Fast Eddie used to always call in a frantic voice, saying police choppers were circling. However, half of whatever came out of Fast Eddie’s mouth was a lie, and the most of the other half was twisted facts. For instance, back in 2001 with the whole story about him being a scout in the Dominican — sure, he had shown me pay stubs from the Orioles when I called bullshit, but later internet inquiries showed the Orioles didn’t have an academy in the DR back then. Who knows where he had been working in the Orioles organization. He has never come clean on that one.
Flash to 2004, with the Yard Gnome and I are sitting on a burm along the outfield lawn of Scottsdale Stadium, drinking strawberry daiquiris to fool our bodies that we are re-hydrating after day of drinking. The Yard Gnome is singing a song by a new band called the Killers. The game is over, the battle won, and now we are enjoying THE SPOILS.
Me: I love you, Man.
YG: I love you too, you demented jackass.
Flash to 2001, in the bathroom of Scottsdale Stadium. Things are about to get real ugly, so remember the scene from 2004. Once the Astros’ scout said he was going to get the cops, Fast Eddie calmly folded his arms, a sign that he was about to go beserk. The Yard Gnome returned to his lines, not knowing Fast Eddie’s body language. An adrenaline surge brought me out of my malaise, realizing that Fast Eddie was about to cross a line that cannot be uncrossed. I cursed Powell for not being there; he was the only one who could talk Eddie down at this point. I knew I had to knock Eddie out because inflicting serious bodily harm on a major league scout would not look good on my resume. We were now all in this together, and we were fucked.
Fast Eddie began walking towards the scout, another very bad sign — a calm Fast Eddie is dangerous. I charged across the bathroom, my backpack with the [em]the Total Baseball Encyclopedia [/em] raised to smack Eddie in the head. [em]The Total Baseball Encyclopedia [/em] is a tome, a wonderful wealth of baseball information that was invaluable before Sean Forman made it obsolete. I never made it across the floor because I was tackled by a 5’3″ former Kansas University baseball standout who was consumed by cocaine who now went by the moniker “The Yard Gnome.” We both crashed to the concrete floor, the Yard Gnome trying to wrest my backpack from me.
“My cocaine!” was all he offered for an explanation. Suddenly, Fast Eddie dove on both of us, then began pummeling the Yard Gnome, who responded with a vicious elbow to the side of the head. Fast Eddie dropped his entire weight on both us, and I could feel the Yard Gnome’s raspy breath on my left ear. Suddenly, my outer ear exploded in pain, and I felt something warm running down my neck. The bastard had bitten me! Then Fast Eddie tossed the Yard Gnome across the floor, and the Yard Gnome’s hard head smacked against the urinal.
“That had to hurt,” Sir Jolters mused, seemingly annoyed that his jersey conversation had been interrupted. “If you assholes are done, we really should go.” The scout was gone.
Dead Religions 