Page 3 of Unwritten Rules
“Sure.” Because Zach has exactly four years of service time with the Elephants and therefore the God-given right to big-league every rookie who comes his way, particularly ones who’ve already promised to bring him food. Even if Eugenio looks to be about his age. Even if Zach can’t quite keep the excitement out of his own voice. “I’m sure it is.”
Something about the way he says it makes Eugenio laugh again, reaching over and slapping Zach on the arm, one of those casual baseball touches guys do all the time. His palm is large and dry and warm; he leaves an afterimage of heat.
“What’s the scouting situation like?” Eugenio asks a few minutes later.
“Mostly the coaches give us scouting reports and then read ’em to us like they don’t think we can. It’s some analytics shit, but a lot of it’s by feel too.”
“I would have expected this club to be different, what with all that moneyball stuff.”
“I mean, I don’t know how it’s being done now in triple-A,” Zach says. “But it’s more or less the same as when I was in the minors—just more data, and a bunch of stats guys who think we can’t add two and two.”
Eugenio laughs again. It’s possible he’s just an easy guy to keep entertained or the kind of guy who thinks buttering up team veterans will help him in securing a roster spot. Either way, he’s easier to talk with than their backup catcher last season, who had the personality of an unoiled mitt. “Maybe in the Elephants’ system. But I spent most of last year with the Pilots’ affiliate in Vegas before I got traded.”
“Congrats on your escape.” And Zach tries not to watch him too carefully as his shoulders expand in another laugh.
Around them, players start to stream in—minor league pitchers who come with duffel bags slung over their shoulders, trainers frowning at clipboards, the aforementioned analytics staff who all seem to live in button-down shirts and khakis like this is a cubicle-farm job and not a freaking baseball team.
“Here they all come.” Eugenio points to the other catchers who didn’t show up early, recognizable by their familiar catcher-esque body shapes. They’re accompanied by dozens of players who will get winnowed down to a twenty-five-man roster, the rest the chaff of middle inning relievers, defensive replacements, and guys hoping for a good enough showing to be trade bait if another team needs someone at their position.
Zach nods toward the field. “We should probably find out whatever meeting we’re having.”
“Sure.” Eugenio gets up, pulling two cups of Gatorade from the cooler. He has large hands, which envelop the cup he offers Zach. Their fingers brush. Zach keeps his eyes on the horizon of incoming players, and not on Eugenio, who moves to stand next to him.
“You volunteering to fetch Gatorade for the rest of the season?” Zach says, trying for the slightly aggrieved gravitas of a veteran player.
A tone that doesn’t work when Eugenio laughs. “Assuming I make the opening-day roster, sure.”
Zach didn’t expect his easy agreement, surprised enough that he glances to where Eugenio is looking at him, amused.
“This the first year you’ve had a rookie to boss around?” Eugenio says.
“No,” Zach lies.
Eugenio laughs at that again, the kind of laugh that will be either very easy or very difficult to listen to for the next six weeks of spring training, especially when he nudges his shoulder against Zach’s. “You might want to work on that.”
“What?”
“Being an authoritarian. It doesn’t seem to come naturally.”
“Um, thanks?” Zach says, a little bewildered.
“C’mon. Can’t give the other guys a hard time for being late to a meeting if we’re also late.”
And Zach gulps down the rest of his Gatorade and follows Eugenio out to the practice field to whatever the morning holds.
In baseball, faking effort for appearance’s sake is calledeyewash. Bust it down the first-base line in the late innings of a blowout game: eyewash. The hitting coach blustering harder when the general manager is around, like huffing and puffing will make guys better at the plate: eyewash.
The entirety of spring training, pretty much all eyewash, with the amount of effort that guys put in inversely proportional to the likelihood of them actually making the team.
Zach spent spring training the last few years trying, urgently, desperately, to make the final roster without pissing off the veteran players by trying too hard in front of them. He woke up this morning optimistic that he wouldn’t have to do the same, that this would behisyear. But sitting in the pitchers-and-catchers meeting, surrounded by coaches and training staff and other players, a feeling blooms in his gut.
He looks up Eugenio’s triple-A stats on his phone, hand over the screen in case his teammates catch him at it. The guy can unfortunately hit both for contact and for power. And field—he threw out more than a third of runners trying to steal second base. And run, or at least run decently for a catcher, meaning he can jog. And and and and and... He’s also apparently the kind of guy who’s everyone’s friend, because he’s already sitting with the other players and telling a joke that has everyone laughing, while Zach tries not to glare at them.
Morgan comes and finds him after the meeting. Finds him, hugs him, and uses their relative difference in height—she’s about a foot shorter than he is—to flip him, though he’s mostly pretending when he lies on the floor, exaggerating his breathing like she knocked the wind out of him.
“Most people just say hi, Morgan,” he says, after she offers him a hand up. “If you need to assert your dominance over these assholes or whatever, could you at least wait until it’s whole-team report?”
“Who says I won’t do it again Monday?” She gives him an actual hug, though pounds on his back with enough force that it could bruise later. She’s gotten her hair buzzed in the offseason, an undercut with a little knot of a bun, and laughs when he rubs his hand over it, telling her it looks good.
