The Real McCoy

About The Real McCoy

Hall of Fame baseball writer Hal McCoy is in his 36th year of covering the Cincinnati Reds, the longest tenure for any active writer covering one team. Counting spring training and postseason games, McCoy has covered more than 7,000 major-league baseball games, written close to 18,000 baseball stories and eaten enough hot dogs to give Babe Ruth indigestion.

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April 2009

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More recent entries

• Some unsolicited advice: Don't sign Sheffield
• Reds have interest in Gary Sheffield
• Bailey dazzles - now where does he go?
• The last days of good times in Sarasota
• Keppinger traded for minor-leaguer
• Arroyo: life with carpal tunnel syndrome
• Jacque Jones one of three Reds' cuts
• They shoulda called the whole thing off
• Back on the job again - Part Deux
• Where was I? Having a miserable time
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Home > Blogs > The Real McCoy | Cincinnati Reds baseball news > Archives > 2009 > April > 01 > Entry

The last days of good times in Sarasota

By Hal McCoy | Wednesday, April 1, 2009, 10:26 AM

Oh, sadness. Made my last stop, probably ever, into Gus’s 12th Street Cafe for breakfast this morning - my last bowling ball-sized Western omelette.

Diane, Gus’s wife, wanted a picture of me so I gave her the one that has hung on the door of the media workroom for several years, indicating that the room is the Hal McCoy Media Workroom & Dining Room.

A few years ago I was working at my desk when I heard somebody stop at the door to look at the picture. It was a Toronto writer and he said, “I didn’t know Hal McCoy died.”

Hey, it doesn’t say Hal McCoy Memorial Media Workroom and Dining Room.

THE CINCINNATI REDS, what amounts to a team of back-ups, made the 2 1/2 trek to Kissimmee today to play Houston. The only regulars on the trip was third baseman Edwin Encarnacion, who needs the at-bats, and pitcher Homer Bailey.

Bailey started because Aaron Harang opted to stay back in Sarasota and pitch against a minor-league team. The rest of the staff is up to 100 pitches, “But they’re holding me to 75 today, let me back off and get a little rest,” said Harang, who starts Opening Day.

The Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim, though, would like to pry Harang away from the Reds and they’d like to send them outfielder Gary Matthews Jr.

Deal or no deal?

Just remember, one of manager Dusty Baker’s closest friends is Gary “Sarge” Matthews Sr.

LOST IN all the late afternoon hub-bub that included the trade of Jeff Keppinger, was the fact that manager Dusty Baker was ejected from the game against the New York Yankees.

In 37 years, I’ve only seen only other manager ejected from a spring exhibition game. It was in the early-1990s and the Reds were in Kissimmee, a short trip at that time because the Reds were in Plant City, the capital of strawberry shortcake.

The manager was Lou Piniella and he began arguing with the home plate umpire. Sure enough, as he usually does during an argument, Piniella began kicking dirt on home plate. And he was ejected.

“Don’t understand why I was ejected,” said Piniella. “All I was doing was kicking away fire ants.” Piniella IS a fire ant.

Asked if he had ever been ejected from a spring training game, Baker said, “Nope.”

It stemmed from a pitch on which minor-league umpire D.J. Reppley called Chris Dickerson out on a pitch that he couldn’t have hit with a back hoe. Next time up, Dickerson asked the umpire where the pitch was.

“Dickerson asked twice and the guy never answered,” said Baker. “Then somebody yelled from our dugout and he thought it was Chris Speier, and Speier was sitting next to me by the wall next to the dugout.

“I told him, ‘You don’t talk to people like that,’ and then you know how baseball arguments are. Things escalated and he threw me out and then I really got mad,” said Baker. Baker eventually walked the long walk to his office behind the right field wall and followed the game on a computer.

JERRY HAIRSTON JR. is still suffering the effects of the influenza he contracted at the WBC in Mexico, “Still feel weak, man,” he said. But he planned to play in a Triple-A game today, “Because I feel pretty good and maybe I can play against the Pirates tomorrow.”

PRETTY QUIET AROUND camp right now. Biggest activitiy is the two guys from Cincinnati who are here with car haulers to truck away about 42 personal cars, most to Cincinnati and some to Louisville and even a couple to North Carolina (where the Class AA Carolina Mudcats play.

I’m watching the gray Ferrerari real close to make sure they don’t dent or scratch it.

I’D TELL YOU about my bad back, but I’m so tired of complaining…

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