Pointy-head economists inside the Beltway are paid to maintain faith. When the Dow fell below 11,000 this month, D.C. economists sounded no alarm. The economy was fundamentally sound, they said. Rising oil prices were the consequence of speculators not peak oil and the ravenous energy appetite of China. If it was not morning in America, as Ronald Regan gloriously proclaimed in 1984, it was at least no later than early afternoon. After all, a quarter century ago the Quad Cities faced June unemployment figures of more than 15%. The local unemployment numbers this summer are ten percent lower. Then again, the manufacturing sector, in the region and in the nation, is not now what it was then. Then again, many area workers are not unemployed but underemployed or multiply employed, cobbling together two service industry jobs that net less than what their fathers made at International Harvester in Rock Island, Caterpillar in Bettendorf, Maytag in Galesburg, or Clandestine Electronics in Silvis.
Meanwhile, salaries in baseball have soared over the last three decades. Curt Flood’s 1970 protest fathered baseball’s free agency. And free agency begat player millionaires. Professional sport remains one of the few enclaves of successful unionism. The money is good. The benefits are good. The food is good. (The locavore sushi created by Moline head caterer Alice Rushforth was recently voted the best clubhouse fare in the Shoeless Joe League.)
But the benefits of the free agent era did not help Curt Flood. And they do not apply to minor-league coaches whose playing careers ended forty years ago in post-war Japan. For long-time Greens’ coach Kiki Hirota, the big money of major-league baseball trickles down to a modest revenue stream, like the Colorado petering out before it reaches the Pacific. What’s more, for Hirota, the economic downturn that economists won’t dub a recession has personal consequences. Hirota has seen his retirement portfolio diminish considerably in the last year. At eightysomething, Hirota ought to have moved back to Fresno years ago, but his love of the game kept the shrinking ex-Nippon star and baseball lifer out there on the field, whacking fungos to men young enough to be his grandsons. Now Hirota hangs on to his long-time coaching position less for the vicarious juvenescence conferred by his minor-league charges and more for the benefits and ongoing contributions the Greens front office make to his retirement annuity. “It is a disappointment, sure,” he conceded in a recent conversation in his Bettendorf home. But Hirota reminds all who ask that he has all his teeth, few filings, regularity, and general good health. “The house has been paid for a decade," said Hirota, settled on his living room couch below a signed photograph of Bob Wills. "I will survive this economy. The presidency I do not know about. That I do worry about. Guantanamo Bay saddens me deeply.” Here Hirota shook his head. “I pray that Mr. Bush will not have enough time to do more great harm. I have seen the photographs of domestic facilities online." Here Hirota paused before concluding. "I am too old for another relocation center.”
Some folks in the Moline front office share Hirota’s suspicion of the lame-duck president. A few of them were gathered at Zeek’s coffee shop this past Sunday morning, listening to Clifford Brown, and trading political concerns over scones and their favorite hot beverages. Zeek’s proprietor and the Greens’ strength-and-conditioning coach Stuart Depp served in the first Iraq War. Depp supports his army comrades but not the war itself. “Put an oil man in the White House, and you get yourself an oil war. But where is the oil from that sandhole? It’s not over here. I paid $3.75 a gallon this week.” Depp sipped from a golden demitasse of Ecuadoran dark roast. “Hussein was genocidal and monomaniacal, but he was running a dictatorship. There was no pretense. Bush claims to be president of a democracy. Damn.” As for Obama, while Depp appreciates the historical prospect of a black president he wonders about how smart the American people will let a black man be. “God forbid we should think about issues from multiple perspectives. God forbid we should ask hard questions and gather sound evidence before acting. And, God almighty, these pecan date scones are good.”
Ana Pulak of the ticket office wonders about the long-term damage done by the installation of a conservative Supreme Court. “I have children now,” she explained while sipping her iced decaf triple grande sugar-free vanilla skinny latte and working soduku in the Moline Dispatch. “What kind of country are they going to be growing up in? What political century will they know, the twenty-first or the nineteenth?”
Head groundskeeper Bill Gartner appreciates a good cup of Chiapas medium roast with just a smidge of honey. He prefers scones made with foraged greens and lots of Wisconsin butter. He invariably talks with a pencil tucked behind his left ear. Gartner asked about lost opportunities for alternative energy. “Not corn, okay. That’s farm subsidies, three-card monty, just another Ponzi scheme. But the right R&D could scale up algae biofuels. It won’t be enough by itself, but it’s part of a larger strategy that could work.”
Wetlands consultant Hugh Crowell toyed with a Condoleezza Rice salt shaker as he noted how many billions devoted to war were diverted from restoring national infrastructure. “I am the son of an engineer,” says Crowell, a Sumatran fair-trade fiend. “You grow up thinking about what you can’t see. So I ask. Where is the follow-up of the I-35 bridge collapse in Minneapolis? Where is the legislation to upgrade our bridges, highways, and roads? Our water pipes are a century old and porous. Why aren’t we worried about that?” Crowell held up a molasses scone and a red Amish road rally mug. “You can’t make a good cup of coffee without clean water.”
Team atheist Liane Luckman puts up with coffee shop jazz but prefers low fi fare. Luckman favors plain scones paired with unsweetened and decaffeinated Ceylon black tea that keeps her judgment uncompromised. About the sitting president, Luckman is succinct. “I don’t believe in God,” said Luckman, her voice rising. “But I know the devil, and he’s from Texas.”
If there are Bush supporters in the Greens front office, they do not announce themselves. Depp has banned a few Bushophiles from his place, when they have make cracks about the Obama posters in the window or when they have suggested that Bush’s pro-business stance somehow helps small businesses like Zeek’s. “I have no problem with reasonable conservatives,” said Depp. “But Bush supporters and idiots I have no patience for. I won't put up with that nonsense in here.”
For most Greens players, coffee and scone choices are immaterial. At Moline Park the November election seems far off and the leader of the free world, past or present, is likewise less important than what’s between the lines of the baseball diamond. For these young men the bloom of youth and flourishing narcissism provide the whiff of determination they need to thrive in the hothouse of major-league baseball. To worry about the long-term damage done by a despotic American president will not help Delmon Young hit a Felix Hernandez curveball. Pat Burrell does not calculate the cost of the debt crisis facing America, not when he’s earning more than $13,000,000 annually and has a sharp accountant in his employ. A few years back the swaying trunk of French pop star Alizee captured the attention of several Greens players. But the coming election and the fallout from a disastrous presidency do not provoke the same concern. “Now if Jessica Alba were running for president,” said third baseman Eric Chavez. He smirked and adjusted his Spalding cup.
It is also easy to focus on the field when the team wins. As August approaches, Moline owns the league’s best record at 66-39. The Greens have gone 18-5 in July, and now find themselves with a two-game lead over the Chicago Cockroaches in the SJL North. March draftee Tim Lincecum has been stellar, and lefty Cliff Lee, acquired for shortstop J.J. Hardy in the off-season, has had a career year. Ace Dan Haren tops the SJL in wins and earned run average. Offensively, the team leads the league in slugging percentage. Burrell and fellow outfielder Ryan Braun are both on pace to hit more than forty home runs each. The Greens have also been healthy. Ever-ailing Nick Johnson again endured surgery that will keep him out for the year, but Adrian Gonzalez has filled in well. Infielder Howie Kendrick has put a hamstring injury behind him and is among the league batting leaders. His middle infield partner Jose Reyes has not missed more than a few games all year. Chavez has been again dealing with back problems, but even he may finally be ready to play regularly the rest of the way. Longtime prospect Ian Stewart, recently promoted from Winnipeg, may challenge Chavez for playing time.
Greens general manager Rolf Samuels, on the road visiting some of the organization’s minor-league affiliates, remains guarded about prospects for democracy in America and another SJL shoe in Moline. In a phone interview, Samuels noted that the November election is ninety-nine days away and the league championship is not much closer. True, the Greens have the best record in the league and the Democratic front runner Barack Obama is ahead in the polls. Even so, July is no time for self-congratulation, said Samuels. In her third year as Moline skipper, Gail Smith is likewise cautious. “We have been good, yes,” said Smith in a recent post-game interview. “But we have had our share of luck in terms of health. What the next two months or so will bring I could not say. If we play this well all year, yes, we might still be there come fall.” About the election, Smith refuses to comment. “This, this I can act on,” she said, gesturing towards the diamond. “Past the field, all I can do is vote.”
