PHOENIX—The flight from Tampa to Phoenix is a time to think about how different spring training is in the two states that equally divide the 30 training teams. The difference is driving. Arizona’s longest ride from the Biltmore area of Phoenix is 40 minutes. You can do that simply turning off 17 towards Dunedin, let alone any drive on 75.
But there is a real sense of baseball history in Florida, and not just the afternoon Bob Veale went fishing in Winter Haven’s scenic Lake Lulu, fell asleep, and when he awoke realized he’d lost his oars and was surrounded by hungry alligators. Fortunately they didn’t realize he was Veale
Lakeland is one of those towns. It sits in the heart of the Polk County, life in the Fifties set between Tampa and Orlando, The Tigers have held spring training there since the 1936, 14 months after Al Kaline was born, and long before Al Kaline Drive led into Marchant Stadium. For all but one year of the elegant Kaline’s life, the Tigers have trained two miles from Madame Christine’s House of Palmistry, ten miles from the Fossil Museum.
The Tigers had finished first in the American League Central four straight years, 2011-2014, but they fell apart with age in 2015, going 74-87. Dave Dombrowski left for Boston after trading deadline deals that sent David Price to Toronto and Yoenis Cespedes to the Mets. Then last year, they stayed in the wild card race to the final week and won 86 games, despite the fact that Jordan Zimmerman’s degenerative neck injury took him from a 5-0 start to not winning a game in the second half, while J.D. Martinez, Cameron Maybin and Nick Castellanos all suffered serious injuries.
However, because of their prior success, the age of stars like Miguel Cabrera, Victor Martinez and Ian Kinsler and the related decline in defense and baserunning (both second worst in the league), it went unnoticed as the Indians went to extra innings in the seventh game of the World Series. Still, there remains a strong sense in Lakeland that the Tigers are better than commonly thought. “I think we’re a lot better than people think,” says Justin Verlander. Verlander changed his approach, became a preparation scholar in late July 2014—with a 2.81 ERA since Aug, 4, 2014 to show, as well as performance that could have earned him last year’s Cy Young (his 4.46-1 strikeout/walk ratio was the best of his career), and now takes pride “in trying to help all the young pitchers on this staff.” For instance, he took Daniel Norris out to dinner last week to encourage him to trust in his considerable stuff.
Zimmerman spent the winter with therapy on his neck that included yoga, and early reports of his throwing are very good. Michael Fulmer was rookie of the year. Brad Ausmus really likes lefthanders Norris and Matt Boyd, who, like Fulmer, were acquired at the 2015 deadline. “We believe we have a legitimate chance to make the post-season because of our starting pitching,” says Fulmer, another Verlander disciple. “It’s a staff that has a lot of potential to be good this season,” says Ausmus.
Throughout the organization, Norris is considered a key. “The stuff is there,” says Ausmus.
Which leads to a day of interesting conversations. Understand, Ausmus and Norris are distant cousins. Now, you probably know that Norris drives his VW bus around the country in the off-season, to the mountains and national parks and surfing venues up and down the coast from Northern California to Oregon.
When he first met cousin Brad, Norris promised to drive to San Diego and surf with his manager. It hasn’t happened, but Norris says “I’ll still do it.” Then Norris was asked if he ever surfed in season. “When I played in Lansing (the Lugnuts were a Jays farm team) I loved to surf in Lake Michigan. I’d drive to the Lake and the surfing was good.” When Mickey Lolich was preparing at Marchant Stadium, I do not recall him talking about surfing in Lake Michigan.
Informed of Norris’s Lake Michigan surfing, Ausmus said “I surfed in Tel Aviv.”
I do not recall talking Tel Aviv surfing with Ralph Houk or Sparky Anderson at Marchant. We were so much older then, we’re younger than that now.
The roads from Lakeland to Bradenton and Pittsburgh’s Pirate City complex go through Fort Lonesome, appropriately. The Pirates have been in Bradenton since 1969, and their Pirate City minor league complex has been home to their training dating back to Roberto Clemente’s salad days. What is fascinating about this place is what GM Neal Huntington and his organization have built in terms of culture. They hire Navy Seals, employ athletic specialists who worked for Chip Kelly, and while most in baseball marvel at how their pitching coaches from Ray Searage to the Dominican Summer League have found ways to recapture careers. “This is a unique culture,” says Clint Hurdle, a major part of it. “They train young men to be men. They teach accountability. It’s amazing. From the major league stars all the way down to rookie ball, every player in this organization has to do community service work. I have never seen anything like it.”
“We don’t talk about it because it’s part of what we do and we have our faults,” as well. “But what we believe is that players on every level need to be reminded about the real world, what everyone else in society works through. Players tell us they like those reminders.” Indeed, several mentioned it. When you’re playing AAU Hoops or going to elite quarterback camps or shelling out the big dough for baseball showcases, you’re not in the real world. Your life from the age of 13 is about The Show and it’s millions.
“We try to make sure that players are ready for the major leagues when they get here,” says Hurdle. One of their prizes that will be in Pittsburgh when his fastball command equates to his raw stuff is 6-8 righthanded pitcher Tyler Glasnow.
Up 75 to 275 and the drive over the spectacular Skyway Bridge that stretches to St. Pete and on to Tampa. The area didn’t get a major league team until 1997, but baseball became a major part of Tampa in the 1880’s when Cuban immigrants moved to the area to work in the tobacco factories and they embraced baseball. I remember Pete Rose and Reds in Tampa, and since the Yankees moved here from Ft. Lauderdale it has been the first stop on many a media outlet’s spring tour.
C.C. Sabathia is in his ninth season at Steinbrenner Field. He has evolved from Cy Young Award winner to a man who has battled weight, demons, injuries and the loss of what once was dominant stuff, but last season he still took to his post (“often hurting,” says Joe Girardi) 30 times. “I hope I can go on pitching for a few more years,” says Sabathia. “This is what I love. I love being a Yankee. I got a World Series ring here. I love working with the younger pitchers.”
“C.C. is an incredible role model for our young pitchers,” says Girardi. “He’s always such a positive force in the clubhouse. He goes out of his way to encourage and help everyone, be it his knowledge and experience or just lifting teammates’ spirits. He’s one of those people who has every teammate’s back.”
C.C. Sabathia is 36. He has 223 career wins. Sometime in April he will win his second game and pass Hall of Famers Catfish Hunter and Jim Bunning. If he wins 13 games, he will tie the iconic Whitey Ford.
“I didn’t know that until you told me,” Sabathia said. “That makes going out and working and doing whatever I can even better. Whitey Ford and me in the same sentence.”
Brian Cashman had wanted to do a bridge year or two as the Yankees got old. By trading Andrew Miller and Aroldis Chapman, then re-signing Chapman, he effectively traded two years of Miller for infielder Gleyber Torres, outfielder Clint Frazier and pitcher Justus Sheffield. Gary Sanchez hit 20 homers in 52 games and this spring puts fannies in the seats to watch him take batting practice.
The Yankees are going to be very good again, very soon. Their bullpen with Chapman, Dellin Betances, Tyler Clippard, Adam Warren, Tommy Layne and kids could keep them in the race all year. And talk to their executives like Tim Naehring and you hear raves about Torres’ maturity, focus and rightcenterfield power, as well as Frazier’s sick batspeed.
But there is a balance here, with Matt Holliday and Sabathia as models of the way those kids have to work.
At the other end of 75, there’s Andrew Benintendi, not only the next in line in the Red Sox left field legacy, but, at 22, a person so modest, so respectful that 14 months after being drafted he was asked by Dustin Pedroia and Aaron Hill to move in with them for September and the playoffs.
One year in spring training, Harold Reynolds hooked us up with a rock’n roll bus so we could take Baseball Tonight from camp to camp. The bus once transported Duane and Gregg Allman and Butch Trucks when they were together. Once spring, I’d love to find that bus and ride around Florida, but most of all, ride it into Lakeland, down Al Kaline Boulevard into Marchant Stadium. And think about Butch Trucks’ uncle Virgil (Fire) Trucks in spring training with the Tigers, and how he must have faced Ted Williams there.
Ted used to tell me “no one threw harder than Virgil Trucks.” And when Butch tragically passed away last night, he could boast that no one ever played the guitar like Butch’s nephew Derek, who has a model 1952 Tiger uniform with Virgil’s number 23, the number he wore when he threw two no hitters after a spring training in Polk County, up the road from the Fossil Museum