He was at the thrift store with his aunt trying to find some cheap stuff: a book bag, a lunch box, maybe a cool shirt or two. Having found none of that, they went over to the Mini Wallbert and picked up some overpriced groceries for lunches and the requisite hot cheddar rippled chips as a reward for walking the way there. At the unusually long self-checkout line - there was only one live cashier in the entire place it seemed, and he was dealing with a family of six at the antiquated passport photo section - there was a wall of candy bars, beef jerky packages, breath mints, something called "vim pips", and, wax packs of Shin-Jysy, Crafting, and yes, baseball. There was a cheap pack from the conglomerate, K-Toy, and after his aunt figured out it was not a gambling scheme, she bought a 3-pack.
"You open one and I open one and whoever gets the most, say, Chicago cards, gets to open the last one."
It had been such a nice day that they had decided to walk to the thrift store, but now laden with a couple of bags, they decided to take the El on the way back. Waiting at the stop for the Brown Line back to Ravenswood, and after mumbling their wishes for the pack, they ripped them open.
Will pulled the only Chicago one: a cool-looking "Deep Cut" edition for a first baseman named Enrique Caballero.
He was quietly stunned. They had gone to Vinnie's two Fridays ago and they witnessed Caballero's first hit: a home run that broke a 1-1 tie with the Wolves. Caballero was a rookie who had been called up two Sims ago when outfielder Omar Robles went down with torn ankle ligaments. Caballero had been tearing it up his first year at AAA Rockford, slashing .310 / .405 / .521 with 27 HR and a remarkable 65:72 BB:K ratio. But he had been hitless in first 3 games with the Black Sox.
On the strength of that home run, the Black Sox would win 3-1 and get back to .500 that night. On the Blue Line platform, rowdy Black Sox fans had struck up a chant: "We're Five Hun-Dred!" Clap, clap, clap-clap-clap! And his aunt seemed to be one of the louder revelers. "I can hardly remember when they've been .500 this late in the season."
In the next two games, Enrique Caballero would register two more hits, each of them a 1-run home run. He would end his 2nd sim with just those 3 hits in 22 ABs, an .136 average. Will hopes that his 5 walks to 4 strikeouts (.296 OBP) and .545 slugging will be good enough to hold down the DH role.
"Caballero. Not bad. First three hits, all home runs. That's gotta be some kind of record. Could be your new favorite player."
"Nah. I still rate Timofei Gadomsky." Will flexed his meager muscles, each hand still held a plastic bag of groceries, and raised his voice to say Gadomsky's nickname: "Full Pack!"
"You just like him because he's on your fantasy team."
"I like him because he's leading the team in home runs and RBIs."
"Look at you!"
Will scoffed but couldn't help adding, "Yeah, he had something like 26 RBIs in August. He started - I don't know - selling out for power."
"To think you did not know what an RBI was 6 months ago."
"I knew what an RBI was!" To be fair, 6 months ago Will knew more about how to cool tires on an F1 car than even the more basic metrics used in baseball.
They stood on the train platform. Will's aunt looked at her cards: all dreck. Although one was from a series called "Fan Favs." It was of a guy she remembered was on the Yellow Springs 9: Burhan Tahir. There was another one of a guy she's never heard of before: John Coxtolstoy. She turned over the card and read that his nickname was "Friend of Alan's." She let a laugh.
"What?" Will asked.
"This guy's nickname is 'Friend of Alan's'."
"Oh, Coxtolstoy. He's a rookie, too. 3rd baseman for Louisville. He was just here last month and killed our pitching." Will looked at the card. He thought of what his friend at Science Camp said: "I'm collecting all the rookie cards, from K-Toy, OsChar, all the top card makers." Will intuitively knew collecting cards was throwing good money after bad but it was fun to open up the pack.
His aunt interrupted his thoughts and said "You should send that to him."
"Send what?"
"The card. Send it to Enrique. Players are required to do a certain amount for fans. There's a metric called 'Fan Interest' that's important for the health of the team."
"Huh. Carley Motet does that."
"Who?"
"F1 driver for Renault."
"Well, you should send that card to Enrique. Write a nice letter, too. And send a self-addressed stamped envelope and you'll get it back signed. I can practically guarantee."
"For real?"
"Really. I mean, there's a chance he's a turd but most likely there's a block of time on his schedule for him to do community outreach. Responding to social media and signing memorabilia and writing letters probably all counts towards that."
"You think a cup of coffee guy like Caballero is required to do that?"
His aunt smiled at the phrase "cup of coffee." When did he learn that? He had pointedly used the phrase "can of corn" during the game two weeks ago. The vernacular is rubbing off on him. "Sure. Look, the card is worth pennies and if you get his signature and have it verified then it'll be worth, I don't know, nickels."
"Not everything has to be about money, Auntie."
"We're springing for the El aren't we?"
As if on cue, the station started to rumble. The Brown Line was coming. Will's aunt breathed a sigh of relief. They were on the verge, just on the verge, of starting an argument - a discussion - about money. It had started earlier in the day when she had suggested walking over to the thrift store. All she had really wanted was to get some solid time to talk to him about the upcoming school year. Which she got.
She gave him the unopened wax pack and he took it without a word. They found adjoining seats on the train and settled in for the short ride.
Before he opened the pack, Will said, "What's your wish?"
Without missing a beat, she responded: "Matthes rookie. Rainbow Rookie."
Chanting "Matthes rookie, Matthes rookie" he tore open the pack.
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Enrique Caballero had an excellent spring. He received 23 starts and amassed 60 PAs, slashing .340 / .417 / .491. He hit only 2 home runs but he walked as many times as struck out. But he failed to make the Opening Day roster. Timofei Gadomsky has 1B on lock. And the Black Sox were paying Jorge Gutierrez $9.5m. So, Caballero promptly went to AAA Rockford and mashed: .310 / .405 / .521 with 27 HR in 114 games.
The injury to Oscar Robles was the opening Caballero needed. But in his first two games he had 8 ABs and struck out 4 times. He relied on his eye to get on base, walking his first two times at bat in his 3rd game.
His first three hits were indeed home runs. The first was against Mauro Ruiz, the second against Tyler Murray in a losing cause, in a game called by weather in the 6th, and the third against Ruben Flores.
