When I told y’all the Friday before the season-defining three-game set in Houston I’d sooner vomit than give in to presumptions of futility, my body took up the challenge.
I spent that Saturday night relocating every sip and snack across receptacles of varying readiness, culminating in my first ever overnight stay in a hospital courtesy of what seems to have been a viral infection of some sort. I watched Sunday’s cavalcade of Seattle sports celebration thanks to the good folks at Swedish First Hill, and while still-woozy and a few days past, I am on the mend and wishing to celebrate. Ryan, Bee, and ZAM took us through that weekend that realized so many of our dreams. From a reclined position I read their words, and so many of yours through thousands of comments. I know I’m 0/3 on the masterfully seedy Jeremy Irons philosophy from “Margin Call.” I am not first, I have not cheated, and I am not the smartest. But I must write on Victor Robles.
Victor plays with his heart on his sleeve, and sometimes that is electrifying, while at other moments it explains why he’s only once mustered more than 407 plate appearances in his career. Ribs are there for a reason, Victor!
15 years and/or less than seven months ago, I wrote the above on Robles in his 40 in 40. The 28 year old is in his ninth big league season, once the best prospect in baseball to the eyes of many experts, and at times seeming it. He was Meant To Be, more than any Seattle Mariners prospect save Julio Rodríguez, Jarred Kelenic, Alex Rodriguez, and Ken Griffey Jr., and the Washington Nationals gave him nearly a decade to become that person.
Robles is my favorite active Mariner. He took over for Mitch Haniger, a man I relished the success of for what he was, and what he was not. Haniger was a great athlete, carved out of the marble by a sculptor whose only sin was not knowing when to stop. Another chip here and there, a fastball to the face, a twinge of the oblique, a kinetic chain whittled down until it could not hold together. Every effort, down the beaten path and way off it, Haniger pursued in an effort to outpace his crumbling form, playing with caution, running in a way Boston Dynamics might’ve found troubling.
Robles is the antithesis. The man has exiled his capacity for reck and achieved a plane of existence of pure id. It is he who ignited Seattle’s victory in Detroit in Game 3 with a double down the line on a swing I yelped with amusement at, then blitzed around the bases to slide into home safely with perfect, foot-first extension.
This is the type of play that brings feast and famine. No or. Always one, eventually, after the other. The way Robles plays is emblematic of everything I have loved in life. Conviction in the face of uncertainty. Heroic, herculean effort whether the odds are favorable or insurmountable. Heroism, not in the sense that a professional athlete is to be treated as a model for morality, but of human effort maximized and limitations bypassed. Not in the absence of limitations or challenges, but with full recognition and surmounting of them.
It’s what makes a player 30/31 stealing bases in 2024, with the lone out being an effort to swipe home with the bags packed and two outs, in a hitter’s count. It’s the type of aggression and mayhem that befits a ballclub with Josh Naylor, hectoring his opponent from second base with signals he may or may not be in command of. It’s Randy Arozarena quelling the nerves of his teammates with a titanic homer, turning to his compatriots and reminding them “It’s okay. I’m here.” It’s launching 27 year old George Kirby back into the fire once again, knowing Kerry Carpenter is licking his chops and the rest of the Tigers lineup is hoping they can stop licking their wounds. It’s knowing the game will come down to Gabe Speier and Andrés Muñoz, yet again, finding a way to get through the heart of that Detroit lineup.
One game of baseball is not enough. One moment with Julio Rodríguez dashing towards the gap. One pitch to Cal Raleigh to keep his record book season going. Tomorrow, the Chicago Cubs will travel to Milwaukee to take on the Brewers for their own Game 5, in a world I’m grateful exists, but might as well be Narnia. There’s tonight in T-Mobile Park. On your screens around the Pacific Northwest and beyond. In each and every radio wave that gives Rick Rizzs life. One moment to live, perhaps to fall short, to careen off course, crumble to dust until the rains of spring imbue new life. One moment, perhaps, to fly.
