Arrival

The flight out of Belgium from Brussels left around 6 PM headed towards Frankfurt, Germany…stopping over there for a few hours before heading off to Israel around 1130 PM and with an hour time difference and an hour delay on the ground due to rain, I finally got into Tel Aviv around 330 AM with no sleep. By the time I got through customs and my luggage at 430 AM, we were only an hour and a half away from a group coming in from U.S. via London so I waited around with the commissioner, Rio (my teammate from Japan), and my coach Ami showed up around 830 AM. After waiting for a group from NYC as well we finally left the airport at 930 AM and at this point I couldn’t tell the difference between yesterday and today.

Originally we were supposed to room with our teams but they were so unorganized they didn’t have that ready yet, so when we showed up they simply said just find a spot and we’ll move you guys later…so I picked to room with Adam Crabb, my aussie mate that I met at the Israel workouts in Massachusetts last august and whom I hit it off with right away, and who I stayed in contact with sending at least monthly emails. He was also the first person to sign with the league so he has become quite a celebrity in baseball circles and esp. in Australia and Israel. The other roommate is Mick Ashton’s (my good buddy from Antwerp Eagles), best friend also from Australia and is really a good guy. Stud baseball player, good looking, good talker, and sensitive and compassionate at the same time…reminds me a lot of myself. We are all on 3 different teams, which makes things interesting but we have a great time together and it’s nice to talk openly about your team with other guys and guys you can trust. We have a lot of fun going out or just staying in and goofing around. The strangest part is that since I’m coming from Belgium and I was learning and speaking Dutch, now I’m in Israel, where I still sometimes think and speak in Dutch when I’m trying to learn Hebrew or attempt to communicate with my Dominican and Columbian teammates in Spanish, yet, since I hang out so much with Crabb and Rees, they’ve got me saying Australian sayings and basically everyday I sound more and more like a fake Aussie with some Belgian/Spanish/Hebrew words. Quite the combination.

Today we had our first official team practice at one of the fields. Our first game is Monday June 25th so our coaches Ami Baran, an Israeli who has basically accomplished everything in the entire world – law school, physical training, Olympic coach, world renown softball player, head of Israeli police and investigation, etc. and Mike Ibbostern, a great guy and good baseball man from the land down under, had about one day to figure out who are starters are going to be and what the pitching rotation will look like. It looks like I’ll start the year as our #2 pitcher in the rotation behind Leon Fiengold, and imposing 6 ft. 8 inch, hard throwing righty who I would like to give him the nickname “Big Country” in the future, of course, if he lets me. He played pro ball with the Indians, so I’m definitely not disappointed to be behind him in the rotation. Also, I hit well enough to make an impression that I will be allowed to handle the bat when I pitch and possibly see some time at the DH spot. Meanwhile, the rest of our team looks pretty solid, we have a deep pitching staff, two solid lefties that bring different looks and pitches and funkiness to the table. Vladamir Guerrero’s brother, Julio, is also going to be pitching for us, and a journeyman Columbian pitcher named Rafael will also be part of the rotation. We also have another pitcher Fabian with some funky arm angles and deliveries, and our lone Japenese player in the league Rio, who has the classic Japanese import hesitation move and seems like he could be very effective with his assortment of oddities and junk. Our hitting also looks pretty solid 1-9, but I like our like our field a lot. Defensively, Ty Erikson at first looks like a hidden gem, up the middle with Ray Rodriquez and Hector De Los Santos we can have some exciting double plays and Ryan at 3B does not look intimidated to knock stuff down and keep things in the infield. Our OF though goes real deep with 6 guys that can all run, throw, and catch very well. I think that might be our strongest area.

Last night we went out to a café in Tel Aviv near the city, it’s only a few minutes away on the bus or the cab and we had an enjoyable evening. In our first time out we began talking to some locals, and the Israeli women were much nicer to us (English speakers) I found, then some of the Israeli men who had numerous futile attempts during our conversations. Not all of the girls were good English speakers surprisingly and so just a few of them carried the conversation, and she said she was only good because as a kid she watched way too much TV. One thing I did notice about the scene was that the women were either really young looking or an older crowd and not a lot of people my age and the reason for that being, all citizens are required to serve from 18-22 in the Army and then afterwards, many of them go on extended vacation out of the country. So the girls are actually as young or as old as they appear sometimes…Interesting.