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.
The rain-snow-hail-rain-sun-hail-sun-rain Belgian weather (we cancelled yesterday’s scheduled contest against the Hoboken Pioneers and barely squeezed a two-hour practice out of Easter Sunday) wasn’t the worst news of the week.
The Merksem Greys got the shaft from a couple of gringo ballplayers. It’s a crime familiar to clubs across the continent who every summer import Australian, American and Canadian talent.
The stateside cleatsters who show up here are usually in their early 20s, fresh out of college, and eager to keep playing baseball and to see Europe. Clubs offer a plane ticket, room and board, and a few hundred euros a month. The players play, sometimes coach (That, for us, has become the key element, as we’ve tried to develop our youth program) and act as general ambassadors for the game.
Belgium limits the number of non-Europeans on the field to two at once. Most European Clubs have similar rules.
The recruiting process is unscientific. Players and teams usually meet online, through ads that read something like this: “Team seeks pitcher-outfield-catcher-middle infielder type who can throw 90, switch-hit with power and steal bases”; this: “I throw 93mph, and will be the winning player of your dreams, good attitude is my creed, I would kill my mother to win a baseball game, I might have a tryout with the Reds next week”; or this: “Pedro Martinez is the player-coach for you. I play for Yankees, Red Sox, Blue Jays, Cubs, Padres, Beavers, Bears, Rotterdam, hit .400, ERA 1.32, 800 strikeouts in 342 innings, I throw 93 mph.”
The result of all this hi-tech scouting is a grab-bag of ballplayas: speedsters, hucksters, crazy lefties, beefy DHs, slick shortstops, sturdy righties and graybeard catchers. Every few years, you get the knuckleball pitcher or the pony-tailed side-armer.
The specimens of Homo Americana that show up are no less various. Jerks, gentlemen, scholars, goofballs and old men, they come, all eager for a season in the Belgian sun.
As the Greys learned, you never know what you’re getting.
We brought over our first ringer in 2000.
Frank Pericolosi hit .500, won games on the hill and started a charity to raise money for our youth program. He’s now the head coach at Pomona College in California. We’ve captured a few other princes. Cameron Forbes, of Geelong, Australia, pitched his way all the way to the Frederick Keys, an Orioles franchise in the Carolina League. He lost his job only because he threw only 90 mph and was right-handed. His ERA was under 3.50 when he got cut. Then, God knows why, he signed with us. Of last year’s pair, Joe Vladeck, an ace righty, is now working for a non-profit in Texas, while Tim McLean, a powerful infielder, is coaching at Haverford College near Philadelphia.
We’re very happy with this year’s pick, Sam Faeder, a 23-year-old catcher and class act from New York City who hit .308 last year in the inaugural season of the Israeli pro league.
But amongst the winners, we also managed to buy airline tickets, food and plenty of euros for a 50-year-old pot-smoker who still lived with his parents (we hired him to coach, God doesn’t know why); a .221 hitting shortstop with addictions to anti-depressants (“anxiety, you wouldn’t understand”) and porn (“because I’m lonely”) and, drum roll, a psychotic flame-thrower who trashed my apartment (he peed in bottles, and that wasn’t the worst) and threatened to maim the 10-year-olds he was coaching. (To be fair, the psychotic urinator did have a terrific slider and two-seam fastball. In 2003, in a memorable contest, he beat the Antwerp Eagles, 3-2, in 12 innings, striking out 15.)
According to the Greys, Cy Donald and Gavin Ng flew in on tickets paid for by the Belgians, camped out for 48 hours, then split. Messers. Donald and Ng better have a good excuse (it will get a fair and balanced airing if they write to oldworldpastime@gmail.com).
Otherwise, they pulled off a very uncool con job.
Do you have a good story about playing ball in Europe? Have you ever recruited a dud ballplayer? Share at oldworldpastime@gmail.com
Previous Columns:
Playing and Coaching in Europe
My Country, Delayed by Rain
Every Monday I’m looking out for the weekly edition of Old World Pastime.
John Miller is not only a talented writer, he is also a talented baseball coach and one of the pioneers of the Brussels baseball youth program which is very succesfull.
I want to thank him for shearing both those talents with us.
Rik Ruts
hi sir
i am mussadiq hanif i am member of pakistan
national baseball team.
sir i gona play baseball many year. i am a
short stapper and left hand hitter.
i gona play baseball other contry.and my team win
the some baseball matech. we winn 7th asia baseball cup 2006. and also we play in japan thailand
indonishia. and united state.
sir i have united state visa and im playing baseball in united state.
sir want to play baseball with your team.
my all expence afored the pakistan fedration baseball.
sir give me all information about your team.
and send the address. and fax no.
contect.
ho/47 /stk/ blockx5/
peoples colony
city. gujranwala
state punjab
country pakistan
92.321.8185471
92.55.4275375
I just completed college and compleated 4 years. I finished with a .397 batting average. My eperiences in the filed is outfield,2nd base and pitcher. I am fast and earned MVP and freshman of the year. I would love to play for your team.