You're a Joke

Backstory and history of a particular player- make them come to life!
User avatar
mragland
BBA GM
Posts: 640
Joined: Sat Mar 13, 2021 7:14 pm
Location: Fayetteville, AR
Has thanked: 39 times
Been thanked: 374 times

You're a Joke

Post by mragland » Wed Jul 21, 2021 1:58 pm

What on earth am I doing in Mongolia? I come from a small town in Finland, Eurajoki, which my English-speaking teammates find hilarious. Eurajoki sounds to them like, 'you're a jokey'. On top of this, my college team was the Jokerit. Some guys quite naturally tried calling me 'Joker', but I don't think it will stick.

So what am I doing in Mongolia? Nothing much, it turns out. Stoneman and I were called up to the Ulaanbaatar team three weeks ago. Skipper at the time told me that the organization thought we were coming along and wanted to see how we handled the batters at a higher level. I remember what Stony said at the time, “great, there's always a chance for us soft-tossing lefties in the minors. We'll show them we're ready.” Three weeks later, Stoneman has pitched great in seven appearances, and I'm collecting dust in the bullpen. There seems to be a bit of a disconnect between upper management and the on-field coaches at the minor league level.

When I got the promotion, I called my parents to give them the news that I'd be relocating. They could not be less excited. In their eyes, this just prolongs a mistake that I made months ago. It was not until two weeks after I told them I'd be leaving college after two years and entering the draft that they spoke to me again. My father, an engineer, doesn't consider baseball a real sport, let alone a valid career choice. Throughout my childhood, when on our way to a baseball game or practice, he would ask, “why not play a real Finnish sport, like Pesäpallo?” Pesäpallo is a game that at once resembles and is nothing like baseball. Very few pesäpallo skills translate well to baseball, and I never had an interest in it.

To this day my dad always introduces me as his “baseball-crazy” son, not to say I'm serious about baseball, but as if to say “he's really into baseball, isn't that crazy?” My own affinity for baseball was always something of a joke to dad. A phase he hoped I'd grow out of.

There are a handful of Finnish pro ball players, but Finns have not made much of an impression on baseball, and by the same token, baseball hasn't made much of an impression on Finland. To date, there has just been one Finnish-born big leaguer, and he only appeared in two games well over a hundred years ago.

We are on the verge of a revolution in Finnish baseball, however, with Aimo Harrki and Esko Takko poised to break into the UMEBA soon, and Jouo Rovanperä is a top-100 prospect. We Finnish pros all keep in touch with each other, and root for each other, hard, because nobody else is. Our country, and even some of our families, remain indifferent to the sport and our endeavors, at best. All of us, at some point, had to say “screw it, baseball is my game, and I don't care what you all think.”

Minor league baseball has a way of letting you know that you're nothing special. In college I was an all-star starter, and now I'm just a lefty reliever, who won't start again unless something dramatic and unforeseen improves with the changeup. Heck, I'm not even a prospect, just minor league filler. I listen to my instructors and work on what I've got. If the organization is interested in what I can do in single-a, my manager does not share their curiosity. He may have forgotten I'm out here. On the plus side, I guess, they can't send me back to China if I never definitively prove that I can't hack it here.

When you're a nineteenth round pick in a draft class that many consider the worst ever, expectations aren't exactly sky-high. Me and Stony are “20/20 guys,” little regarded and disposable, though Stony is showing them there might be more to him. He was a fourth round pick and a bonus baby, so somebody must think he's worth something. When I signed, I got a one-way ticket to Wuhan, coach.

When we arrived in Ulaanbaatar we had an afternoon to play tourist. There's definitely a feeling of isolation out here, a stone's throw from Siberia. There are statues of scowling Mongol generals sitting on their little horses and, somewhat incongruously, a monument to the Beatles. On the edges of town, there are actual yurts, and beyond that, grassy mountains all around. Ulaanbaatar is the coldest national capital in the world, owing to its latitude and elevation. They told us that the grandstand faces south, because if it didn't, the field would never thaw due to too much time in shadow. Rumor around the clubhouse is that this is the team's last season in Mongolia, with the organization interested in putting its Class-A squad in a more practical location.

What am I doing in Mongolia? I'm paying attention, not just to what the coaches say to me, but how they work with the other players. I'm determined to stay in the game, if not as a player, then maybe as a coach. Perhaps I can help grow the sport back home in my own small way. Let the kids playing the game know that somebody takes their dreams, their effort, seriously, and is in their corner.
Morris Ragland
President, Baseball Ops, Beirut Cedars (8/25/46 - 10/23/47)
President, Baseball Ops, Valencia Stars (10/24/47 - present)
925-891 Lifetime Record
2048 Caleca Winner

"Success is stumbling from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm." - W. Churchill

scottsdale_joe
Ex-GM
Posts: 3407
Joined: Tue Jun 29, 2010 12:55 pm
Location: scottsdale, az
Has thanked: 68 times
Been thanked: 121 times

Re: You're a Joke

Post by scottsdale_joe » Wed Jul 21, 2021 3:20 pm

Great story.
Joe - GM UMEBA CAIRO PHARAOHS (2047-xxxx); Vancouver Mounties (1996-2009; 2035-2036); Halifax Hawks (2023-2026)Image LINKS:ImageImageImageImageImage

Post Reply Previous topicNext topic

Return to “Player Spotlights”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 2 guests