Performer:
Dire Straits
Songwriter:
Mark Knopfler
Original Release: Brothers in Arms
Year: 1985
Definitive Version: On the Night, 1993
Aside from being featured
prominently in the finale of one of my favorite Miami Vice episodes, Out Where
the Buses Don’t Run, this song also played a role in my inaugural season in the
Flint Journal Rotisserie League.
My friendship with Dave
flourished in the late summer and early fall of 1990 as the Wonkas clung
desperately to a lead they held the entire season. During down times on the
copy desk, to amuse myself—and Dave, who was kind of on an island out in
Fenton—I composed parody songs to my beloved though infuriating team. When
others in the league, who were above such shenanigans, got word of it, they
ridiculed me pretty good. Well, that just made me want to do it more.
I can’t remember how many I
did. It might have been as many as six. The ones I remember for sure were End
of the Line by Traveling Wilburys, Everybody Wants to Rule the World by Tears
for Fears, When the Levee Breaks by Led Zeppelin, We Are the Champions by
Queen, of course, after I won it all, and this song. You all remember Wonkas in
Arms, right?
As I mentioned, most of the guys
in the league took the whole thing just a mite too seriously. Many said they
did certain things only to aggravate me. I think part of it, however, is they
had too much emotion wrapped up in it themselves. Then along comes this newbie who
drafted Cecil Fielder—the only Tiger no one else really wanted—and showed them
their rumps. They didn’t like it.
It didn’t take much to get
certain parties’ undergarments in a twist, as they say, so who exactly was
doing the aggravating here? The difference was, I wasn’t trying. And as it
became more clear as the season rolled along that my team WASN’T going to fall
apart, the teeth-gnashing and open rooting for the only team that had a real chance
to catch me increased.
I can’t remember now exactly
how it happened, but one of Dave’s messages in the Rotball general forum became
misinterpreted and blown up as Dave openly saying he was going to rig a
lopsided trade between his team and my Wonkas. The truth is no such deal was ever
discussed. Dave wouldn’t do it, because he wouldn’t cheat … and like the
die-hard Mets fan that he is, he still thought his team had a chance even though
it didn’t.
The message led to all sorts
of accusations that any trade I made would be protested vigorously by certain
parties, let’s call them Sam and Seamus. (Gee, is it any wonder why this league
splintered the year before I joined?) But two funny things happened:
First, it led to a blatant
and obvious three-way rigged deal between Sam and Seamus and the second-place
team. (Doing the thing you accuse others of is the hallmark of hypocrisy, don’t
you think?) The deal was promptly and soundly rejected by the commissioner
without any need for a protest.
Second, and more ironic, it
led to exactly the thing they hoped to prevent—a trade between me and Dave that
did in fact clinch the championship.
By this time, Dave and I
started to have lunch together at least once a week, and our favorite place was
Ryan’s. An all-you-can-eat buffet for $6 was right in the wheelhouse of two
strapping young men. We’d go there, load up on grub and plot ballgame or
card-show strategy.
Well, just before the trade
deadline in August, Dave came in more aggravated than usual. After all the Rotisserie
League shenanigans and additional shenanigans at the hands of The Journal
softball team, which had a lot of cross-pollination with the Rotisserie league,
he reached his breaking point.
As we sat down with our
buffet trays, he said one thing directly to me before anything else: “OK, you
HAVE to win. Who do you want?” Without another word, he opened his notebook to
his roster.
Well, like any baseball
team, I could use some pitching. We played in a keeper league, and Dave had two
pitchers who were at the end of their contracts and thus free agents, so he
couldn’t keep them the next year. Their names: Dave Stewart and Dave Stieb. How
about I take them for, say, Tino Martinez, a superhot prospect, and a
minor-league draft choice in 1991? Done. The deal went through, and as I recall
there was a surprising lack of gnashing of teeth.
Obviously, that trade helped
me a lot down the stretch, but I’m not sure it was the thing that put me over
the top. I might have mentioned this before, but I won the league on the last
day of the season, when my whole team went nuts. I got four homers, but the key
stat was nine batters on base in 11 innings, because that stat was so tightly
bunched. Stieb did in fact pitch that day.
I suppose when it came down
to it, the rest of the league were fools to make war on my Wonkas in arms …
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