The Shadetree Mechanic Chronicles

I changed the oil in my car last weekend.  That hardly seems worthy of note, but what was routine a generation ago is now cause for either celebration or questioning one's sanity.  I feel caught between generations.  I am in lockstep with most of my era because this was the first time I had not taken this car to a mechanic for an oil change, but Grandpa's "if I can't do it, it can't be done" handyman/inventor spirit resonates through my guilty conscience all the time.  I finally got up the gumption (and found enough time in a sportsless weekend) to do the job myself.

In the abstract, changing the oil in a car is not difficult.  Messy, perhaps, but not terribly challenging.  In my case, it's a bit more involved.  Partial dismantling of the car is involved.

First, the car must be on a lift or jack stands.  Then, the right rear wheel must be removed.  And the right rear wheel liner must be pulled back.  And don't forget to take off the rocker panel cover that runs the entire length of the right side of the car. 

Now we are ready to drain the oil.  Problem:  the plug is too close to the jackstand location to allow the oil recycling container to rest below, so I have to hold a spare bucket by hand to catch the oil that cascades out.  Of course, I have to jam the plug back in halfway through the process because the car holds about 8 quarts in the reservoir, and the bucket only holds about 4.  Dump out the oil from the bucket into the recycling container, pull the plug again, and resume.  Messy.  Even though I now resemble one of Red Adair's fieldhands, I resolve to put off running through half a roll of paper towels to clean my hands, arms and possibly forehead until after I have removed and replaced the oil filter (holding onto the filter with one hand and the dump bucket in the other to keep at least some portion of the oil off the floor).

So, oil drained and filter replaced.  Done?  Not even close.  This being a comically over-engineered German vehicle, there is another drain plug under the engine.  Plus, there is another oil filter, tucked away where it cannot be seen or touched until several hoses underneath the engine are disconnected.   The crankcase plug is easy to handle because the recycle container fits under it, but the second filter is a nightmare.  It took a solid ten minutes of crawling under the car and squinting into road-grimey crevices, and repeated retreats from under the car to recheck my reference materials, before I could even find the thing.  Adding injury to insult, the filter dumped its contents down both of my forearms as I searched for a way to smuggle it past engine parts and suspension pieces.  

Finally, all the old oil was out, the new filters were in, and the plugs were tight.  Oh rapture!  All that remained was to fill it back up with 11 quarts of oil.  Naturally, the oil filler is tucked away in the corner of the engine bay under the side panel of the body and cannot be accessed directly, making a simple fill-up impossible.  After eight-plus years of ownership, I have learned of these quirks and have acquired the necessary tools, including funnels, necessary to deal with these design ... challenges.  Eight quarts in, the car decided it needed some time to digest the new oil and burped several ounces of oil back up the filler pipe, where it landed on portions of the engine and muffler assembly inaccessible to humans.  My fellow commuters may think differently, but I find nothing alarming about trailing a cloud of oil smoke behind me for the several days it will take to burn off all of that overflow. 

Thankfully, after firing the engine up to allow the oil to flow from the reservoir into the crankcase, thus clearing space for the remaining three quarts (yes, it is standard operating procedure to top up the oil with the engine on), the oily part of the job was done.  I cleaned the rocker panel cover and wheel before reattaching them to the car, lowered the car off the jacks, and congratulated myself on the successful completion of a task I should have known how to do years ago.

Then I spent the rest of the afternoon scrubbing the garage floor, trying to remove evidence of what appeared to be a visit from the Exxon Valdez. 

Perfection

Tonight, San Francisco Giants pitcher Matt Cain starts his first game since he pitched a perfect game last Wednesday night.  Only 22 times in over 140 years of professional baseball has a pitcher thrown a complete game, one in which not a single opposing runner reaches base.  Amid the avalanche of events and statistics generated by the game for over a century, a perfect game stands out as a unique and singularly impressive achievement.

That Matt Cain was the first pitcher in the history of the Giants, a franchise with a 128-year history, is equally as intriguing.  The organization boasts some of the finest players ever to take the mound, including Hall of Famers Christy Mathewson, Carl Hubbell, Gaylord Perry and Juan Marichal.  Each of those heralded pitchers threw a no-hitter in his career (Mathews had two), but no Giants pitcher ever threw a perfect game before Cain managed the feat. 

Cain is very much in the mold of those great players of the past.  Drafted by the Giants out of high school, Cain was a big, strong country boy who could throw hard.  He has spent his entire career with the Giants organization.  Cain made it to the majors in 2005 when he was still only 20 years old.  Since then, the Giants have had quite a ride.  They went through an uncomfortable era of celebrating a tainted record when Barry Bonds set the career home run record in 2007 amid criminal proceedings against steroid providers. The team went through a fallow period after Bonds retired, as the franchise shifted from relying on veterans to young players who were not ready to shoulder the load.  Then Tim Lincecum burst on the scene, winning the 2008 Cy Young award in an otherwise dismal season, and repeating the feat in 2009.  Buster Posey arrived to win the Rookie of the Year award in 2010, leading the team to the first World Series title in San Francisco.

Through it all, Cain pitched solid if unspectacular ball, enduring an almost comical lack of run support.  Lincecum, space cadet Brian Wilson and the young, unflappable Madison Baumgarner garnered much of the attention for San Francisco's well-regarded pitching staff, while Cain simply continued to give the Giants a chance to win nearly every time he took the mound.  As 2012 rolled around and Cain entered the last year of his contract, Giants fans finally realized, as they contemplated life without him, that losing Cain to free agency would be a terrible blow to the team.  Lincecum is more decorated, but also more delicate, with his success dependent upon the perfect execution of his unique and unorthodox delivery (as his miserable 2012 season has shown, that delivery does not take much to go out of tune).  Cain, barely 27, is the longest-serving Giants player, emerging as the lead-by-example clubhouse leader nobody wanted to see leave.

The ownership group got the job done just before the season began, signing Cain to a big-money deal that keeps him in San Francisco through at least 2017.  Long term contracts for pitchers often work out poorly for teams, as the risk of injury and declining effectiveness over time are an ever-present threat, moreso than with position players.  More than one player has also been observed to put up eye-popping statistics during a contract "walk year," only to regress back to the mean or worse once he signs the big deal and loses the hunger that led to the huge contract.  The Giants, believing they are in the heart of a rare opportunity to go deep into the playoffs for several years running, took a significant but necessary gamble by signing Cain to a massive deal.

They need not have worried.  Cain threw a 1-hitter in his home debut this season.  He followed that up with a duel against the Phillies' Cliff Lee in which he pitched nine innings of shutout ball (Lee was more than equal to the task, pitching ten shutout innings) in a game many hailed as one of the best in recent memory.  Cain emerged as one of the top three pitchers in baseball in just about every meaningful category.  Still, it took him until June to balance his career record at 75-75, despite a career earned run average under 3.5 runs per game (a miracle in the steroid era).  In a year that Lincecum has struggled mightily, Cain finally took his place as the unquestioned ace of the pitching staff, even though few outside of the Bay Area knew who he was.

And then the June 13th game against the Houston Astros happened.  In the middle of a week of beautiful weather as schoolkids enjoyed their first days of summer vacation, Cain mowed through the Astros order and delivered what some have called the best game ever.  The game began with an uncharacteristic explosion of Giants offense, putting 10 runs on the board before the fifth inning was over in their best performance of the year at home.  As usual, Cain's excellence had gone unnoticed in the excitement over a rare glut of home runs.  With the win no longer in doubt, however, the attention of the broadcasters and the crowd turned to Cain's quiet perfection.  Cain delivered pinpoint control and was rewarded with bunches of strikeouts.  Somehow, a long drive to the fence stayed in the yard in the sixth, and then, in the seventh, the right fielder (previously unknown Gregor Blanco) ranged into the wide expanse of nearly straightaway center field to catch a deep drive in a full-extension dive at the warning track.  It seems that every no-hitter needs a stellar defensive play or two, and it is no exaggeration to say that there has never been a better catch in a game like this.  (I would embed the video if it were not for Blogger's terrible new embedding procedures; however, it is worth the time to click through to the MLB link.)

As the game wound down, the fans' excitement was palpable.  Even though we always have the Giants games on, I had not watched an entire game all season, but by chance had turned this one on in the first inning.  After dinner, as I puttered around the kitchen, I turned the radio on to keep tabs on the game, something I had not done since the World Series.  At that point, I was enjoying the beefy offensive performance, but I also took note of the fact that Cain had given up nothing to the Astros.  As the evening went on, I settled in behind the computer with the TV on, participating in an online chat of fans and fantasy baseball geeks tracking the game.  I felt the same joyful, tense nervousness I felt during the playoff run of 2010, and the full house at AT&T Park looked and sounded just like it did in those days, too.  It was the 2010 World Series experience compressed into a single evening.  Every pitch was meaningful, every movement fraught with significance.

After Blanco's miraculous catch (his catch would have made a highlight reel under any circumstances, but he had no business being in that part of the oufield to begin with), it was clear to anyone who believes in the gospel of the baseball gods that something truly special was in the offing.  My Facebook friends who are Giants fans went uncharacteristically quiet in observance of the superstitions about not talking about no-hitters in progress, and I was not about to break the commenting embargo. Like every other fan, I lived and died by every pitch. 

As the eighth inning rolled into the ninth, I got Michael out of bed to witness what could, I fervently hoped, be history in the making.  After two fly balls to the left fielder to get the game down to its last out, the next batter squibbed a ball to the third baseman.  He backed up on the ball and stumbled slightly, so while our hearts were in our throats, he had to throw from his back foot all the way across the diamond.  His arm was strong and his aim was true, history was made, and we could all breathe again.  27 up, 27 down, 14 of them by strikeout, Cain's career high and matched only by the immortal Sandy Koufax for strikeouts in a perfect game.

Matt Cain is not a flashy guy.  His perfect game will merit but a small blip in Sports Illustrated.  He does most of his work long after the media power-brokers on the East Coast have gone to bed, and is rarely mentioned in talking-head discussions.  But he is exactly the kind of player around whom a franchise can build, rally and win.  A no-hitter was going to happen for Cain eventually, and the perfect game was just ... perfect.

Not Coming Soon To Fodor's Travel Guides

In a fine display of civic good humor (or humour, in this instance), the Oregon town of Boring will become a sister city with the English hamlet of Dull.

May they both enjoy many years of mediocre trinket sales.

All-Star Weekend

Capping a 10-month period in which he received a Most Improved Swimmer trophy from his swim team and made the all-star team for his soccer league after scoring 20 goals in eight games, Michael concluded his sporting year by being selected for one of the two teams our baseball league sent to a Memorial Day tournament. The teams are selected by the coaches, and Michael was solidly in the upper half of every coach's ballot for the "B" team. Our team of 12 players was equally divided between 10-year-olds and 9-year-olds. As one of two regular-season coaches with the kid on the all-star team, I was also named one of the coaches for the team.

Our league sent four teams from two divisions up to Sacramento for the weekend. We all stayed in adjacent hotels that have large meeting areas, a pool and a basketball court. The parents got together over food and drinks while the kids played endless games of basketball and elevator tag, with baseball games offering an occasional diversion.

Stealing third

We had a great time at the games. Our first game was against an overmatched host squad, which we beat 15-1, with the score and duration of the game limited by mercy rules. Our second game was against a good team (which eventually played in the championship game). Every time we scored, they matched us. We had trouble against one of their pitchers who threw nothing resembling a fastball, while we also managed to keep their bats in check. We took a 6-5 lead into the bottom of the sixth (last) inning, but they came through with two runs to win the game. We were disappointed, but satisfied that the game had been played at a high level. After dinner back at the hotel, the kids played basketball together until long after the sun went down, suffering no ill effects whatsoever from the loss.

With the loss, we knew our chance to meet the "A" team from our league in the championship game was gone. Nevertheless, we wanted to finish the three-game tournament with a winning record, so we focused on playing well on Sunday against our next opponent, another good team. It was another closely-contested affair. In the bottom of the fifth, we managed to induce grounders to our shortstop (Michael) and our third baseman, and our tall first baseman used every inch of his length to stretch for their throws to get critical outs.

The pitch is on its way ...

Ground ball to short ...

The throw to first ...

Got him!

The game went into the sixth inning tied, 5-5. Let’s go to the highlight reel …

We scored three runs in the top of the sixth, the first driven by Michael, who stretched what was really a single into a double, and the second, game-deciding run, scored by Michael on a close play at the plate on a passed ball. The other team clawed back one run in the bottom of the sixth, and had runners on base, but our pitcher finished off the game in style with a strikeout.

Finishing the tournament with a win against a good team in a well-played game was a thrill for everybody. It was a pleasure to coach a team that was solid from top to bottom, which is of course the nature of any All-Star team. Michael played very well, leading the team in steals and third on the team in all other offensive categories. As shown in the video (captured beautifully by Cheryl), he came through in the clutch when we needed the leadership of the experienced players the most.

It always gives me a thrill when my kids get to represent their town on special teams like this. I'm especially proud of the hat I received by virtue of coaching the game. I got the hat not on my merits, but because Michael earned it for me. It brings my baseball coaching career to a very satisfying conclusion.

Next year, Michael will go back to being one of the young kids in the next division. However, he has proven to himself and others that he is a capable player with developing skills and, most importantly, an abiding love for the game. We are both a bit worn out from the long season, but I am certain that he will ask to go to the schoolyard to hit balls at the next available opportunity. That's fine with me.

Score Another One For The Good Guys

A friend from high school, who was a neighbor and a formidable student, went on to become a prosecutor for Santa Clara county.  She somehow developed the thick skin necessary to work in the sex crimes and child abuse sections of her department.  She does excellent work there on behalf of the People of California.  She put another person away this week for a very long time, for some very heinous crimes. 

My professional victories sometimes affect millions of dollars paid or not paid.  It is all part of how the economy works, and is important work, particularly from the perspective of our clients.  It does not generally involve making the streets safer for all of us, though.  I do not think I have the stomach to do what Erin Nordby West does.  I am glad she is out there doing it, and doing it so well.

Track Town, USA

Perhaps because NBC has not gotten around to telling me what human interest stories I should pay atention to yet, it somehow escaped my attention that the U.S. Olympic track and field trials will be held in Eugene again this year.  For a non-resident, I have an inexplicably strong sentimental attachment to Hayward Field.  Most of it comes from my appreciation of "Without Limits," one of the Steve Prefontaine biopics that came out a decade ago.  My love of that movie (cinematic comfort food to me) undoubtedly stems from deep personal ties to the town, if not the university.  One of my most fun moments in recent years was the lap I took on the Hayward Field track, before it received a makeover that turned it into more of a fortress and less of the quaintly outdated bandbox it still is at its core. 

Here is a nice profile -- from the Sacramento Bee, of all places -- of the track and city in anticipation of the Olympic Trials, which will be upon us (or at least upon those who think about the Olympics even when Bob Costas isn't introducing a soft-focus, piano-backed profile of an athlete who overcame immense odds, etc.) before we know it.

RIP Daisy (unkn. - 5/8/2012)

One of the things that brings me joy is a sunny Northern California spring morning, when the fragrant cool of the dawn gives way to the promise of the warmth of the day to come.  It takes me back to elementary school and the days late in the school year when the finish line was in sight, when class parties, kickball games against the teachers and summer vacation appeared on the horizon.

Today was one of those mornings, but cruelly, there was no joy in it.  Today, in what was otherwise one of the prettiest, warmest days of the young spring, we were called upon to be executioner-by-proxy.

Daisy, the border collie/Aussie shepherd mix we rescued from extermination just under two years ago, left us today.  Six weeks or so ago, we noticed her appetite was substantially reduced.  Since we never knew exactly how old she was, we presumed that her increased difficulty climbing stairs and smaller appetite were a function of age.  Over the last week and a half, she her breathing became labored.  It got to the point this weekend that it was difficult to sleep in the same room with her because her wheezing was so loud.  She was obviously in distress, because she could never get relief from the gasping.

We took her to the local vet yesterday.  The doctor showed me an x-ray of a healthy dog, in which you could see the ribs, heart and lungs.  He then put up Daisy's film.  The organs and ribs were there, but it looked like someone had also stuffed her abdomen with cotton balls.  She had the canine equivalent of breast cancer, which had spread throughout her body.  It was a shock to see it.  I asked if she had even a month left, and the vet said that she would eventually suffocate if we allowed her to continue to deteriorate at home.  She was not in immediate pain, but was clearly in distress.  He said that there are radical human treatments to deal with cancer this virulent and advanced, but those treatments do not translate well to canine use even if someone were inclined to try.  He said we needed to plan on putting her down within days, not weeks.

I went to the lobby and stared out the window while the nurse put the bill together.  I thought I had handled the news with clinical detachment until the nurse said she was sorry in a soft voice.  Then I found I couldn't speak, and paid the bill as quickly as I could without making eye contact.

We treated Daisy to fresh cooked chicken and any other treats we could think of, and she followed us to the table for the rare treat as any other dog would (one of the few ways she ever acted like a normal dog). The treats felt hollow, though.  We were giving the condemned her last meal.  She didn't know it, but we did.  We gave her as much love and affection as we could all evening long, even as she gasped, wheezed and could not get comfortable enough to lie down for long.  All night, it was difficult to sleep because of the noise she made.  Every time I woke up I hoped to hear her sleeping peacefully, to no avail.  Looking back, she probably slept only a few hours total over the last several days.  She also ate and drank almost nothing.

This morning, I concluded we could not continue to make her suffer.  We decided we had to make the final choice sooner rather than later.  The thought of her gasping through the rest of the week with little food, water or sleep was too much to contemplate, especially knowing how sick she was.  She went outside when Cheryl and Michael left for school in the bright morning sun, but would not leave the rear deck.  She stood still, gasping nonstop, until Cheryl came back.  By then I had worked through a halting discussion with the vet's office about our options.

In the end, we elected not to stay for the final moment.  I will never know if that was the best choice, but we were both so shattered that watching her take her final breath felt like something that would not add anything positive to her life or ours.  Taking off her collar and tags in the vet's waiting room as the nurse waited with a temporary leash that might as well have been a noose was one of the lowest moments in my life.  We walked her down the hall and left her with the nurse.  We closed the door and walked outside, Cheryl leaning on me for support.  That was all.

The decision to put a pet down is a terrible burden.  My college roommate, who lost a much-beloved dog some years ago, wisely notes that the pain comes from not being able to explain to the pet what is happening and what you are going to do.  It feels fraudulent to lead the loved member of the family at the end of a leash as always, with the knowledge that this time, she's not going to come home.  It is a participation in a betrayal.  Watching her suffer, knowing the cancer had overtaken her and would consume more of her before it was done, did nothing to make the decision to relieve her of that suffering any less distasteful.

Daisy was utterly devoted to Cheryl.  Even in her last day, she followed Cheryl wherever she went in the house.  When we prepared to get in the car for her last trip, she came outside willingly, but wandered off into the bushes in the front yard, as if she knew something was not right.  She eventually went to the gate to the backyard, the same gate she went through after countless walks on her way back into the yard and the house.  It was also the same gate I reinforced with metal pieces the first week we had her when she spent her first hours frantically trying to dig her way out of the yard.  Now, the only thing she desired was to get back in.  I so wished we could have let her.

Daisy did not particularly care for me.  As with most adult males, she distrusted me and cowered when I approached her.  We always assumed this behavior had its basis in whatever hell her life prior to us had been (some speculated that she had been kept in a puppy mill, and eventually ended up as a stray).  Still, knowing we would deliver her to her death, and that she would no longer be a part of our family, upset me more than anything in recent memory.  Such is the hold dogs have on our hearts.

She did not play, she did not bark, and she was not even particularly affectionate with most people, but she was a part of us.  She always will be.

How Many ...

It's puzzle time here on the ol' blog.  As in the classic kids' magazine Highlights, how many differences can you spot between this:

And this:

For further comparison purposes, here is where we started about 14 months ago:

The Boys of Summer, Spring 2012 Edition

After delays with scheduling quirks and rainouts, our Pirates have finally played half of our regular season games, plus a five game non-league tournament over the past weekend.  We are having a great time with the boys, and their families, even as they remind us frequently that they are just nine and ten years old.

The tournament, played against teams in the neighboring towns, gives us an opportunity to play kids in new positions, pitch players who have never pitched before, and use usual batting orders.  The coaches of our league like to do this every year in order to give kids new opportunities to play, but also to develop players in new positions (particularly pitcher) that we will need for the playoffs when multiple games put a squeeze on every team due to strict pitch limits.  We followed this practice over the weekend, which gave some kids a chance to experience the pitcher's mound for the first time, but also revealed some hidden gems that will help us later in the season.  The teams from other towns do not follow our practice, so we ran into difficulty in our first four games as we faced their best pitchers and regular defense.  Even though our bats performed in two of the games, our defense and pitching were not up to snuff.

Our last tournament game was against another Moraga team, so we went back to our normal lineup and used our top pitchers, who had not gotten enough work over the weekend.  It was another beautiful day, so to get the kids to loosen up and enjoy the game, we traded in our baseball pants and Pirates sweaters for shorts and Hawaiian shirts.  The kids laughed, the parents loved it, and we played our best game of the season by far.  Our pitchers (Michael was one of them) were precise and efficient, our batters knocked the ball all over the place, and our defense was solid.  It was a great way to end a fun weekend, and helped us forget the feeling of losing the other games.

Michael has turned a corner in his development.  He has become a very good player in all aspects of the game.  In the weekend tournament alone, he had five hits in seven at bats (they are shortened games), scored five runs, stole four bases, drove in a run, and pitched three innings, giving up one earned run while striking out five.  He also plays solid defense wherever we put him.  He made three putouts at third in our last league game before the tournament, caught a long fly ball in the tournament, and tonight had assists from pitcher, third and shortstop, the last on a nasty bad hop.

Bringing the heat on the mound

It is a pleasure to see Michael play so well, especially at the plate where he struggled most of last year.  He is now in a groove as a reliable hitter who puts the ball in play but also leads the team in walks.  He picked up his first double tonight off of one of the best pitchers in the league.  His effort and smarts have always been a positive, but now he is performing up to the level of his thinking.  While he is probably the third best hitter on the team, he may well be our best overall player thanks to his elevated play in all areas.  On a night like tonight, when we faced dominant pitching and our defense completely broke down, he was one of the few bright spots, making defensive plays, getting on base and pitching well (even as defense let him down).

Drilling a ball to right

He is not destined for the majors, but he is among the top players in his age group in town, which is a fun place to be.  He knows all the hard work he has put in is paying off -- his swing, in particular, has lost its little-kid uppercut to become something close to textbook -- and is having a good time.  He likes wins, but he does not need to be on a winning team to love playing (fortunately, in our case).  I probably will hang up my coaching spikes after this season, so this is a memorable time for me, too.

An Earth-Shattering Kaboom

We took advantage of a rare open schedule to slip up to Lake Tahoe this weekend. We did some sledding near the house, and later lunched amoung the beautiful people at Squaw Valley, all in mid-70s temperatures under spectacular blue skies.

Sunday morning, we were startled out of our lazy start to the day by a resounding boom that shook the house and trailed off in a long echo. It was a little like somebody taking a run at a sliding glass door and bouncing off, but amplified many times over. Daisy has been known to run into closed doors, so that wasn't completely beyond the realm of possibility, but the sound was just to big and all encompassing for that. It was like a single peal of thunder, with no preamble and no follow-up reverberations. I concluded that it was a sonic boom, but could not figure out why we would have experienced one. I could only surmise that a military jet flying across the deserted wastelands of western Nevada had strayed too close to populated areas at high speed.

As it turns out, we did hear a sonic boom. So did people across California, from the Bay Area to Reno and Las Vegas. The source of the noice, as it turns out, was somewhat more worrying than a wayward warplane. A meteor the size of a washing machine tore through the low atmosphere, turning into a fireball that was plainly visible in bright sunlight as it streaked to earth, ripping off a sonic boom as it passed through the sound barrier. It is presumed that pieces of the meteor made it all the way to the ground, even after it burned and broke up on its passage to earth.

I think I am glad I did not see the meteor come in. I might have been a little alarmed if I had seen a bright fireball streak across the morning sky, accompanied by a sonic boom. Manmade or alien, whatever it was could have been terrifying to witness.

I hate to think that my last thought, as the earth was blasted asunder by a meteor strike, could have been, "the Mayans were right!"

The Best Backyard Ever

An Oregon family has built a 1/3 scale Fenway Park on their back acreage, perfect for wiffle ball games.

I love this. If I had the room, I am reasonably convinced I would try this, but with a replica of San Francisco's AT&T Park. The pool could go behind the right field arcade.

R.I.P. Ferdinand Porsche

The designer of my favorite commuter car has died. Working for the company founded by his grandfather, who designed what became the Volkswagen Beetle, Ferdinand Porsche penned the equally iconic (and long-lived) 911.

I will deploy my car's rear spoiler at half staff on my way home from work tonight.

Boeing is testing its new space vehicle -- excellent! It's time to return to manned space exploration, to boldly go where we haven't yet gone ...

Wait a minute. This looks familiar.


Welcome to the brave new world of 1965 all over again. Automakers are mining the '60s for their current designs, so why not the space program?

Come on, NASA, quit pretending. Just call it "Apollo" already.

Building

Spring break has arrived. As with most traditional vacation breaks, it means far less to me that I wish it did. Annoyingly, employers outside the education system do not keep up with the childhood traditions of Christmas, spring and summer breaks.

Kelly's spring break will also be a bit different this year. She is spending her break with 240 other high school students and adults from our church and community on a mission trip to Mexico. This trip, which our church has been taking for more than 20 years, sends kids to build houses in communities around Rosarito. The trip is extremely well organized (it is run by Amor Ministries), a lot of hard work, and ultimately very rewarding for everyone involved. The families will get a solid roof and walls around them, and these American kids from the affluent suburbs will get a first-hand look at both the poverty in which much of the world lives, and how little wealth matters when it comes to the dignity of human relationships.

I delivered Kelly to the church at 5 am on Sunday; the buses were rolling by 6 am, and they reached their camping site by the evening. The students will spend the week in tents in a closed and guarded compound, and venture out to the job sites with their teams each day this week. Each team will build a basic 11 x 22 wood frame house for a specific family they will meet and get to know over the course of the week.

Coming off a successful two-week run of Guys and Dolls performances and two thirds of a year of high academic demands and achievements, Kelly really wanted a chance to relax for spring break. Once the departure date approached, however, she warmed again to the idea of the trip. She will get a chance to put the Spanish she has learned so well to use, and she may even learn how to drive a nail. We have no doubt that she will come back changed by the experience.

This being the 21 century, the church is maintaining a blog for the trip, for which we are grateful. The first step in the weaning of a parent is preschool, when the child is away for a morning a few days a week. Then comes elementary school, with the full day away from the house, and some homework besides. High school takes the child even further away, with more curricular and extracurricular activities. This is a whole new arena, though. Kelly is off doing something tremendously impactful in a community far from here, someplace we will likely never visit. She is going to have moments of struggle, inspiration and growth that are completely beyond our influence. As much I'd still like to share all of Kelly's experiences, this is a good thing.

Ups and Downs

Our Pirates' first game of the year packed a lot of intrigue and action into a swift six innings. Although we did not come out on top, the game bodes well for the season.

As the visiting team, we batted first, and immediately put our first two batters on base. We had runners on second and third with no outs and our three best hitters coming to the plate, which was a much as we could have hoped for to start the season. Unfortunately, those three hitters knew the other team's pitcher, a big kid and good player, and believed that he threw the ball much harder than he actually does. Falling victim to expectations of reputation, each of our three big hitters struck out, two of them on called third strikes. For his part, Michael, the last to strike out, swung the bat practically before the ball left the pitcher's hand, apparently believing he was facing the next incarnation of Nolan Ryan. Unfortunately, the rest of our hitters were afraid to swing the bat at all in their first turns at the plate. Adjusting to facing kid pitchers is a common difficulty for nine-year-olds entering the division, and one that will probably require about half the season to overcome. Over the course of three innings, however, we did manage to put three runs on the board, sparked by one of our weakest (but most spirited) players.

We managed to get solid pitching from our top three pitchers, including Michael. Our defense was shaky, however, as we give away outs and allowed the other team to come back from a 3-1 deficit to go ahead 5-3.

That was the score as we entered the top of the sixth (and last) inning. Our batting order was set up perfectly, rolling back to the top, but we were facing the other team's best player (by general acclaim, the best 10-year-old athlete in town by a wide margin). Our first two hitters could not get on base, leaving us two runs down with two outs. Then the fun started, in that delightfully unpredictable way that baseball games can shift momentum in an instant. Rex, our first big hitter, crushed a double to deep left field (retrieved by Rex’s younger brother, whom Rex struck out earlier in the game). Rex stole third and scored when Ryan, our next big batter and best player, delivered an infield hit. Still facing two outs and now down by a single run, Michael dug in at the plate. Ryan stole second, and on an 0-1 count, Michael stroked a solid single into center field, scoring Ryan from second to tie the game. It was as solid a hit as Michael has yet had in organized baseball. The fact that he got the hit off of the one athlete all the other kids in town acknowledges is their most athletically-gifted peer made it extra sweet, but also encouraged Michael that he is capable of competing against the best of his peers. The inning ended when Michael was forced out at second on a very close play on a ground ball by the next batter.

Due to pitch-count rules, we had to bring in a less experienced pitcher for the bottom of the sixth inning. The first batter walked on five pitches, and the second batter drove the second pitch he saw past our right fielder for a game-winning walk-off RBI double. We lost the game on that play, but it happened so quickly after our two-out rally in the top of the inning that we were still riding high in our team meeting after the game. The positive finish, coming back under pressure, outweighed the loss.

The game gave us a lot to work with as coaches, which we put into action the next day at practice. It also gave the boys good lessons about not giving up and understanding the scope of their own individual capabilities. Some nine and 10-year-old boys appear to be oblivious to what goes on around them, while others take every fractional success or failure deeply personally. We have both types on our team. Managing the players' psyches is as big a part of our job as teaching them how to field a ground ball. Our first game had all sorts of triumphs and defeats, gains and reversals. Overall, they came through it well, and it looks like we are going to have a fun, competitive year.

Now pitching, No. 8 ...

Play Ball!

After more than a month of practices, Michael's baseball team (the Pirates) kicks off its season schedule tomorrow. My co-coach and I are very happy with the team we selected this year. They have a lot of skill, determination and coachability.

We have played two practice games so far. We lost one game and tied the other, but we used players out of position and tried marginal pitchers just to see what everybody could do. That the unusual lineups hid the true talent of our team from the other teams is just a happy coincidence.

Michael is off to a solid start. He was the starting pitcher for both games and played well, particularly in the second game. He has started to put the bat on the ball consistently, and drove a textbook solid single up the middle in the second game.

Now batting ...
Cheryl took this great profile of Michael at the plate in the first game. The picture alerted me to some alignment problems in Michael's stance. Last Saturday, I reworked his batting stance to give him a more compact swing by lowering his hands substantially, and he has been pounding the ball ever since. To Michael's credit, he understands and put those adjustments into action immediately. Is not the biggest or strongest on the field, but he is a kind of player who can make a coach look good.

Cheryl also took a great sequence in which Michael was thrown out on a teammate's ground ball to short.

Off at the crack of the bat
In the next picture, you can see the shortstop fielding the ball as Michael is on his way to second.


In the last picture, Michael has entered his slide as the ball is visible in the air on its way to the second baseman. He was out, but only by a matter of inches.


Much of the time, when they miss catches or throw the ball away, the boys remind you that they are still just nine and ten years old. Every now and then, however, they will pull out a sparkling play that is pure baseball, regardless of level or age. I love helping the boys learn how to produce those sublime moments.

Making A Difference

One of my high school classmates, now a successful biologist, is the subject of nice feature in the local newspaper, detailing the work he is doing to battle brain diseases. He and his father, a chemist, are working together to develop a drug that may prevent the progression of brain damage.

It is fun to say I went to school with professional sports figures, but I am particularly proud to say I know people doing things like this. Wreck the curve all you want, Paul. Having seen two grandparents-in-law succumb to dementia, any progress toward beating brain disease is most welcome.

UPDATE: Paul earned himself an interview on local TV.

Wrecking The Curve

We spend our days doing the best we can with whatever gifts, talents or insight we have been given. We strive to make our little personal world, and the people who inhabit it, as pleasant as possible. We succeed daily, in greater or lesser measure, and move on to the next day with the general expectation that we will rise to the challenge of whatever comes next. That challenge is usually pretty moderate on the Grand Scale Of All Things: will I have enough milk to go with my Cheerios? Will I make someone at work laugh with me and not at me? Will I trigger the 30-second fast-forward button on the DVR this evening so perfectly that I skip the commercials in the show I recorded without going even a nanosecond into the show itself (which, if not done correctly, will trigger a back-and-forth with the rewind and fast-forward buttons that takes longer than the original commercial break)?

Then there are the people that make us all look like chumps.

This article tells the story of a fascinating kid who just happens to have figured out how to create nuclear fusion. In a garage. The really interesting kicker is that he has come up with a way to adapt his work to create a bomb scanner for cargo containers. I don't think I would want to be this boy, or his parents; his brain seems to work at speeds and levels that are scarcely recognizable. If he can harness his frighteningly powerful mind to work for good in the world, and he doesn't become a bizarre hermit along the way, more power to him. From my perch on the couch, I will gladly raise my TV remote to him in tribute.

And then there is this guy (video link). Unless you are a tall, tanned, muscular Adonis-type who could make Renaissance sculptors weep at the perfection of your abs, with a peerless sense of drama and timing, you cannot approach the sublimity of his marriage proposal.

Thanks, pal. Now I'll have to pick up an extra dozen roses at my next anniversary just to retroactively make up for not proposing marriage with such awesomeness.

Freddie Solomon, R.I.P.

Freddie Solomon, who died this week of cancer at the too-young age of 59, was an essential yet understated pillar of the first great San Francisco 49ers Super Bowl teams. Less celebrated than Dwight Clark (the player who gained immortality for making The Catch) and less renowned than Jerry Rice (the transcendent player who is considered by some to be the best NFL player ever), Solomon was the veteran presence that the budding dystasty Niners teams of the early '80s headed toward greatness. Anyone who followed the Niners in those exciting days knew that Solomon was a dependable and indispensible part of that team. Unlike so many wide receivers over the last 15 years, who preen, mope and strut all over the field, Solomon was a team-first player who, it seemed, was always where Joe Montana needed him. He earned two Super Bowl rings with the team, and then quietly tutored Rice to take his job and usher his exit from the league.

Solomon went on to enjoy a fruitful career of service to the Tampa community, where he is as beloved for his post-football career as he is in the Bay Area for his expoits on the field. Solomon is the sort of sports star we heard about too seldom: supremely talented yet humble and dedicated on the field, and equally diligent, talented and sacrificial when his playing days ended.

Local Hoopsters Making Good

Jeremy Lin, late of Palo Alto High and Harvard, has been a minor local sensation for several years. Lin led his high school basketball team to a highly unlikely state title over a nationally ranked foe. After generating no interest with west coast basketball programs, he took his talents to Harvard, where he led the Crimson to new successes and notable victories over traditional hoops powers like UConn.

No NBA drafted Lin, but the Golden State Warriors signed him as an undrafted free agent, and he made his professional debut for the home-town Warriors last season. It was a big deal for the local community, and particularly the local Asian-American community, as Lin is of Taiwanese descent. Lin was very popular, but still raw and a bit overmatched by the situation. He bounced between the Warriors and their developmental team, and was released in December as the Warriors geared up to make a run at trading for more accomplished players. Those deals never materialized. Lin ended up with the Houston Rockets briefly, without making much of an impact, then moved on to the New York Knicks, where he again shuttled between the big club and the developmental team.

On the verge of being released yet again, injuries forced the Knicks to play Lin. What he did in the five games became a matter of instant legend. Immediately averaging more than 20 points a game, his court vision, toughness and athleticism envigorated a Knicks team that was swiftly sinking to the bottom of the league under the weight of disinterest. As the media frenzy built, the LA Lakers came showed up in Madison Square Garden last Friday night for a game televised on ESPN. Always a prime draw, the Lakers arrived to find themselves supporting players in what had become a national story.

By chance, we were in a restaurant that was showing the game. I rarely watch NBA games, and won't go out of my way to turn one on until the playoffs, but I gladly turned my attention to this mid-season game. Like something out of a sappy Disney sports movie, Lin lit up the Lakers. He was involved in the Knicks' first 15 points (scoring or assisting on all of them) as the Kicks jumped out to a big lead. He made spectacular passes. He drove the lane for crazy layups. He stole the ball. He made three point shots. He did everything you could possibly ask one player to do, under the biggest spotlight imaginable for a non-playoff game. The joy with which he played, and which his teammates returned, was palpable. Kobe Bryant eventually brought the Lakers close, as he always does, but Lin stepped up yet again, sealing the game with two three point shots, two free throws, and a tremendously alert defensive move to take a charge and generate a turnover (he is a Harvard grad, after all). From my vantage point in the dining area, I could not always tell who had made the play to send the Knicks fans into unbridled joy, but over and over, inevitably, it was Lin.

Lin's rise from NBA obscurity, after rising from the obscurity of schools with no basketball tradition, all while commentators try to explain the significance of his Asian-ness, marks the best way that sports can elevate a community. That community may be defined by geography, educational institution, league, the sporting world in general, or race. The "experts" remain skeptical that he can keep up the pace he has set, but just about everybody is delighted that he made so much of the opportunity he was given.

At the other end of the basketball food chain, Michael's basketball season came to an end this weekend. His team also played with characteristic enthusiasm, but in this case with a pronounced lack of success. We went winless this season, and it wasn't even very close. Nobody on the team could shoot the ball reliably, so the offense suffered in all ten games. Michael was the primary point guard and played well at that position. He was near the team lead in points, he reliably ran the offense (to the limited extent that the team could be said to have an offensive system), and played tenacious defense with a lot of steals. The boys, to their credit, never showed any ill effects from losing games. They seemed to accept the fact that they collectively and, for the most part, individually lacked basketball instincts, and simply enjoyed their time on the court doing the best they could. Michael got a chance to play on a team with his best friend for the first time, which was a treat for both of them, and they both played better as the season progressed.

The most fun game, certainly for me and, I think, the players, was when we were matched up against the other team from our parish (I think that is the right term). That team, which was mostly the team Michael had played on last season, had killed us in scrimmages and a practice game. Our regular coach was gone (along with his son, who was our leading scorer), so I stepped in for my basketball coaching debut. I said a few motivational things, reminded them of some basic offensive and defensive principles we had worked on in practice, and turned them loose. When the other team immediately dropped in two baskets, I thought we were in for a long evening. I kept barking instructions, though, and they kept listening (amazing!), and we toughened up.

The only special play I put in was to match up Michael one-on-one with the other team's best player to keep him from dominating the game. I warned Michael I was going to do that earlier in the day, and understood immediately why, and how to do it. While the rest of the team played zone behind him, Michael shadowed the other team's star, denying him the ball, harrassing him into turnovers, and basically taking him out of the game. By midway through the fourth quarter, Michael was called for his fifth foul and I had to sit him to keep him from fouling out. He was devastated that he had committed so many fouls, but the fouls were a measure of how tough he played and that intensity was exactly what we needed. The other team rested their star at the same time, and I was able to return Michael to the game before the end without our guys losing ground. The game hung in the balance, 10-9 (yes, after 38 minutes of play, that's all that had been scored) until the last minute, when the other team put the game away with a single basket. Despite the loss, the boys came off the court excited by their effort. It was their best game of the year, and they knew it. For me, it was an opportunity to try on the coach's mantle for another sport, one I do not know well. It is always gratifying to see the boys respond to coaching, advice and encouragement, and that game is one I will remember for a long time.

It would have been nice to win some games. I am not a fan of valuing participation medals on the same plane as championship trophies. Character building through adversity is a delicate thing in youth sports, though. The older they get, the more competitive the competition, and the more losing hurts. Fortunately, these boys never lost their joy of the game and of competing, and their coach always kept them focused on their own improvement rather than how they compared to others. We can hope for better results next year, but we will not regret the games we played this season.

The Point Guard In Action