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Breaking the Shell
Many people in this league command
respect. Not all of these players who command respect deserve respect,
but that's another article for another time. One of the men in this
league who does not command respect from his fellow combatants is
Eric
Christensen. Another one of those players is Dean
Evans.
Most everyone in the league knew OF
Dean before we began our 2001 season. He is the same age as guys
like Terry
Creighton, Scott
Carmichael, Derek
Byrd, Casey
Sylvester, James
Vassar, Mickey
Kendall, Jeff
Morrison, etc. All of these guys went to high school
with Dean, and they all knew who he was. First off, they knew he
was goofy. They knew he was skinny. They knew that he could probably
not bench his weight. They might have known he drank a great deal
of grape soda, and would occasionally bust out some catchphrase
from the wonderful yet not-so-accepted world or professional wrestling.
They knew that if the time ever arose, they could probably kick
his little ass in under 30 seconds. Dean did not command respect.
He wasn't blessed with genetics, or blessed with an insane desire
to lift weights so that you at least LOOK strong. He wasn't blessed
with the desire to, when the sun comes out, get some color on his
skin. Today, Dean does still not command respect. The thing is,
if you give Dean time, he will start to deserve respect. At least
on the wiffleball field that is.
"Jock"
is not what one would call Dean, myself included. However, after
the past few wiffleball gamedays, "untalented" is another
thing I would not call him, with "afraid" being a close
third. Dean has stepped to the plate time and time again against
the same guys who are considered better athletes than he is, and
in those times, has gotten a base hit 21 times out of 70. For you
math morons, that's a batting average of .300. Rarely do rookies
hit in the .300 range during with their initial ABs (his .300 average
includes Winterball '00). Those who do are usually the guys who
command respect, like James Vassar and Jason Eberhardt.
Watch Dean play the field, and you
begin to realize that maybe you just aren't giving the kid enough
credit. Sure, he wasn't blessed with a great deal of speed, but
he seems to have an inate amount of hand-eye coordination. He's
made some great plays for Jeff Morrison in the field this year,
and seems to have found his niche, batting behind Jeff in the lineup
for Wiffolution 51.
His pitching? Again, on the surface,
nothing special. He'll get hit occasionally, and seems to once in
awhile have a control problem, but in no way does he back down from
the big hitters. His unconventional windup causes many of people
who watch him to wonder "how good can this league be if THIS
guy is in it?" When this site posted a pic of Jeff and Casey
with the heading "Jumping back into the fire", don't think
Dean wasn't included. After getting his car broken into the night
before, Dean still made it out Sunday, knowing full well that the
only thing waiting for him at The Byrd House was Scott Carmichael
and Mike
Walsh. He threw two innings against the same team James
Vassar and Greg
Creighton couldn't get out, and gave up zero runs. All
Scott and Mike--who have combined for 50 HRs this year--could manage
off Dean was a lone single.
I have no idea how we are going to
work the teams next season. I don't know if we'll keep the same
teams, only filling up spots where people quit while adding a couple
expansion teams, or if we're going to start all over again with
new captains. If we do the former, Casey Sylvester has got himself
a true gem, possibly winding up with a similar situation to what
happened to the Boston Red Sox when they got a young man who went
by the name of Wade Boggs. Sure, Dean has only one HR this season,
and it doesn't look like he'll be hitting a great deal more, but
any batter who forces Scott Carmichael to work a little harder on
the mound has true potential and, dare I say it, true talent.
Sometimes it's weird how the wiffleball
league is it's own little world, a world that does not really represent
reality. In this wiffleball world, guys who would normally never
see each other or hang out become teammates. Some guys are forced
to play with guys they would normally never be seen with. Every
other Sunday is the only time Dean sees Jeff Morrison or Casey Sylvester,
yet on those days, they can bring it together and come within a
hit or two from beating the seemingly unbeatable. And maybe, just
maybe, they'll srike out the side, facing the same guys who only
two games later would BOTH break the HR record in a game.
If Dean can do it, anyone can...right?
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