FanNation - The Republic of Sport

Surprisingly, I am starting to settle in here in Venezuela. The last week was not a typical let???s go to Home Depot on Saturday type of affair, but it felt significantly less adventurous then the previous weeks. So while I don???t have a ton of big stories, I thought I would do more of a quick round up of little things that I???ve wanted to throw out there. I must warn you that these are just ramblings off the top of my head, and there is no semblance of order or theme here. Finally, I appreciate the people that have asked me for opinions on different players. I will try to give you a few, but I don???t ever see myself criticizing or even critiquing another player publicly. I???m not a scout and to be honest if most people who had an opinion about me as a player were right I would be finishing up law school instead of living the dream in Venezuela. On to the show: It does not matter where or what level you play at in the States or in summer ball in general, because this league is completely different. Our bullpen has some big leaguers who are pitching in the fifth and sixth and struggling (much like myself), and a guy who hasn???t pitched above low-A getting huge outs in the seventh and eighth every night. I???ve seen independent league players tearing it up and short season players make huge plays, all the while a couple of somewhat established big leaguers hover at the ???Mendoza line??? (.200 average or below). I played for that ???Mendoza??? in Mexico last year, and he is a great guy. But under no circumstances mention the line. In fact, forget that I even said anything. There is no such thing. I would love for someone to ask Elias Sports Bureau or Stats Inc. which is more probable: a ten game winning streak or a ten game losing streak. I bring this up because my team, the Leones de Caracas, hit ten games with our win streak this week. While it???s a great feat and a somewhat rare accomplishment, it???s actually the third time in pro ball that I have been a part of a team that has reached the ten wins in a row mark. On the other hand I have never been on the flip side of that coin on a team that has lost ten in a row. Even my mighty Bengals were able to stop their NFL skid before it hit ten games. I know I???ve been blessed to have been on some winning teams, but I really think that the ten game winning streak has to happen more often then the ten game losing streak. If anyone has an answer I would love to hear it. Our third basemen Jose Castillo, who I think is still with the Giants, is the man down here. He comes up to bat to this reggaeton (basically Spanish hip hop) song that uses the words ???El Hacha??? (the axe) in the chorus and the whole stadium goes nuts. Everyone, men, women, children, cops, grounds crew workers, barnyard animals, I mean everyone, spontaneously busts into the ???Tomahawk Chop??? the second the song comes on. At first I was amazed at how active the fans were in getting in on this, but lately I???ve been doing it too. The song came on in our bus the other day and I started to ???Tomahawk Chop??? like I had been programmed Manchurian Candidate style. I have played the last two years against Phillies prospect Carlos Carrasco and have watched him have pretty mixed results. However, I have heard a lot of really good baseball people talk him up and obviously the Phillies, who were in a pennant chase and looking for help, held on to him because they have high expectations. I get it now. Watching him day in and day out, not just when he is on the mound in the game, I realize that he is a special talent with a chance to be a really significant starting pitcher for a long time. He has shown a ton of ability but I really like how even when he is working hard it looks easy. He???s also a pretty good guy, and I enjoy making fun of his Cosmo Kramer haircut he???s sporting right now. Josh Kroeger, who is a minor league free agent, needs a real chance in someone???s big league spring training. I have seen guys go on some fluky hot streaks, but what he is doing right now is beyond anything someone can fluke. I???ve seen him hit every pitch off of every type of pitcher you can imagine down here. Soft tossers, lefty specialists, flame throwers, he???s absolutely drilling them all. They even gave him a nickname down here. I might mess up the spelling but they call him ???La Pesadilla???, or the ???Nightmare???. They???ve even gone so far to make his walk out song the screeching sound from Psycho. It???s actually a pretty cool walk out song. Not quite ???El Hacha??? but it does the job. Momentum swings occur much more frequently in this league. Instead of a couple runs here and a couple of runs there, it seems that most games feature more big innings than in the States. It???s not uncommon to see one team put up three or four and the other team fire back with six or seven of their own. It might also just be our team because it seems that when we get hot everyone throws fuel on the fire. That Bob Sinclair song ???Love Generation??? is now getting worn out down here. Rob Thomas and his never ending line of similarly sounding singles (if you move your lips while you read that it definitely just caused a tongue twister) have also made the trip down to South American Radio. Thank God for that. The Presidential Election did not cause a ton of stir down here, but everyone wanted to know my reaction the day after. Now some of you may know my political ideologies if you???ve read some of my other stuff, but I am not one to mix baseball and politics in a purely baseball forum. I thought the amount of coverage of the actual election was a little overboard and that a lot of issues should have gotten more attention. I think that both of the main candidates are good men, and I will leave it at that. As for the Venezuelans I talked to, they were much more interested in what will happen as opposed to the horse race that engulfed America for the past one/almost two years. I felt like I caught the Bubonic Plague at the beginning of the week. Seriously, I spent our only off day in bed for twenty three of the twenty four hours. My body ached, my head pounded, I couldn???t eat a thing, I had the chills while sweating. It was miserable. It didn???t help that above my hotel suite they were renovating the penthouse floor and the hammers started at eight in the morning and did not stop until six that night. So I went to the field the next day in real bad shape still. The medical staff gave me a couple of pills to take and magically the plague vanished. My hope is that there was nothing bad in those pills, but honestly at that point I didn???t care. Finally, if there are any specific questions that anyone has, please keep emailing them in. I really appreciate the different questions and comments I have been getting and really like the insight I have received from people like Leo. I???ll come back with something more coherent soon. Randy Newsom is a 26-year-old, side-arming closer in the Indians minor league organization who will be blogging for Dugout Central about playing in the Venezuelan Winter League. An undrafted free agent signing out of Tufts University by the Red Sox, Newsom was traded to the Indians as the player to be named later in the Coco Crisp deal. See his career stats here.