John Miller, head coach of the Brussels Kangaroos and a reporter for a major American newspaper, is chronicling his team’s 2008 season in a column that will appear every Monday on mister-baseball.com. It is the first of several Mister-Baseball Blogs this year.
Kangaroo Field, like much of Western Europe, was basked in warmth as the Antwerp Eagles came to battle on Sunday. These Birds were riding in a tie for fourth place. Their record includes two forfeits for neglecting to pay fines.
The day before, in Antwerp, the Eagles triumphed 11-7. That loss, more than any other this year, was partly a result of my playing teenagers at key positions. We’ll take a few punches, though, to gamble on the future.
On Sunday, as Sacha tossed his eight preparatory pitches, the Eagles’ coach demanded a license check. Every Belgian baseball team travels to battle with catcher’s gear, balls, bats, helmets — and a plastic folder carrying a couple dozen slim white laminated cards with the names and pictures of every player on the field. It helps enforce two key rules: Only two non-Europeans on the field, and no unregistered ringers.
A license check is an accusation of fraud. It says: You must be cheating. Is there an extra community college flunky in your dugout? How many years has that Dominican lived here? Is that skinny 16-year-old Romanian-born pitcher warming up really Belgian? It’s also a natural reaction by a team seeking bureaucratic retribution for a couple of paperwork losses.
I left my squat behind the plate and walked to the backstop.
“What’s going on?” I asked.
“A license check, you gotta a problem?” said the opposing coach.
“Well, it’s not very sportsmanlike,” I said.
The conversation soured within seconds, concluding with the other party calling me by the name of a southward opening near my waist. The umpire forced the gentleman to apologize, and that was that.
The episode, however, drew into sharp focus the fertile intellectual ground of baseball etiquette. What is wrong and what is right in this intricate, legally-minded game? Ballplayers, as much as 19th century Germans and 20th century French, love to claim, though less frequently debate, moral authority.
The incomparable Dave Gutmann recalls a Kangaroo game he attended earlier this year. Our hitter floated a popup down the right field line. Dave, sitting in a foldable nylon chair and committing only the crime of cherishing a beer at a ballgame, yelled “I got it!” The right fielder was furious. That he decried, was a clear violation of the Code.
Who’s right? Well, this arbiter of manners and morals believes fans can say anything short of ethnic, vulgar or homophobic slurs. But why trust me? I’m just a stubbornly vain self-righteous ballplayer.
In the minds of the uniformed, the game’s unwritten constitution is a bible of such interdictions. You must not confuse the opposing fielder, or steal up by 10 (or is it 9?), or check my licenses, or time the pitcher when he’s warming up, or bunt with one out, or (in this country) chalk the inside line of the batter’s box, or use (as we do) the third base dugout for the home team, or…
The Eagles won 11-9, completing a two-game sweep over our league-registered team of seven Belgians and two Americans. It was, however, a hard-fought, decently-played, exciting game, the kind that makes a body love baseball. We have one more series left, and must split to stay in first division next year.
What is your code? Send your unwritten rules of baseball to oldworldpastime@gmail.com. And a picture of your field.