Moneyball by Lewis, Michael (mobile ebook reader txt) 📕

for assignment, Billy explains, “you put him in baseball purgatory. But he can’t pray his way out.”

He then makes several quick calls. He calls the A’s equipment manager, Steve Vucinich. “Voos. We gotta get rid of Mags by game time. Yeah. You have twenty-five minutes to get him out of there.” He calls the Mets’ Steve Phillips. “Steve, I got the guy I wanted. Rincon.” (For you, it’s Venafro or nothing.) He calls the Giants’ Brian Sabean. “Brian. Hey, Brian. Hey, it’s Billy. I’ve made a deal for Rincon right now.” (So don’t think you can wait me out.) He calls Peter Gammons and tells him what he’s done, and that he’s not doing anything else.

Then he brings in the Oakland A’s public relations man, Jim Young, who agrees he should have a press release ready before the game. He also says Billy should make himself available to the media. “Do I have to go talk to them?” Billy asks. He’s already talked to everyone he wants to talk to.

“Yes.”

After the final call, his phone rings. He looks at his caller ID and sees it’s from the visitors’ clubhouse. He picks it up.

“Oh, hi Ricardo.” It’s Ricardo Rincon, who is Mexican, and normally gives his interviews through an interpreter.

“Ricardo, I know it’s a little bit shocking for you,” says Billy. His syntax changes slightly, he’s groping for a Mexican mode of expression and winds up saying whatever he can think of that Ricardo might understand. “But we have been trying to get you for a long time. You’re going to love the guys on the team. They’re fun.”

Ricardo is trying to get it clear in his head that he’s supposed to do what he’s just been asked to do, take off his Cleveland Indians uniform, gather his personal belongings, and walk down the hall into the Oakland clubhouse and put on an Oakland uniform. He can’t quite get his mind around it.

“Yes! Yes!” says Billy. “I don’t know if you’ll pitch tonight. But you’re on our team tonight.”

Whatever Ricardo says he means: Oh my God, I might actually have to pitch tonight?

“Yes. Yes. Possibly you’ll punch out Jim Thome!” Possibly you will punch out Jim Thome. Billy is becoming, quickly, a Mexican immigrant.

“We’ll have a uniform and everything ready for you.” And everything. He’s had just about enough touchy-feely for one evening. He tries to lead the conversation to a not horribly unnatural conclusion. “Where are you from, Ricardo?”

Ricardo says he’s from Veracruz, Mexico.

“Well, Veracruz is closer to here than to Cleveland. You’re closer to home!”

He finishes that one, hangs up, and says, “It’s gotten to be a longer road trip for Ricardo than he expected.” He looks absolutely spent. The wad of tobacco is gone from his upper lip and his mouth is dry. He gargles with the glass of water on his desk, and spits. “I’ve got to work out,” he says.

At that moment Mike Magnante was removing his Oakland uniform and Ricardo Rincon was removing his Cleveland one. Mags quickly left the Oakland clubhouse; he’d come back for his things later when no one was around. His wife had brought the kids to the game so he couldn’t just leave. Magnante watched the game with his family until the sixth inning, and then left so he wouldn’t have to answer questions from the media. He had no desire to call further attention to his situation. In his youth he might have mouthed off. He would certainly have borne a grudge. But he was no longer young; the numbness had long since set in. He thought of himself the way the market thought of him, as an asset to be bought and sold. He’d long ago forgotten whatever it was he was meant to feel.

The main thing was that Mags was gone from the clubhouse before Billy walked across to change into his sweats. As Billy headed in, however, he bumped into Ricardo Rincon heading out, in street clothes. Ricardo remained confused. He had heard he was going to the San Francisco Giants, or maybe the Los Angeles Dodgers. He’d never imagined he might be an Oakland A. And he still doesn’t understand the full implications of what’s happened. The Oakland A’s only left-handed relief pitcher is going out to find a seat in the stands to watch the game. Billy leads him back into the clubhouse where the staff has just finished steaming RINCON onto the back of an Oakland A’s jersey. “You’re on our team now,” says Billy.

Ricardo Rincon walked back into his new clubhouse, put on his new uniform, and sat down and watched the entire game on television. “I was not ready,” he said. “I couldn’t concentrate.” His left arm, however, felt great.

Chapter

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Anatomy of an Undervalued Pitcher

After Billy acquired Ricardo Rincon and Ray Durham, the team went from good to great. The only team in the past fifty years with a better second half record than the 2002 Oakland A’s was the 2001 Oakland A’s, and even they were just one game better. On the evening of September 4, the standings in the American League West were, with the exception of the Texas Rangers, an inversion of what they had been six weeks before.

Wins

Losses

Games Behind

Oakland

87

51

—

Anaheim

83

54

3%

Seattle

81

57

6

Texas

62

75

24%

The Anaheim Angels were the second hottest team in baseball. They’d won thirteen of their last nineteen games, and yet lost ground in the race. The reason for this was that the Oakland A’s had won all of their previous nineteen games—and tied the American League record for consecutive wins. On the night of September 4, 2002, before a crowd of 55,528, the largest ever to see an Oakland regular season game, they had set out to do what no other team had done in the 102-year history of the league: win their twentieth game in a row. By the top of the seventh inning, up 11-5 against the Kansas City Royals, with Tim Hudson still pitching, the