’s 56-game hitting streak won’t be broken. We are too immersed, too aware, and too bombarded by the opinions and summaries of others, furtively trying to explain what it all means. Joe D had the same group of a dozen or so newspaper guys. Their work showed up in the newspaper, and that was it. Now, with television everywhere – nowadays by the time someone gets to 30 there’s cameras at batting practice – there’s no way the process doesn’t interfere.

I wouldn’t see an MLB Bartman being related to our man in the blue sweatshirt. I think any hope of him being a baseball enthusiast in a normal manner has been dashed. If he ever has kids – and that’s really got to be the match.com profile of a lifetime – I could see him wanting to make them cage fighters or defensive tackles. I couldn’t think of anything crueler than having to sit at a Little League game and you hear your name, announced over the loudspeaker, and some bozo has to make a smart remark. About something you did by mistake 6 years ago. Position? He’d catch. (And when I thought of that I was thinking of the fact he’d wear equipment and feel sort of protected and concealed; but when I wrote it down I realized the heckles wrote themselves.)

Though personally, I’d love to see a line of Cubs jerseys that would be specifically sold to irritate Cubs fans – “SIANIS 45”, “BARTMAN 03”, “MAC 03”, or “CAT 69.” Then again, I’m a White Sox fan.