We All Get Deked Now & Then

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“Deke” is a cool, made-up baseball word.  The deke — short for “decoy” — is a play (or maybe it’s better called a “ploy”) that takes advantage of a baserunner who has either a) let his mind wander off, or b) has gotten “lost” during a play and assumed — wrongly — where the ball has gone.  Then, trying to just get back into the moment, he acts rashly, assuming where he hopes or thinks the ball is, rather than knowing where it truly is.  A crafty fielder can take advantage of that baserunner’s unfortunate momentary lapse.

I have my own version.  It’s the Yoga Deke.  I’ll get to that another time.  First, back to baseball …

In a well-executed deke, a player (usually an infielder, but occasionally an outfielder can get in on things), pretends he either has, or doesn’t have, the ball.  He tries to fool the baserunner.If an infielder pretends he has it in his glove — when it actually got past him and is now somewhere in the outfield — a baserunner can get confused, hold up for a precious moment, and lose his chance  to take an additional base.  If an infielder pretends he doesn’t have the ball — when actually he has hidden it in his glove — a baserunner might idly step off the bag and be tagged out.  Outfielders can pretend they cleanly caught a fly ball, when in fact they trapped the ball in the grass, so the play is still “live”.  Oh, the possibilities are endless!

My longtime baseball friend Jim Johnson, NTP (Not The Pitcher) reminds me that dekes can also lead to injury, if a baserunner slides aggressively into a base because he thinks he must avoid a tag.  He’s right on that count.  Although the argument is, of course, had the baserunner been paying attention … well, he would have known better.

(Why is it that when a player is deked, he feels the need to blame someone else for his lapse?)

Dekes don’t pan out very often — at least in the majors — because most players are paying attention and are fully aware of where the ball really is.  The deke only works if a baserunner has lost his present moment and starts acting on assumption rather than fact.

OK … here’s one that worked.   From just last week, the Reds vs. the Cubs, the Cubs’ Starlin Castro gets lost in the play and does a huge double-take when he thinks the 2nd baseman is fielding the ball for the “out”.  It comes up about midway through this clip at about the 1:30 mark.  Starlin Castro Gets Deked  (I kinda feel bad for the poor guy … )

I think we all lose our focus and then act on assumptions from time to time — in the name of efficiency or simplicity or impatience.  We space out in the middle of running our own bases.  Well, I do anyway.

Yoga and baseball remind us to be ever-present — right here, right now.  To stay in the present moment is to be fully aware and ever-ready.  We are more likely to act wisely and appropriately.  We are far less likely to fall for a deke.

And, we won’t end up like poor Starlin Castro, who clearly had one very deke’ing bad day.

Be Quiet

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About a week ago my husband got me a book and said, “Here.  Read this and tell me if there’s anything I should know in it.”  First of all, wasn’t there a Seinfeld episode where George has someone read books for him?  Anyway, the book is about the online media — specifically big blogs — and how they manipulate and overload people to encourage clicks and page views and user activity.

I don’t really like the book or the author — who admits he was a PR guy who did all the same sleazy things he is chastizing bloggers for doing now.  I’m not even sure I believe what he’s writing — he tells such a back story of how he couldn’t be trusted with his copy online, why should this book be any more truthful?

But, here’s what sticks with me.  What’s wrong with a little quiet?

To be successful, he writes, a blog has to be noisy, constantly updated, larded with clicks and provocative headlines.

I got nothin’.

This blog is quiet as a mouse.  I’ve had one click in the 3 weeks it’s been up.  Full disclosure — that one click was me.  And, I clicked by mistake.  Even I didn’t mean to click on this site.

But, I kind of like the quiet.

It’s like baseball.  Baseball is so quiet.  Nothing happens for these long, sweet intervals.  Everyone just stands there, watching and waiting.  All there is … is a green field, a handful of guys, and waiting.

It’s not that the players are standing around stupid.  Instead, they are being present, being ready, and — like a game of chess — have expanded the stillness into all the possibilities that may come.  You’ve got to be pretty good to keep yourself so centered when things seem so quiet.

I love that.

Yoga is like that.  And, it’s what scares many people away.  In the middle of a flowing series, I sometimes ask my students to stand still.  And, many get antsy.   They don’t want to.  They want to DO something else.  You are doing something, I insist.  You are standing there.

According to the book I’m reading, the best blog posts are 200-300 words.   This guy clearly doesn’t understand how exciting extra-inning games can be.  I bet he hates baseball.  I bet he thinks nothing happens.  He’s wrong.

Now, I’ll just soak in some quiet.

For awhile.

The Burden of the Player …

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“Baseball doesn’t have any intrinsic power.  It only has what people give to it.  For some, the man who plays is a superhero, and he can do great things.  For some, the man who plays is an obstacle who must get out of the way.  Is baseball as important as food, knowledge, care, or a dry pair of boots?  Is it as important as some of the things that pass us by in everyday life?  I don’t think so.  Can it inspire, motivate, and call us to do something greater than ourselves?  Absolutely.  The burden of the player isn’t to achieve greatness, but to give the feeling of it to everyone he encounters.  It was wrong of me even to try to separate life and the game.  They were intertwined, meant to be, one affecting the other, one teaching the other, even when the mixture occasionally blows up.  It takes a real person, one who understands himself, to use the tool of baseball for something good.  For that person, as long as he has a jersey on his back, he has a chance.”

Dirk Hayhurst in The Bullpen Gospels, a reflection on a year pitching in the minor leagues.  Really, really good book.  Really.

Here … you can go get … now … http://amzn.to/OFP6YS

 

Slumpasana

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Slumpasana.  That’s what I call the droopy pose I sometimes see my Yoga students in.  They’re sitting at the start of class, but clearly the day has worn them down.  They’re stooped over, scrunched up.  Their muscles have abandoned them and their posture curls.   Their heart sinks into their belly.  Their spine collapses.

I can’t even make eye contact, because they’re all curled down.  They look so sad — a deflated body where a person used to be.

I’ll step behind them and adjust them by drawing their spine up and shoulders open.  It’s about getting the heart to widen.  Sometimes they stay up.  Sometimes … they slump right back down … or as soon as they think I’m not looking.

Without strong, healthy muscles, the body loses its structure.  Without energy, the body loses its structure.  And, when the world weighs heavy on you – physically, mentally, emotionally – you hang down your head and slump.  It just seems easier to be curled down.

Orioles catcher Matt Wieters is in a slump.  If my math is correct (and it is sometimes) he is 1 for 27 over the past week.  Wait, scratch that.  Since I’ve tinkered so long on this, he is now 1 for 30.  Sigh.  I better post this before I have to update again.

I don’t mean to pile on here.  I know it’s only temporary … slumps always are. Aren’t they?

It’s painful to watch a batter or a pitcher in a slump as they grimace in frustration, drop their head down, stoop their shoulders and shuffle off … out of the batter’s box or off the mound.  It can just break your heart.

I endure slumps on my Yoga mat.  Unrolling my mat can feel like an invitation to fail.   Fortunately, I don’t have 30,000 people staring at me as it unfolds.

Sometimes the failure is physical.  Really?  I’m a Yoga instructor and I can’t hold this pose for a minute?  I am weak and old and horrible.    Sometimes the failure is mental.  Dammit, where is this bliss they keep talking about?  Why am I the only one who sucks at this?  Heaven knows I’m miserable now.  Really? You, too, Morrissey?  And, sometimes I just lose energy.  I slump because all the energy has been sucked right out of my bones.

Sometimes I just lie down and wonder if that can be “good enough” for my practice.  And, that slump affects every other aspect of my life.  I sigh and my body sighs and everything seems harder and heavier and more annoying.

By the way, I’m actually rocking the Yoga mat like Buster Posey right now (he’s had a good couple weeks).  I feel strong and inspired and every once in awhile I see that magical bliss sitting out there and I can just about reach out and … nearly … nearly … nearly  touch it.  I vibrate from the inside out, and things are fun and the birds sing and my heart is wide and my spine is long and my body feels strong. Everything seems so effortless.

The next slump seems so far away … although I know it’s out there, just waiting for me to get cocky and a little too comfortable.

Not too long ago, I told one of my Yoga teachers about a struggle I was having with my practice.  He sent back a brief email.  It read: “Persistence is success.”

Oh.

Just unroll the mat.  Just do it again, even if it really seems to not be getting better.  Because sometimes it’s the doing that is the most important part.  And, how will you know if a slump is gone, unless you keep at it?

So, what’s the point?  No point.  This is a blog afterall that is only a week old and really had no point at the start.  But, we all slump.  And, we unslump.  And, we slump again.

I hope Matt Wieters unslumps.  I hope that I don’t slump soon.  And, I wish non-slumps to you.

I fell in & out of love with baseball …

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I fell in love with baseball.  I fell out of love with baseball.  I fell back in love with baseball.

And, over the years I discovered that baseball was a lot like the other things that sustained me … the Yoga, the meditation, the mindfulness of being present, right here, right now.   It may not mean anything to anyone else.  But, it all weaves together and it’s the stillness, and mindfulness, and, yes, even the oft-time unending slowness of this simple sport that seems to have a lot in common with my Yoga mat.

Just like my Yoga practice … a baseball fan sits and watches and waits for something to happen.  Trying to enjoy the present moment, even when there’s no exciting “action” to hang onto.  It is the sitting and watching that IS the bliss.  True fans know that.

Occasionally, your Yoga practice is upended by a burst of Samadhi — that purest of bliss, however fleeting.  Those fleeting moments are like the moments of action in a baseball game.  Having watched … and waited … there comes a moment of athletic beauty the blossoms out of a play in the outfield, or a baseball is hit way into the stands, or a pitcher simply, smoothly, effortlessly, fires a fastball right by a batter for strike 3.  But, those moments of baseball Samadhi are just that … moments.  And, then the quiet and the waiting and the watching begins again.  The stillness.

I don’t play.  I’m just a fan.

It’s who I am.  And, I like to type words which is sometimes thought of as writing, but often is just typing.  But, I thought, why not type about baseball?  And, Yoga.  And, Zen.  And, me.

When I’m not scoring games, watching games, checking out an arcane baseball stat, or reading about the history of baseball, … or unrolling my own Yoga mat in search of bliss in my practice … I’m a Yoga instructor and a massage therapist.

And, in case you’re wondering … I bleed Orange & Black.  That’s for the Orioles.  But, I bleed a little on the side for the Giants.  So, I can see the Yogic appeal of having a DH … or not.  And, I married a Yankees fan … which shows my capacity for understanding and compassion.  Although I have been able to squeeze a bit of Orange & Black out of him in recent years.

In any event, I don’t know if anyone will ever see this … or read a single word.  I don’t have any clue where this will go, or if it will stall out like other blogs that come from a person’s real passion, but never quite make the transition onto a page.

But, to see baseball and Yoga on the same page makes me feel very happy indeed.   And, if you did find this and read this far … Namasté!