I’m walking back to my hotel from Thursday’s off-day workouts at Safeco Field because the concierge told me to.
“We only get sunshine like this a few days a year,” said the first concierge I’ve seen with a pierced lower lip. “Walk.”
So I’m walking the final seven blocks back almost straight uphill, huffing, baking, sweating, beginning to feel like the White Sox must. But that’s the question: How do they feel after losing the first two at home of a best-of-five?
Something manager Jerry Manuel said in the Safeco interview room keeps replaying like that infernal refrain stuck in my mind, “Who let the dogs out?” The theme song adopted by the White Sox and Mariners this season applied in the flea-bitten sense to Sox hitters in Games 1 and 2. Dogs, indeed.
But this from Manuel on Thursday was vaguely troubling: “Obviously, I would have liked to have won two games, but the effort has really moved me. To see them give all they have to give and come up short–I obviously would be somewhat empty [if the Sox were closed out in Friday’s Game 3]. But at the same time I would have enough satisfaction that I would live through the winter.”
He smiled his made-for-Seattle smile. You almost could see Manuel sitting at a sunlit table outside one of the java joints on nearly every corner, sipping cafe latte while telling grunge rockers and tree-huggers: “We had a great year. We gave our all. This just wasn’t our time.”
Thursday’s remark had the faint ring of a concession speech, or at least the groundwork for one.
This is the Manuel who has studied Gandhi, who knows his Bible so well he made a recent reference to Gideon’s Army in Judges, Chapters 6 and 7, who is as decent and humble a soul as I’ve encountered in sports. This Christian soldier still hasn’t received enough credit for keeping this 95-win club together with his patient strength and instinctive mixing and matching of kid pitchers and a Cortisone Corps of aching veterans. I wish I could have played for this man.
But now I wonder if, in danger of being swept, his Sox need a little more Mike Ditka or Phil Jackson from him–some straight black coffee instead of decaf.
Manuel’s constant refrain this season was something like, “This is happening a year or two ahead of schedule. We have battled all year, but we’re still not as talented as we need to be.”
And that’s pretty much the way the Sox have played so far in the postseason. Even now the attitude seems to be, “Play hard, have fun, don’t forget it has been a great year even if we lose.”
The Sox looked and sounded pretty much the same during Thursday’s workout as they did during Monday’s–fairly loose, upbeat, cliche-spouting. No angry words for the media. No vows. No signs of do-or-die.
No, this isn’t the NFL or NBA, in which emotion can carry a team through one must-win game. This is a baseball team with very little playoff experience versus ancient Mariners with ages of it. Manuel, one nice guy who finished first, now walks the fine line between relaxing an overanxious team and making it OK for his Sox to lose.
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Is he just easing the pressure? Playing dead? Will the Sox jump on the unsuspecting Mariners like unleashed Dobermans, taking extra bases, sliding hard, getting mad instead of tentative at the plate, refusing to lose?
I still say they’re in the perfect spot to switch the momentum from sunlight to cloudburst on the Mariners. How seriously can the Mariners or their fans take Game 3 starter James Baldwin, whose sore shoulder and fragile psyche have Manuel ready to replace him from the first inning on? While Baldwin thinks he’s unbeatable under roofs–he’s 15-1 inside–Friday’s forecast calls for more sunshine. Safeco’s retractable roof will stay open.
So I’m walking uphill, sensing no buzz over Game 3. Seattle’s attitude: Enjoy the weather until the playoffs get serious against the Yankees or A’s. Even the “Sodo Mojo” signs in the coffee house windows seem contrived and half-hearted. The neighborhood around Safeco is called Sodo, for south downtown. But who needs mojo against a team that, like Austin Powers, has lost its?
To these people the White Sox are nothing but coffee grounds.
I stop in a java market. I find a packaged sandwich called–no joke–“Chicago Style Turkey and Havarti.” Only in Seattle.
I hope Manuel can feed his Sox a little less havarti.