Dragon Questions - Vladdy Edition

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stormfall
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Dragon Questions - Vladdy Edition

Post by stormfall » Tue Feb 12, 2019 6:24 am

Running a baseball team is a difficult business. It’s even more difficult in times like this, when team news this week has been completely dominated by the incident involving our six-man pantomime mascot, Vladdy the Golden Dragon. I would love nothing more than to discuss our record this week, or our season-ending series with Jerusalem, or even Mike Román and Juan Solís’s officially confirmed managing experiment, but I can’t. All I have time to give you is the story behind last Saturday’s promotion gone horribly wrong. So sit back, relax, and enjoy the tale of how Vladdy’s intended triumphant return ended with blue scorch marks all over the field.

It all started when we decided to bring Vladdy the Golden Dragon back into the spotlight. Ever since the video of Vladdy falling down and arguing with himself went viral, we had avoided calling too much attention to our six-man mascot, but when we found out that the first-place Balauri had the worst attendance in the UMEBA, we decided that hiding Vladdy was no longer an option. But what could we do with him? Even simple things like walking around the concourse or standing on the dugout were a challenge, and we could forget about having him dance the YMCA or fire a T-shirt cannon. We were so out of options that we even turned to our promotional director, whose ideas had already gotten him restraining orders from four UMEBA ballparks, for help - and he gave us a way to save the reputation of our mascot. In order to remind everyone of the fearsome dragon he really was, Vladdy would have to fight a knight on horseback - and of course, he'd have to breathe fire.

As soon as our promotional director said that, he could see his court-ordered "minder" turn pale and reach for his phone, but he explained that he'd built his reputation on pyrotechnics, and swore that he could get Vladdy to shoot a ten-foot blue flame without anyone getting hurt. All he wanted was a chance, he pleaded, just one opportunity to show what he could do. The nervous minder finally agreed to stage a demonstration, but gave our promotional director a dire warning: Get this wrong, and you may be out of baseball for good. That night, the entire front office gathered in the parking lot to watch him prepare for battle. With the eyes of our team upon him, our promotional director unveiled a massive flamethrower, shining in the moonlight. Before we had time to be impressed, he ripped open a series of blue packets with DANGER written all over them and poured their contents into a tube on the side of the flamethrower, cut a small hole in Vladdy's mouth fabric, and pushed the nozzle of the flamethrower through. Our promotional director then picked up Vladdy's head, pointed it towards the sky, and out came exactly what he had promised - a magnificent ten-foot jet of blue flame. He swung the head around and around, flashing brilliant arcs across the darkness of the night. We were all incredulous, I was ecstatic, and even his minder managed a weak smile. Later that night, we received a call from the league office. “I’m not crazy about it, and I’m not crazy about you, either,” the league president sighed, “but I do believe you can safely make that dragon breathe fire. Now please, please, try not to prove me wrong.”

In the team offices the next morning, our promotional director explained his idea in greater detail. After the top of the fifth inning, he suggested, Vladdy would come down onto the field to get the fans on their feet. Right before he would leave, though, the center-field entrance would open, and out would come a brave knight and his trusty steed. It would then be my job to cue the crowd and get them to cheer Vladdy on. If the fans truly believed in Vladdy, I would tell the stadium, then Vladdy would have the power to breathe fire. Right when the knight raised his sword, the fans' cheers would push Vladdy over the top, and he'd raise his head and spew a blue blaze into the sky. Both knight and dragon would then circle each other, and try some half-speed attacks, until the Bucharest players arrived. As a team, they would get a hold of both Vladdy and the horse, and lead them away from each other and off the field so the game could continue. The whole plan was perfect.

Except for one minor detail - we didn't have a horse, and even if we did, we didn't know anybody who could ride one. Our owner, who hadn't approved of the idea in the first place, refused to put up any more money for a horse or a knight. We were about to give up on the idea entirely when Vladdy's tail operator spoke up. He knew a guy who knew a guy who could find us a horse and a suit of armor for the day - no questions asked - and as for a knight, he had us covered - he'd been riding horses all his life. So, despite the best efforts of yet another official, the battle would go on.

Before I explain what actually happened on the night of the battle, I should probably tell you a little more about Vladdy's operators. None of them were best friends to begin with, but two of them have a particular animosity for each other. I can't legally give you their names yet, so let's just say Big Vlad operated the head and Little Vlad operated the tail. Big Vlad and Little Vlad had already been involved in a number of incidents since the start of the season, so we should have suspected something as soon as Little Vlad volunteered to be the knight. However, both of them were perfect gentlemen in the days leading up to the battle - which should have been our first and only warning.

Now, at last, we get to the incident on the night of the 11th. The Balauri had sold out the Ballpark of Bucharest for this game, and the 2600 fans on hand for our series finale against Mumbai knew that something big was going to happen. The league president sent us a final voicemail reminding us that it was not too late to call off the battle, and that we were under no obligation to go through with it, but we would not be deterred. In the top of the fifth, with the Balauri surprisingly down 3-0, I gave the signal to send Vladdy onto the field. When the audience realized that something out of the ordinary was about to happen, they rose as one out of their seats, and began a feverish chant of "Vlad-dy! Vlad-dy! Vlad-dy!" I signaled to open the center-field wall to reveal Little Vlad in full armor, riding a jet-black stallion through a cloud of smoke, and the entire stadium erupted. Seizing the PA microphone, I addressed the delirious crowd. "Ladies and gentlemen," I asked, "do you believe in Vladdy the Golden Dragon?" The crowd somehow found it within themselves to get even louder. "Do you believe?" Louder. "Do you believe?" Louder still. "DO YOU BELIEVE?" The entire stadium began to shake. "It seems Vladdy believes it too! Very well... let the battle begin!"

Right on cue, Big Vlad tilted Vladdy's head toward the heavens and let loose with a monstrous, brilliant, almost obnoxiously bright column of fire. As he blasted incendiary blue arcs through the air, the roar of the crowd became so deafening that our entire office started to feel tremors. Atop his horse, Little Vlad raised his sword high in the air, and charged - much faster than we had planned. Little Vlad flipped his visor down and leveled his sword at the flaming end of our mascot. Big Vlad, relishing a confrontation, raised Vladdy's head up in preparation to strike - and a passing Little Vlad swung his sword around, nailing Big Vlad in his mini-Vladdies. This was when the battle really started to get out of hand.

After getting hit, Big Vlad went absolutely berserk. I couldn't really blame him - I mean, that sword was made of solid wood, so there had to have been some serious bruising. Raising Vladdy's head once again, Big Vlad aimed the flamethrower at Little Vlad and started blasting away, leaving fiery trails across the field and incinerating everything in sight. Little Vlad was desperate to get away from the dragon, but his horse bucked and threw him off as soon as Big Vlad started taking aim at him, so he was forced to turn tail and run for the dugout. We looked around in desperation for any players to help, but all fifty of them - for both teams - were safely inside their own dugouts. As Little Vlad stuck his sword into the blowtorch flame and almost hit Big Vlad in the leg with it, we realized that there was nothing anyone could do to prevent the carnage unfolding on the field.

We've been given a lot of promotional credit for having the police drive onto the field to break up the fight, but in the interest of full disclosure, I have to admit that was not intentional. As the flames and swords continued to fly, the red and blue lights of the Bucharest Sector 6 Ghencea Police Force miraculously appeared through the center-field entrance. Over the sirens and the general chaos, I could vaguely hear an order to "drop your weapons and step away from the dragon." Gradually, mercifully, the noise and smoke died down, giving us a look at the remains of our ballpark. In all honesty, the field wasn't quite as bad as I made it sound. Except for the blue scorch marks on the center-field grass, everything looked pretty much the same as it had before the fifth inning ended. In fact, after a bit of pleading, grumbling, and a few ejections, the umpires even agreed to resume the game, which the shellshocked Balauri lost without incident.

Our trial to face the consequences of this promotion will be scheduled sometime in October. I have been generously allowed to continue managing the Bucharest Balauri through the end of the season, although it will be entirely under the supervision of the league president himself. Our promotional director was not so lucky - until the trial, he will be held in a cell with Little Vlad and Big Vlad. Good luck to him.

We'll be back next week with a normal (I hope) edition of Dragon Questions. Right now, I have to sign a replacement for our dead-armed ace pitcher and inform our temperamental manager that his players will be doing his job for the last two games of the season. Once again, feel free to submit any questions or suggestions. What's the worst that could happen? Find out next week, with another look into the front office of the Bucharest Balauri!

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Re: Dragon Questions - Vladdy Edition

Post by bschr682 » Tue Feb 12, 2019 7:20 am

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Re: Dragon Questions - Vladdy Edition

Post by RonCo » Sat Feb 23, 2019 12:50 am

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