Confirming his release point with video from last night’s game, he ran his middle finger down the inside edge of the seam. Something still felt wrong with his retooled grip but he couldn’t argue with eight shutout innings. Ronny’s dream of making it to the Bigs had been stuck in limbo for reasons other than his performance. Selected as the starting pitcher in over a hundred minor league games, he was the default of an uneven powerhouse, too large for his temper yet too small for his appetites.

Limitations withstanding, he would become the breakout star of the National League, winning the Cy Young Award as a rookie. The chances of this were on par with getting run over by a Lamborghini Countach, the most frivolous thing he could think of after signing for a quarter billion. At the photo op for his eight year deal with the Reds, he never took his eyes off the press corps. Flashing the wan crescent of his signature smile, he finally gave in with a dose of bunny teeth condescension, and as he rested a barely there thumbs up on his side, he leaned over and whispered in his agent’s ear.

“My goodness Brutha, that’s a lot of freakin’ Countach.”

But before all the glitz, he received a text while studying his mechanics in a triple A Florida clubhouse. In typical form from his friend of ten years and his agent of five, the message revealed a mutual taste for irreverence laced with popular ephemera.

“Oh Ronny boy, oh Ronny boy, the Reds the Reds are calling. Llámame hermano.”

He had worked his way up the farm for six years, spending the last three with the Jacksonville Jurists. Ending his minor league career, Ronny finished with 48 wins and 31 losses, an ERA of 3.19 and 8.1 strikeouts per nine innings. His consistent numbers had always made him an obvious candidate for the Show, but until he got the call every page on the scouting report had a glaring footnote about his behavior. Although fodder for MLB board rooms looking to avoid every risk, his extramarital activities paled in comparison to those they deemed extramural. On the plus side he got along like a house on fire with most of his teammates, the holdouts subject to likely conversions.

To get payback for even the smallest of slights Ronny would bait the offender with common trickery before finishing them off with disproportionate revenge. After his first win in the minors with the Rum Runners, his first baseman implied that a little more hustle would have prevented another run. Two weeks later while the team was out for drinks, the first baseman was hitting on a popular waitress. Butting in with a kind eye, Ronny pointed at something across the bar like it was the craziest thing he had ever seen. When they turned to look, he poured out his cocktail of piss and soapy water on the floor behind them. And when they turned back to ask what the hell he was talking about, he made his move.

While fake panicking that the thing was flying to the other side of the bar, Ronny pushed his first baseman into the slick. To finish him off he fake sneezed, convulsing with just the right amount of torque. Falling ass first into the puddle his first baseman rested there in a state of wide-eyed bewilderment. Ronny leaned down to help him up but not before whispering a conciliatory word.

“How’s that for a little field hustle, Peregrino? May the better man win tonight with Miss Manners, and don’t ever doubt my intentions to win a ballgame. First for myself, but also for my brothers. Which by the way, you may now count yourself included.”

On the minor league mound Ronny set an emerging standard for extreme yet specific misconduct: gibberish laden rants after long at bats, remorseless torrents of chin music, and the fan favorite, drop kicking his glove and catching it behind his back. With an OPS of .614, when he was on deck he heckled opposing pitchers by whistling through his hands like a mourning dove. After reaching second base on a double, he would spit on the bag like it was beneath him to even have to stand there. Always working hard to shatter his opponents focus, he would crawl under the skin of those dumb enough to show the way. He didn’t intend on changing for the majors, but he knew something would have to give.

Ronny’s private life was more of a hazard of arguable decisions with due dates for debts owed converging at the wrong time. Before he was finally called up, his ex-wife was in the process of cancelling what little he had left. This fueled his yo-yo battles with vice, and to those who knew the couple best, his futile attempts to disclose her secret dalliance with the judge assigned to their case.

He had a non-relationship with his only parent, and the situation had numbed itself into an unresolved burden. Nadia Rutikowska was chair of the psychology department at Northwestern University. Most notably she was the infamous pioneer of reverse treatments for sufferers of EMDR. Although her data supported the benefits of re-sensitizing traumatic experience, her conclusions while based on valid causation made her unwelcome in most academic circles. MLB on the other hand judged her insufficient for no other reason than it looked bad for a mother to ignore her son.

Ronny’s on field aggression was only part of the problem. More concerning was the hostile territory he staked out on otherwise neutral areas of the game. Despite his rare athletic gifts he never withheld a contrary opinion. Word spread quickly about his theories, solidifying his rep as an unhinged snob. It wasn’t that Ronny didn’t like the game, but his skill developed more out of a sense of need. Relentless in pursuit of distraction, baseball stilled the pains of his restless mind and satisfied his thirst for conflict. Yet in spite of his stated ambition to be the best in a sport he regarded with ambivalence at best, his assault on the bogus reality of pro baseball made him miserable if not correct.

Too many times he jawed the wrong ear off the wrong scout, expounding on his theory of Hydro Boys – his pet name for juiced players – being supplanted by livelier baseballs – or “Hydro Balls”. The balls were modified down in Costa Rica in military grade warehouses, decreasing at an incremental diameter of 1/20^th of a millimeter per season. While he ranted he would recall that as long as you did it right, a bag of gold could slowly replace a sacred head without anybody noticing.

“They’re tricking us into accepting what really should be dismissed as an outlier free-for-all of homeruns. First we need to expose the deceit, and then we need to rally for change. But everybody’s just sayin’ gee that’s peachy John Boy, these boy’s sure are implementin’ them launch angles. Meanwhile, we ante up for another fleecing through the turnstiles for our so called good time because we don’t want to think twice about our precious clans masquerading as high priced clowns.”

He wouldn’t shut up about corporate poison leaking into every facet of the game: executive greed, permanent advertising, rulebook complacency, and money as the sole incentive for achievement. These evils were preventing the most necessary of changes, chief among them: automatic score calling, universal replay review, shorter games, shorter seasons, bigger balls, less homeruns, and even lesser salaries. He had always been a proponent of using irrefutable data from sabermetrics and instant replay, and MLB was making some progress along these lines, but he agonized over why they were cherry picking from the buffet.

“Why are they stockpiling the ranch dressing and mash potatoes while leaving the others untouched, like the tiny corns on a cob or replay review of judgement calls for runner interference?”

Another pet argument revolved around the benefits of replacing all the on field umpires with a single officiating bot. Even though the technology was there nobody could stomach the image, but he couldn’t understand the rationale for retaining them if it meant an extra hour of non-essential play. He understood the tradition of on field humanity was additive towards the theatre of the game, but that was for the fans whom he generously dubbed,

“Partisans clamoring for a circus of needless concessions while they inhale cotton candy at the expense of the integrity of my fellow puppet gladiators.”

According to Ronny the disputes, reviews, and posturing had nothing to do with gritty ballplayers trying to win fair ballgames. The players were the ones rewarded when the rules were observed, and the players were the ones punished when disavailed of common sense. As the central gears of the enterprise the players should have their success or failure reflected as accurately as possible.

“There’s no longer any need for human beings to call balls or strikes, or safe vs. out, or fair vs. foul, when a bot can do it instantaneously with no margin of error. There’s three reasons we don’t replace voluntary error in baseball. Well, there’s one reason that stems from needing to avoid three things. First off, MLB is afraid of losing money, period. And they only lose money if fans don’t pay for change. And the three reasons fans don’t pay for change are this: when it happens too fast, when it makes them look old, or when it makes them look stupid.”

He would go on to add another thing that was bothering him.

“And why don’t they extend the protective netting for screaming line drives all the way down the flagpole? Is it like a four way intersection thing where at least a hundred babies have to get their heads caved in?”

All of his rhetorical questions like those of all men were intended to provide the lesser informed with a profound answer. Ronny thought of himself as the first man to discover what had already been known for centuries. Yet despite his lack of outward humility, during his time in the minors he advocated for players unions while mocking their complicity in a failing system. His unwillingness to stay quiet on these matters was more than enough for the Reds to hold off on a promotion until he changed his tune.

Working twice as hard on the mound to overcome the consensus about his character, a handful of times in the years before it finally happened his pitching was almost too good to ignore. Even so, the red flags on the scouting reports amounted to a nuclear siren on a beautiful day.

“Clydesdale is reliably dominant for 100 pitches in 80% of his starts. The other 20% of the time he remains unpredictably wild, likely stemming from the alcohol abuse that quiets the paranoia of his self-authored and self-defeating conspiracy theories, i.e. MLB is out to deceive the public by converting players into pawns in a grand scheme meant to defraud the integrity of the game.”

Under one of the family values summaries, one scout appealed to an owner’s biggest fear.

“While Clydesdale is a devout atheist, something to be dealt with per MLB policy, he’s also a mouthy distraction, a primadonna battling his own imagination. That said, at the end of the day he’s a loyal and ferocious team player, albeit one with the highest risk of PR liability. He is respected in various camps as some sort of elitist shaman and tolerated in others as the requisite misfit. An otherwise solid candidate for MVV – Most Valuable Villain – unless you have him in your corner the only thing to do is hate watch for hours on end. Although easily exploitable, many fans will despise this man way down in the place they normally reserve hatred for themselves. How their horror will manifest on the bottom line, nobody knows, but he will likely run amok, self-imploding per the usual of his type. Final Recommendation: His consistent WAR – Wins Above Replacement – remains unbalanced against his Prohibitive RAP – Risk Against Promotion. Even though this kid can deal like a tornado in a haystack, look elsewhere until further notice.”

Variations of this made the rounds for years, but once he mastered his grip and locked in at the highest level, the Reds couldn’t help themselves. They needed to fill in for their ace Hank Mencklen who was serving his 30 days on the IL. Finally a good team again the Reds had been waiting years for Ronny to change his tune or master his craft. His pitching broke first but to bolster his case he started biting his tongue. He cut back on drinking too, limiting his binges to once a week to reward himself for a quality start. The rest of the time he settled on dry-hopped pamplemousse, made palatable by a large bag of kettle chips, as long as the potatoes were fried in a canola-peanut blend. As Ronny would say,

“I’m an animal on the mound, but a gentleman with my snacks.”

The Reds hadn’t won a pennant in 30 years let alone made it past a wild card game in 15 but they were finally on the verge. Rebuilding since their last place finish three years ago, their mid-season percentage sat at .583, first in the Division and second overall. The time to place a bet on their most talented but diciest farm boys had come. Ronny wasn’t getting any younger and for what it was worth he was showing signs of reverse inertia on the conspiratorial booze. So the scouts, owners, and suits decided,

“Let’s see what he can do.”

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Their friendship began with their status as the worst and best players on their college team. Tony was a bench warmer who satisfied the complementary defects needed to make the pair, a flattering frat boy to Ronny’s susceptible misanthrope. They bonded over a steady diet of repugnant rock and roll, blind staircase drunks, and mutually assisted conquests. After receiving the text on that fateful day in the clubhouse, Ronny called him back right away, Tony answering with a bad Irish accent.

“Are you ready to stop acting like a wee lil’ bitch and finally level up for the respect you deserve?”

“This better not be like that time when you said the Blue Jays wanted me for that wonder boy from the Tucson Tudors. I don’t need any baseless intel from a two bit, check that, would be sycophant giving me false hope.”

“This ain’t baseless, dog. It’s not that at all, my bitter Broham of the night. Your recent performance has caught the attention of the brass monkeys. With Mencklen out, they want you on a plane, suited up, and ready to deal in three days’ time. These are words di-rectum from the horse’s mouth, babe, the ones you’ve been waiting to hear. Do you think you can handle that? I’M TALKIN’ RONDO MANIA ALL GODDAMN DAY YOU SCURVY SACK OF SHIT!”

So Ronny got the call from the Major Leagues of America. At 27 he was proud to have finally earned his chance but also aware that he almost needlessly aged himself out of the picture, all for the sake of his principles. When he got drafted six years ago he knew he’d eventually have to conform, and he tried to hold out for as long as he could with his immutable self. Hell, nobody could follow their Übermensch around forever. At least he had followed his mom’s teachings, although he would never admit to what extent. If his objective talent was the only thing they cared about, and they were willing to disregard his character, he guessed he was somebody after all. He was okay with that, so he said to Tony,

“Okay, here are my demands. You ready?”

“Easy, bud. You’re not signing anything yet.”

“I know, but get a pen and paper just in case.”

“Ok, I got it right here, man. Shoot.”

“I want two things. Number one. I want all the money in the world. Every fucking cent. Number two. I want my walkup music to be Patti Smith’s version of Gloria, but just the intro where she sings, Jesus died for somebody’s sins but not mine. When I walk up to the plate I’ll cross myself in reverse and point up, see, but then I’ll do it again after striking out. That way people will realize what happens when they pray. I might also do it after giving up the game winning home run. That’ll show em I’m not crazy. I too beg forgiveness from a nonexistent father when I mess up. I too they will know, need a handout once in a while.”

“You need a jock jam or some hip hop, bro, some big sweeping beats with a fat hook. Isn’t Gloria all tinkly winkly for the first minute? Nobody’s gonna hear that shit, bud. It’ll be drowned out for sure.”

“Just hear me out. They’ll have to time it up just right, and when I give the signal, let er rip.”

Ronny liked both walkup scenarios: the one where it echoed off the stadium walls and the one where it was drowned out for lack of recognition. Either way, presenting himself as a flashy cliché of power or a poorly considered act of spite would be a glorious waste of everybody’s time. He liked being in charge of these bad decisions, especially if they were his to make.

“Ok, if you can’t get me Patti, but please do your best before giving up, I’ll go for some Exuma. None of that Obeah Man stuff but maybe one of his nice voodoo ballads like Dambala. Failing that I’ll settle for something, say, mid-range GG catalogue.”

“I got nothin’ to do with that, bud, but when the time comes, I’ll do my best. Let me tell you what’s gonna happen right now though.”

The Reds were giving him a shot, and they planned on starting him in three days. Pending he didn’t do anything crazy, they would go from there. He shouldn’t worry though, all he had done with his 2.47 ERA in 12 games this year was put those more intractable concerns to bed, but Tony passed along a caveat from the suits.

“They wanted me to tell you their army of lawyers are ready to pounce. If you try any shit, you know, start badmouthing the League, talking Costa Rica, they’ll make you disappear faster than you can say Japan is beautiful in the Spring. Personally Ron, I think that last part might be an empty threat but we need to take the message seriously.”

They both agreed that Ronny would have to inhibit his natural overreaction to all things dropped hat. At least for a while he would choke himself down for the sake of not blowing it. The plan was simple. Through a series of CBT techniques countering his worst emotional distortions he would build his case by presenting evidence to the contrary. Getting ahead of the damage from blaming, catastrophizing, and factophilia, Ronny would reintroduce his thoughts to the consolations of perspective.

But after nailing the strong but silent type routine he would re-loosen his stirrups, releasing the freak show everybody knew they deserved. Hold and release he called it. He had tried this same technique back when he was first drafted, and it worked, but the quality of his pitches could only take so much. They faded in prominence next to the awakening of his wellbeing. By tricking his darkness he incurred the type of debt that nobody likes to admit is real. The thing that isn’t supposed to happen does happen. He lost his edge. Thank God he knew how to get it back.

They decided the adrenaline of being called up should counter his needs for enough time to embed within the league’s good graces. From there he could pick his fights and get back to normal. Regardless of the vile things he knew he would eventually do, he also knew his established performance would be enough for leniency. Greatness was on the line. Just as skulls require occasional holes, harnessing the full extent of his bitterness required certain sacrifices.

His first start with the Reds was only supposed to last four or five innings. Even if he was doing fine they planned on pulling him before things got ugly, but to everybody’s surprise except Ronny’s he went all nine, earning a complete game shutout against the Brewers. His pitch count was so low and his run support so high his coach had no other choice but to keep him in. Ronny struck out twelve that day with three digit heat, keeping everybody else off balance with airtight spin on the corners, painting all four quadrants like a fence. It was such a dominant performance he made one hall of famer look like a tee-baller swatting at flies.

With a swagger that belied his frightening intensity, he kept his gloating in check. Only showing hints of emotion that day, he was steely on the mound with a detached Zen in the dugout. When they interviewed him after the game he dropped none of his early non sequiturs nor any of his unprovoked ripostes. No discussion went viral except his performance. He was open and thankful, what you might expect from an earnest rookie beaming aw shucks for his own good. But despite the pause on the real Ronny, he meant everything he said that day, even showing hints of homespun pride.

Five days later he went six solid innings without the magic of his first game. The Red’s officially added him to the starting rotation. If he choked, Mencklen would be off the IL in a few week’s anyway, but if he kept it up, they’d be cheered as having an ace up their sleeve. This vote of confidence from his new team sat well with the big righthander. He pitched 7 innings for his third win, a grind with long pitch counts and only 6 strikeouts. He gave up only one cheap run, a wandering flyball pushed out by the wind. Keeping his emotions on the back burner, he modulated his thoughts with calming notions of hard work balanced against compassionate expectations.

The league zeroed in on his weakness, taking note of how he tended to throw the same pitches to the same hitters their second time through the lineup. He adjusted and proved resilient during his fourth game. Nadia was in the stands that day for the first time in eighteen years. Having missed all of her son’s high school, college, and minor league appearances, on that July afternoon at Wrigley she bore witness to her son laboring for the most difficult outs of his career. Whether or not she was present for any of his little league games was still up for debate.

He asked her to come because it would be easier with her being a local and he also knew a place they could get a decent Patty Melt – her favorite food – after the game.

“Of course, dear,” she replied, as if the formality of his asking was absurd.

“After all, how can I miss the occasion where my only son reaches the pinnacle of his chosen profession. Unless you’re too embarrassed, kiddo, I’ll be there with bells on.”

He knew her reasons for accepting his invitation were only slightly related to whatever affection she still might feel. Mostly it would look bad if she snubbed her now famous son, even if the fame was for something she deemed trivial. She decided to sit in the nose bleeds instead of the parent’s box. Wanting to be seen as a woman of the people instead of a woman who needed to be seen by the people, sitting with the masses would run interference for the fact she had no intention of repaying the favor.

Nestled within the crowd she would have the chance to either bask in the attention of her son’s accomplishment or to accept praise after the fact that she was too modest to mention it. She would wait until the right moment when he was too far ahead to lose, announcing to the crowd that this amazing specimen happened to be her son. If he did poorly she would decide to remain anonymous while still getting credit from her colleagues at Northwestern for supporting her child. The result would either be a co-opted accomplishment or a harmless leverage she never thought Ronny capable of providing. In truth she had thought about it so very little, but all of a sudden she was graced with Ronny’s first call in three years.

He won the game that day in less than heroic fashion by giving up 4 runs in 7 innings. Nadia never spoke up during the game, but not because her son was struggling for outs. Most of her time was occupied trying to unsuccessfully figure out what was going on. Afterwards while they were eating dinner together, she said everybody around her seemed to think he was doing a fine job, but she couldn’t tell because everybody kept standing up to block her view.

“They were drinking beer and shouting like they had something to live for. It was pathetic.”

Eating their Patty Melts in silence as the liquid sun dropped behind Lake Michigan, he didn’t play along with this typical sleight of hand. If they were relieved to see each other, they were mostly looking forward to wrapping things up.

By August Ronny was 5-0 with an ERA of 2.88 and a second complete game under his belt. He was an unqualified sensation, especially among Red’s fans desperate for years for anything above average. Catching up with his client after his fifth win, Tony could sense that his old friend was building up too much steam. Ronny had played the choir boy in his dealings with the press so far, but earlier that night the blond affiliate reporter from CTV was giving him a big smile. She called him over for the post-game interview and when they were rolling, she said,

“Ronny Clydesdale, how does it feel getting your fifth win in a row and re-taking first place over the Cubs?” Matching her tone and cadence he said,

“Well, God damn, if you weren’t so pretty I’d say you were the only one around here allowed to smile without puttin’ a quarter in the kitty first. Holding his hands up to surrender, he said, “But I won’t say that, I’ll just enjoy the company and let the moment wash over me.”

She was about to start in on the more routine questions but she hesitated, brushing it off with a nervous laugh. Ronny knew in that moment he had broken the rules. As a rookie you weren’t allowed to curse on field, let alone with a mic on you during a televised interview. As a veteran – after having some success – you were allowed to curse into your glove after you got your three outs. The only other time you could swear out of your glove was after giving up a grand slam, so long as you looked down in shame.

The jumble of post-game mics in the locker room was another story. This was the one accepted location for all things brash: name calling, shot calling, tobacco chewing contests, and lazy dismissal of an honest reporter’s questions. Ronny’s other mistake that night, comments implying vague forms of consensual Eros, were off limits for all players of every stripe and tenure. Per the regulations laid out on page 632 of the MLB players manual, Ronny interpreted the text with his own particular bias, regaling his teammates with his version like an auctioneer at slaughter.

“All transmissions or reproductions of sexual banter between players and/or members of the free press are strictly prohibited within the adjunct guidelines as dictated by the upright behavior inherent to upholding the tradition of intellectual property rights administered by Major League Baseball.”

The moment he tried to dam the bitterness it was already flowing out of his mouth. Feeling that particular swell when his instincts were on point, he took great pleasure in contradicting the code of honor without them noticing the intended sin. The reporter asked him one last thing.

“Does your tremendous focus come from a pre-game routine, or were you simply born this way?”

“Sweetie, I just do what they say so all of us can make money. My pitching doesn’t reflect due process or finding inherent weakness. I just cherry pick the three hottest batters in each line up, knowing that if I can shut each one of them down I’ll be ok. It’s kind of like how we accommodate the outrage of the month. If we react to the most talented red herrings we’ll make it at least partway through the playoffs without finding out what we really should have been scared of until next season. In baseball that’s ok, in other things not so much.”

For these remarks he received his first fines: $53,180.08 for the curse, $69.99 for attempted sexual harassment, and $1776 for slander. He was dressed down in many a gilded conference room but no mention of Japan was ever made, so he knew he was across the threshold. On sports T.V, retired players turned chubby broadcasters were appalled by how quickly he compromised every little boy’s fantasy. Though they pretended, most of Ronny’s detractors didn’t have a clue about his real intentions, nor did they assume the principle of charity when dissecting any of his words.

During the remaining two months of his rookie year he barely flinched, and the timing of the Reds offense was right on cue to back him up. He gave up 7 runs during one of these starts but his overall rookie performance was ranked among the all-time greats. Considering how long he was held down for nothing but a lack of conformity, a drinking problem, and performance issues, his feat was all the more ironic to those who called him a talented failure. He won five more games that year, even taking a no hitter into the eighth.

In 15 starts as a rookie, he went 11-0 with a 2.37 ERA. On September 11^th he tied the club record for strikeouts in a single game, fanning the Pirates 17 times at Great American Ballpark. The Reds won the division that year by two games over the Cubs. Both sides celebrated by either burning or worshipping competing effigies of Curvy Howie, the disgraced Cubs broadcaster who moments after retiring admitted to rooting for the Brewers simply because he favored their beer.

Ronny’s first playoff start against the Braves in the NLDS was his first big league loss, giving up four runs in 5 and 2/3rds. The Red’s lost the series in three consecutive but close games. Skeptics offered that Ronny couldn’t hack the high leverage situation but the consensus remained. The Braves were always the better team on paper.

-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-

Winning the Cy Young after his rookie year gave Ronny all he needed to sign his huge deal, keeping Rondo mania in Cincinnati right where it belonged. Printed on the front of a popular t-shirt was his quote, “Just Enjoy the Company,” with a kitty bank and a quarter reimagined as the Red’s logo. On the back of the shirt two amorous cherry’s – a CBD mom and a literate plumber – skipped rope while steam boiled from their ears as they got frisky in a downpour of cash. The shirts sold out faster than tickets for Ratt’s 1984concert at Bogarts downtown, Dokken filling in that night for usual tour opener L.A. Guns.  

Ronny’s postseason bacchanal in the slums of eastern Europe soon became common knowledge, the league tailing their asset at all times. His unapologetic carousing with prostitutes was roughly half the iceberg. While travelling in Bucharest he met Des, short for Desdemona.

Raising her arms above her jet black braids, both of her buttons narrowed vertically with each pull. She worked in a highrise brothel on the edge of the Dâmboviţa river, her window overlooking Coptic cathedrals to the east. Ronny talked too much, hoping to provoke any hint of surprise as they drank vodka and chain smoked Greek cigarettes. With the early records of Françoise Hardy spinning on repeat, Des complied without a word of protest.

She had tattoos on her shoulders and thighs, disciple serpents standing guard in front of suspect wisdom. She knew Ronny was rich but she found him endearing enough, a serene if overbearing schoolboy who gets what he wants. The hustle she ran on Americans, letting them go too far while she abstained in secret, wasn’t necessary with this one. Emboldened by his excessive tips for even the slightest courtesies, she pitied the way he spoke about his success: inevitable destination paved with self-denial. Her legs buckling from above, she burst like a pressurized melon, covering Ronny’s face in a puddle below.

The league’s private detectives took countless photos but they took even more of his liberal abuse of tobacco, smoking fancy free with the locals as they fawned over his generosity. When the Reds management confronted him with the dossier at Spring training, he said,

“What’re you gonna do with those, shove em up your ass or ask me if I had a good time?”

He loved all the concerned faces, knowing they were only a bluff.

“I always smoke in the offseason fellas. I probably always will. It’s boring not playing ball, and the smoking keeps me relaxed, you know, keeps me from going stir crazy. Of all people you guys should understand. You’re just like the tobacconist. You hook young boys early, then after they’ve spent God knows how many years pumping whatever they have into your pockets, it’s too late. You deceive about notions of hard work, honor, and love, convincing them their only path is triumph over one’s adversaries. You guys made up that WAR statistic right? Like, wins against replacement? I think I finally know what that means. It means you’re replaced if you lose, and if you’re replaced you’re undeserving of love. Am I right? I’m smart enough to know that A doesn’t always lead to C, but in my experience, it absolutely does.”

He paused, scanning the room to make sure he still had the floor.

“Now, my trip to the old country to see the sites? Well, that’s my business gentlemen, and as you know, fully within the boundaries of international law. I got nothin’ to hide, and I won’t be shamed for lookin’ for love in all the weird places. Nor should any of us for that matter.”

Directing his attention to the Reds GM, he said,

“What do you enjoy, sir, to cut loose that not everybody agrees is a good use of your time?”

The GM realized he wasn’t supposed to answer, so Ronny kept going.

“I’m sorry your little boys will have to see proof of their new hero acting like a common turd, however manlike that turd may be. That’ll be hard for them, I agree, but maybe it’s time for a teachable moment about the limitations of myth.”

Needless to say they never released any of the incident photos, and they had to admit Ronny deserved an atta boy for standing up for his international pastimes.

The following season he succumbed to the predictable sophomore slump. As black market video emerged from every available angle, teams began to ferret out his tells. His opponents came up with game plans that made him look average. After losing his first two starts at home, he finally got his first win on the road, letting his old self out of the bag along the way. When a reporter pointed out how Dodger fans were holding up signs suggesting the unraveling of his mental health, Ronny let his real voice do the talking.

“I don’t suffer the opinions of a murderous peanut gallery that pays $17 for a watered down tallboy. Now that’s a bunch of nuts.”

Floundering in the second half the Red’s missed the playoffs by four games but the season was not without controversy. On the fourth of July, the Reds were playing the Cubs at Wrigley. Before the game, Otto Badenswish, first baseman for the Cubs, decided to protest the treatment of German immigrants during reconstruction after the Great War. Just when the anthem was picking up steam, a lucrative idea appeared over his head. Taking a seat first people’s style on the grass, he crossed his arms and pulled his hat down over his eyes. In his official statement after the game, he said he was doing it because he felt bad for the way his ancestors were treated. Even though he had nothing to do with them, by way of several degrees of separation he still felt entitled to reparations.

Knowing Ronny might have an improbable take on the matter, reporters asked for his opinion. They knew he was provoked easily on matters of national security, and he answered like he had been waiting all day for them to ask.

“I mean, yeah, this is a classic case of separatists getting too big for their britches. Be it God guys or racialists or socialists or conservatives, before you know it they start mixing it up with the good guys. That’s their right of course, but we’ve always managed to give these people just enough cake without letting them get too fat, which I hope continues, but separating ourselves from the carnage of creationism and tribal groupthink is the best idea we’ve ever had. One that billions of enslaved people around the world aren’t lucky enough to experience. So yeah, do I think we should remove our fuckin’ hats for the sake of the bigger picture? God damn right I do. Especially if the ones telling us otherwise are ad campaign seeking has beens. Excuse me, you can give me a little space.”

He ended his second season at 10-12 with a 3.69 ERA. Nobody ever knew – there wasn’t a consensus anyway – what Ronny was talking about when he said these things. Beyond a sense of his lack of decorum for any moral standard, the sporting press wanted to know why he was so upset about things unrelated to baseball. Knowing the best outlet for his views would be an obscure podcast, he went on a local comedian’s show with a weekly audience of about two thousand listeners. The interview was enlightening for fans wanting a better picture, but afterwards half of them who liked him no longer did, with the other half now on board. The listenership jumped to twenty-five hundred that week.

During his third season, Ronny caught up with some of his rookie year mastery. He went 15-9 with a 3.21 ERA, pitching within two outs of a no hitter on Memorial Day. By season’s end, the Cubs were one game ahead of the Reds, both clubs earning a wildcard slot with the Cardinals winning the division. Ronny was selected to start the elimination game, and at the press conference beforehand he was asked a question about how much sleep he was getting. Looking more hollow around the eyes than usual, instead of answering he pulled out a statement and began to read.

“If I win this game, I will donate 50% my remaining salary over the next six years, roughly 100 million dollars to prostate cancer. If I lose, I will donate the same amount to the Chicago Cubs on the condition that they only use it to increase their salary pool for signing free agents. If I get a no decision, for every year remaining on my contract I will destroy that year’s proportion of the total. I will do this at my annual televised bonfire attended by myself and several hundred of my closest celebrity friends, burning every bill of liquidated paper over a dedicated cauldron.”

With his right hand, Ronny held up a legal looking document with several signatures on the bottom.

“I hold in my sacred pitching hand, one blessed by the consecrated Oil of the Denier, my signed pledge of donation. It has been scrubbed for imprecise language by my crack legal team, and verified by countless notary publics. As we speak, several copies are being faxed over to the commissioner’s office. This is the real deal, people. On my honor, I will see this through. Why, you ask? Because it’s only baseball, folks. If I’m gonna gamble, I’m gonna gamble on myself.” He continued.

“Athletes exist to demonstrate the excellence of our profession with an uncompromising embrace of competition. I’m not doing this for the fans, the suits, or pandering to those who seek to emasculate with threats of impotence or a bad shave. Like I’ve talked about before, they have enough problems to get too worked up about. I’m doing this for the sake of winning beyond a shadow of a bad call, and maybe to spite everybody who says I deserve to keep the money. Now, everybody is welcome to watch the game, or better yet, get a life and let us do our job. That is all. I will be taking no questions.”

Up until the top of the seventh, the Reds were in control. They were up by 4 runs when the Cubs hit back to back homers. Ronny left two sliders out over the heart of the plate, the Cubs three and four hitters making him pay. In response, he decided to throw his bread and butter pitch, the “Fear of All Things,” by aiming just below the chin. Not concerned about a few walks, what he needed now was predatory leverage. If they didn’t cower, he would keep attacking until they remembered why they should.

It was a delicate move, one because he had to fake intentionality, appearing to have lost his feel, and two because it was hard to keep stoic while rage was burning down his spine. Although circumstantial unless confessed, the punishment for throwing at batters was stiff, but he would protect his lead as he saw fit. The Cubs would fear him, and the best way was by introducing risk.

He started throwing face balls, walking the next two batters with pitches just below their chins. The Cubs bench reacted in kind. Complaints were hurled at the umpires, and slurs were directed at the size of his mother’s nose. Ronny tipped his hat and placed his hand over his chest, giving them a look that said, “My bad, I’ve just lost my feel.” With one out and two on, the Red’s pitching coach jogged out for a mound visit. Under his glove, Ronny said,  

“This is all for show, Boss. I’m gonna blow these next two away with heat and spin on the uppers. I’m just filling up to focus on the deal. You know how I do. I promise I won’t let you down.”  

The next batter for the Cubs was The Cuban Tank, better known as El Tanque Cubano, the strongest player in both league’s combined. Weighing in at 240 pounds with only 7% body fat, he was more of a natural tight end than a right fielder, more of an ungentle giant than a well behaved immigrant. He was a living wall of steel equipped with that rarest of blueprints: no weights, no stairs, no roids, just food. Ronny was in trouble, but he wasn’t quite ready to paint, deciding to beam El Tanque instead.

He needed to be running at peak aggression so nothing could stop the advancing tunnel, the corners of the zone inching closer with each assault, time slowing down with the box right in his face. If he could get to this heightened state, his most powerful yet depleting tool, sustainable for only two batters, all he had to do was reach out and drop in a four seamer. The best hitters reached a comparable immersion zone, pitches as obvious as the broad side of a barn, only once or twice in their careers, but Ronny could have done it every night if not for the extenuating forces of stamina.

If he could just get out of this jam he could hand it over to his closer for the last six outs. Marihuano Luchera was lights out on two days rest, let alone four. But the plate was still too far away in his mind, good enough for his nasty stuff at ten feet, but he needed it closer to five. El Tanque stepped up to the plate, spit through his teeth, and licked the fattest part of the barrel. The fans at Wrigley cheered, blinded by their allegiance to the possibility of relief. Ronny came set, targeting the bulge in El Tanque’s tricep, switching his grip to a four seam. Hearing the flesh before it happened, he knew how good it would feel once it did. The “thwomp” of the impact would be followed by the dead ball “thud” on the dirt. He was about to throw the equivalent of a smart phone 100 miles per hour at a side of shiny beef.

El Tanque would want to shrug it off like a tough guy, even though it hurt like hell, but he would act the perfect amount of mad to fuel Ronny’s perfection, who went into his wind up, pushed off with a fluid motion, and delivered the pitch right on target. El Tanque’s arm sagged and flooded, a temporary beanbag for a future hematoma, made useless for the benefit of bystanders. He looked down, rubbed his no longer bionic arm, and looked up to find his assailant staring back. Snarling and wagging his tongue as he walked to first base, he gave one fake lunge in Ronny’s direction before settling on first. Now the bases were loaded with one out, but with the ringing in Ronny’s ears at full pitch, none of that mattered. With six consecutive pitches, he struck out the next two batters, bringing the inning and his battle to an end. Or so he thought.

Barking like a junkyard dog after he got his third out, Ronny spun around to face the three dejected baserunners as they made their way to the dugout.

“NEXT TIME YOU’LL BE DEAD. DO YOU HEAR ME!?”

El Tanque rushed at Ronny headlong, but the benches cleared before he could reach, obstructing his path. Trying to remove their respective players from the fracas as fast as they could, the skippers for both teams got in front of their men. On the first base side, a frothing El Tanque was squirming under the weight of his team, but most of them were barely holding back their own impulse to charge. With a buck and a spin, El Tanque managed to break free, charging like his life depended on it. Ronny was more than happy to oblige, screaming at his prey while holding up an invisible target with both hands.

“TANKY NEED DIAPEY!? TANKY NEED DIAPEY FOR BABY PARTS!?”

Ronny dropped and rolled as El Tanque swung and missed with a haymaker. Bouncing up with the momentum, he fixed his gaze behind the Cuban as if a pterodactyl was swooping down. Diverting the giant man’s attention just long enough, Ronny sailed in with his non-pitching hand, landing a clumsy if gainful sidewinder on the cheek. Not enough to knock him off balance, El Tanque lifted Ronny up around the waist, carrying him five yards before slamming him down with a shoulder tackle. Both benches piled on the scrum, each player trying to deliver blows or extricate their man. In Ronny’s case they were trying to prevent his near certain death. In El Tanque’s, near certain conviction on charges of second degree murder. As it happened, Nadia was in her highrise apartment down on West Van Buren, writing a thank you email with the T.V. off. Walking down the hall to retrieve the pancetta from the kitchen, her lover was in the nude. Fortunately nobody was hurt.

MLB reviewed the tapes but since both of the accused were the two best players on the two best teams, a profits bonanza, each man received a light suspension of one game each. Ronny served his time against the Braves the following day, the Red’s beating them in four games to win the NLCS. El Tanque served his time on opening day the following year.

After getting the wildcard win but before winning the championship, a reporter asked Ronny how he felt about betting on himself, and did he still plan on donating that 100 million to prostate cancer?

“Well for Pete’s sake, of course I’ll follow through with my pledge, it’s legally binding!”

“And I tell ya, winning feels incredible. I’m learning that maybe there’s worse things than baseball to help me believe that joy is real when reality is not.”

Halfway through their World Series parade route, the Red’s stopped at an ad hoc press junket. Some of the big shots of the Series got up to speak, including Ronny. Stone drunk while bleating out a new harangue about the inferiority of the other league, he pleaded for solidarity.

“I don’t want to watch no fat fuck phenom hit a million home runs while he gets a splinter up his ass cause he can’t shag a routine fly ball. That ain’t baseball, folks. That’s the American League. The best should be expected to do what the game demands, and plenty of it. THE FIVE TOOLS, MAN! You don’t see me battin’ a buck twenty, do ya? Otherwise you didn’t learn how to play the game. I say the National League secedes and we have our own little championship, right here in sunny Cincy-a-natty. We’ll call ourselves the NLB. All the AL fans will get so bored watching the leftovers, MLB will go bankrupt, and if the handful of five toolers over there want to jump ship, they’ll be welcomed with open arms, man”

Serenading their champion like they had something to live for, the crowd went wild.