A Dialogue of Faith

Dude!  Dude! Oh my gosh!  Did you hear!  The Cubs are gonna get Theo Epstein!

Really?

Oh my goodness that is so awesome!

Who is Theo Epstein?

Man, are you serious?

Yeah, is he like a good first baseman or something?  I don’t think I’ve ever seen him play.

No man, he’s a general manager.  The guy who constructed two championship teams for the Red Sox within the past decade.

Ohhh.  I see.

Yeah man this is such great news.

But he doesn’t play?

Ha! No.  Duh, don’t you pay attention to baseball?

So… you’re excited about a guy who doesn’t really play the game, but only hires the people that play the game?

Yeah!

Huh, just doesn’t seem like that big of a deal.

Uh, hello!  They just made a movie about a general manager.  They’re essential.  Brad Pitt Essential.

Good point.  (rolls eyes)

This is so exciting. We’re World Series bound!

 Like next year?

Well, probably not.  But soon.  Super soon.  Like within five years.

Five years?

Maybe next year.  Yeah man.  Probably next year.  I have hope!  Each new season means new hope, right?

Huh.  Interesting.  Don’t you guys have a lot of work to do?

I don’t know… sorta.  Maybe five years is more realistic.  Yeah.  Five years.  Guaranteed.

But I heard you guys don’t really have any great outfielders.  Don’t really have a long term first or third baseman, your pitching rotation is pretty thin and your bullpen is just terrible, save for your above average closer  - that may or may not be trade bait.

Um.  Well yeah.. but uh, I’d still say five years… probably.  At most seven.  And dude we got a super awesome shortstop.  Castro is going to be like the next Alex Rodriguez.

Didn’t it take A-Rod fifteen years to win a championship?

Dude whatever.  Theo is like really good at building up young talent.  

What about Hanley Ramirez?

Yeah?

Didn’t he trade him?

Yeah… but… but then they won their second championship right after that!  What a great parallel.

So you think he’s going to be able to trade your best and only real building block and then win a championship?

I mean, not all analogies are perfect man.

Of course. 

Come on dude, you got to at least admit that this is fate.

Fate?

Dude, he broke the Curse of the Bambino!  He has a gift.  The baseball gods smile upon him.

Right…  Fate. Curses. Baseball gods.  What, do you have like voodoo dolls at your house or something?

No man. Nah.  I just have faith.

Uh... in what?

I don’t know man.  Why you got to be such a downer?

I’m just being realistic.

Dude you got to be a romantic. You got to have hope.  Like haven’t you ever seen ‘Field of Dreams’ or ‘Angels in the Outfield?’

Are you trying to validate your real life philosophy through fictional movies?

[silence]

  …they were fictional…?

Oh my word.

Whatever man, someday all this hope and pain and anticipation and pain and joy and pain and all of it… all of it will payoff.

How can you torture yourself like this?

I don’t man.  It’s just like… you know, perspective.

A silly perspective. 

It’s the only one I know man.  The only one I want to know.