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someone yells.
    Hyzdu strikes out to end it. The final’s 11–7. Unsatisfying, but we did win the A game, knocking Contreras around, and Arroyo looked good.
    Outside, we walk by the players’ lot, ogling a classic tomato-red GTO convertible. Someone says it’s Nomar’s, except he’s already left with Mia Hamm in her car.
    A Jeep Cherokee with BK in it flies by us.
    “You’re making friends,” someone shouts after him.
    Several people confirm a new trade rumor: BK and Trot for Randy Johnson.
    Most of the big names are long gone, but first-base coach Lynn Jones rolls down his window and signs, as does Cesar Crespo, driving a pimped-out Integra with Konig rims. Terry Francona doesn’t stop—“Another bad decision!”
    A young guy pulls up in a Taurus. No one can place him. He stops and rolls down his window, but no one approaches.
    “I’m only a rookie,” he says. “You probably wouldn’t want my autograph.”
    He’s right, but we can’t say that to his face.
    “Sure we do.” A couple of parents push their kids forward.
    It’s Josh Stevens, a pitcher for the PawSox.
    There are only four people left when we take off. It’s almost five.
    Driving back to the hotel, I say, “I wonder if the Twins are playing tonight.”
    “You want a divorce?” Trudy asks. March 9th
    We’re home, it’s snowing, and summer seems a long way off. Maybe it’s the weather, but that connection to the Sox that felt so strong just yesterday feels tenuous. I tell Steve it’s like getting a taste of high summer and then having it snatched away. By season’s end, I imagine it will seem Edenic, all possibility and perfect weather.
    That night while we’re watching TV, Dunkin’ Donuts runs a commercial starring Curt Schilling. Schilling sits by his locker, eating a breakfast sandwich and listening to a language tape teaching him Bostonspeak. “Wicked hahd,” he repeats between bites. “Pahk. Play wicked hahd when I go to the pahk.” For several years now the spokesperson for Dunkin’ Donuts has been Nomar. Another sign he’s leaving? March 12th
    I catch an interview with PawSock third baseman Kevin Youkilis at the practice fields. In Michael Lewis’s
Moneyball,
A’s general manager Billy Beane champions Youkilis as “The Greek God of Walks.” He’s the kind of player Beane loves: average glove, so-so wheels, but a great eye, quick bat and astonishing on-base percentage. Likewise, Bill James, the Sox’s statistical guru, is high on the guy’s numbers. The interviewer is optimistic about Youkilis’s chances of making the team, which I think is crazy. He’s fourth on the depth chart behind Shump, and Shump’s probably not going to make it.
    Youkilis is positive but realistic. “Hopefully I’ll make it up to Fenway this year”—meaning a cup of coffee in September when they expand the roster. Clips roll of the Monster seats and Pedro going up the ladder on a flailing Devil Ray, and again I’m ready for the season to start. March 13th
    Mr. Kim has a sore shoulder. I’m not surprised, with that goofy motion. Bronson Arroyo may take his slot, though the
Courant
says that during the first few weeks of the season the schedule’s spread out enough that we can go with a four-man rotation.
    Steve’s not upset. He says Kim looked lost out there in the playoffs, as if he didn’t know where the ball was going.
    “He’s only twenty-five,” I say, “and he’s already pitched in a lot of big games.”
    “That’s part of his problem.” Stat maven Bill James found that the more innings pitchers threw before the age of twenty-three, the more problems they had later in their careers.
    “What about Clemens?”
    “James doesn’t count college. Clemens is actually one of the guys he uses to make his case. And Clemens is an exception, he’s a workhorse. Dan Duquette found that out when he looked at his stats and said his career was over.”
    I don’t see how James can have it both ways—an example
and
an