For the first 12 or so years of my life, I was convinced that one day I would be the starting catcher for the Yankees.
I was a switch-hitter, like my idol Jorge Posada, and I wore No. 7 for Mickey Mantle, the player I was almost named after. I practiced my autograph and wrote out projected stats for my eventual Hall of Fame career, as if the sheet of paper were the back of my baseball card. I wrote the script that John Sterling would read for my Yankeeography and listened to it over and over again in my head. I made up a Sterling home run call for myself. Sadly, I don’t remember it. What I do remember is my first walk-off home run, when I was playing for the 11-year-old East Fishkill All-Stars. Afterward, I wrote the date on the baseball, described the event and authenticated it with my signature. I had no doubt it would be worth something someday.
Chuck Solomon/Sports Illustrated
At some point, though, I woke up from my dream and realized I would never play for the Yankees, no matter how hard I worked. So I found a new dream. If I couldn’t play for the most accomplished franchise in Major League Baseball, I would cover it for the most accomplished publication in baseball writing.
On Monday, Feb. 4, 2019, after another 12 or so years, my new dream came true. I walked into the Sports Illustrated newsroom for the first time as a staff member. Over the four years since, I worked my way up. I started as a nights and weekends producer on the 6 p.m. to 2 a.m. shift—driving more than an hour and a half each way to and from my parents’ home in Hopewell Junction, N.Y.—and wrote about baseball, too. (Coincidentally, my first SI byline was published exactly four years ago today.) I became the baseball editor at night, working closely with Connor Grossman, my predecessor as MLB editor, before I took over for Connor, just two weeks ahead of the ’21 season.
Two years later, as we near the start of another MLB season, my SI dream has come to an end. As some of you may know, I was one of the SI staffers who lost their jobs as part of this week’s layoffs. The news was sudden and terribly sad.
Layoffs are an unfortunate but inevitable part of our industry. SI has had three major rounds of them in my four years here. Each time, we lose some of the best sports journalists in the business. But, more than that, we lose an essential part of SI.
You see, the reason why I’ve always wanted to work here, and the reason why I had no intention of leaving, is because this publication is much bigger than any individual writer, editor, photographer, etc. Indeed, SI’s legacy is the result of all of us, past and present, who have worked together to tell the sports stories that matter most. I am so incredibly proud to have had a hand in all that is great about SI. I wish my time here didn’t have to end.
Thankfully, Tom Verducci, Stephanie Apstein and Emma Baccellieri are still here. They are three of the best baseball writers in the country, and I have no doubt that they will continue to provide us fans with the illuminating, entertaining and fulfilling stories that we love. As for this newsletter, SI will put it on pause for a bit and rethink things before the 2023 season gets underway. If you have any feedback about what you’d like to see, send it over to our newsletter editor at josh.rosenblat@si.com.
I do not know what is next for me, but rest assured, the remaining few baseball stories I have left to publish here will not be the last I write. I love what I do too much to let a round of layoffs keep me down. As the great Jimmy Dugan once said, “Baseball is what gets inside you. It’s what lights you up; you can’t deny that.”
It has been the thrill of a lifetime to cover baseball here at SI. Thank you to everyone who has helped to make my dream come true.
1. THE OPENER
Jeff Roberson/AP
In the summer of 1959, a writer from Memphis, David Bloom, visited Rochester, N.Y., and the Triple-A Red Wings to check in on 17-year-old catcher Tim McCarver, who had graduated only two months earlier from Memphis’s Christian Brothers Academy.
“As for McCarver, he’s on a perpetual picnic,” Bloom wrote. “Happiest guy around, full of fun, in the midst of everything the Red Wings do.”
The picnic never ended, at least not until he took his last breath. Tim McCarver died Thursday in his beloved Memphis at the age of 81. A man of immense interests, McCarver enjoyed them with gusto. He wrote five books, read poetry, studied and enjoyed fine wine, recorded an album of American standards, hosted a TV sports interview show, won three sports Emmys, appeared in movies and visited art museums wherever his travels took him.
That’s how Tom Verducci begins his fitting tribute to the great Tim McCarver, who died yesterday. I cannot recommend it enough.
Remembering Tim McCarver, Baseball’s Renaissance Man by Tom Verducci
2. ICYMI
Let’s get you caught up on some of our other stories from the past week.
Shohei Ohtani Says He’s ’Not Thinking About Free Agency Right Now’ by Stephanie Apstein
MLB Indicates Path for Potential End of Local Blackouts for Some Teams by Stephanie Apstein
Four Burning Questions Surrounding Spring Training by Emma Baccellieri and Matt Martell
MLB Is About to Become Much More Exciting by Tom Verducci
3. WORTH NOTING from Nick Selbe
With players beginning to report to spring training, now is a time typically filled with unbridled positivity and enthusiasm. But speaking to reporters Thursday, Brewers ace Corbin Burnes struck a different, more uneasy tone.
Burnes—who just lost his arbitration hearing with Milwaukee, and will now make $10.01 million rather than the $10.75 million he and his camp asked for—was asked whether any harsh feelings existed between him and the only organization he’s ever played for. With his response, he did not mince words.
“There’s no denying that the relationship is definitely hurt from what [transpired] over the last couple weeks,” Burnes said. “There’s really no getting around that.”
For Milwaukee’s sake, let’s hope both sides find a way to maneuver. Burnes is unquestionably one of the game’s best pitchers, and he took issue with what he characterized as the Brewers’ “disrespectful” handling of the arbitration hearing. While this is merely one vaguely worded side of the story, it’s worth revisiting the age-old topic of how and why teams choose to undertake these head-to-head financial battles with their own employees.
Of course, not every player shares the same sentiments that Burnes did here. But is the $740,000 the Brewers will save this season worth this kind of burned bridge? Burnes noted that everybody involved is professional and will handle themselves as such going forward. Time will tell how that plays out. But despite Milwaukee’s winning the arbitration hearing, it’s hard to shake the notion that both sides are walking away feeling like they’ve lost something.
4. TRIVIA from Matt Martell
Previous question: Mike Trout ranks fourth among active players with 350 home runs. Who are the three players ahead of him?
Answer: Miguel Cabrera (507), Nelson Cruz (459), Giancarlo Stanton (378)
5. THE CLOSER from Emma Baccellieri
Our closing note today is an appreciation of Matt: His passion for baseball (and for good baseball writing) shone through not just in this newsletter, but in every story he edited from me, Steph and Tom. Editors don’t get their due as often as they should. But if we three writers are the pitching staff, Matt was, fittingly, our catcher, skilled both at calling our games and at framing every pitch to look its best. Onward and upward.
