A Sip of Spring Training

Guest post from a brewer on the Brewers

Welcome to Warning Track Power, a weekly newsletter of baseball stories and analysis grounded in front office and scouting experiences and the personalities encountered along the way.

This week, I’m happy to share a guest post from Ryan Woldt, host of the Coffee Smarter and Coffee People podcasts and author of the Roast! West Coast coffee newsletter on Substack. Ryan and I initially connected a couple years ago on a Substack writers’ forum; both of us live in Carlsbad, CA, and love coffee and baseball. Meeting Ryan face to face, over a couple cups of coffee, of course, added a new dimension to this heretofore virtual community.

I value his friendship, and I appreciate the ways in which writing continues to create new bonds. If you’re passionate about coffee or curious about people in the coffee industry, please check out his newsletter and podcasts. I enjoy his work, and I’m even able to look beyond the fact that he’s a Brewers fan.

March 7th, 2020, was the last time I saw baseball in person. My team, the Milwaukee Brewers, was playing the Texas Rangers in a Cactus League game at American Family Fields of Phoenix. It was my first Spring Training experience, and it was a thrill just being there. I didn’t know that it would be one of my last pre-coronavirus pandemic experiences before aggressively locking down and—

Let’s back up.

My in-laws were visiting us in Southern California. They are truly lovely humans. If you get a chance to meet them, jump at it. They are also baseball fans, as am I. We cheer for the Milwaukee Brewers* and listen to almost every game on the radio. Bob Uecker is the voice of both my youth and my adulthood. Mr. Baseball is entering his 52nd year calling Brewers games. Sometimes I listen to old games on the MLB Radio app just to hear the comforting patter of his banter.

At some point during the visit, the family started talking baseball. 

How do you think the team will be this year?

We’ve got some decent pitching…

If only Yellie’s back could…

What do you think of the new kid?

This could be the year…

We checked the schedule, briefly wondered if this virus thing was going to be a big deal, and then a decision was made. We would all caravan to Phoenix, go to a game, and split up after. My wife and I would return home to California, and the in-laws would continue east on their annual meandering camping trip home to Wisconsin.

The morning of the game, I got up early. The sun was just poking out over the trees. I found a coffee shop on the map and pointed my feet in that direction. The corner shopping center was called The Strip. Someone must have had a sense of humor. There was an actual adult entertainment club next door. [WTP note: Welcome to Phoenix.] The center was also home to a bar, salon, contractor, and cake shop. Nestled in the middle of it all, on the ground floor, was the Esso Coffeehouse.

I pushed through the front door and ordered my typical drip coffee, black. No room for cream, please. A long shaded patio ran along the front of the building, and I found a comfortable patio table where just enough sun rays pushed through the ivy on the trellis to keep me warm. I sat alone and drank my coffee. I remember writing notes for an article I was writing about Spring Training. 

By the time I was ready for a refill, I was joined by a lifelong friend who lived nearby.

We drank coffee and caught up the way old friends do, smiling and nodding at the other coffee shop-goers filling in the spaces on the patio. It was calm and comforting, and weeks later — post-Rudy Gobert touching the mics, but before the games began being played in front of cardboard cutouts — I would remember this moment, drinking coffee, getting excited about baseball, as the beginning of one of my last truly pandemic-free days. Three full years later, I still remember the comfort of that moment. It was only the beginning of a great day. There was still a baseball game to be played.

We got to the game early and tailgated with all the other fans in a parking lot near the stadium. We took pictures next to the statues honoring Molitor, Yount, Fingers, and Aaron. We met friends at the gate and made new ones in the seats around us just up from first base. No one was wearing a mask, nor was anyone that worried. Nothing had really changed yet.

We drank oversized beers and wandered around to check out the view from the outfield. Balls were thrown, and bats were swung. The field was so close, so green. It took all my willpower not to hop the low barrier and make a break for second. It wasn’t hard to imagine sliding in hard, then popping up to dig for third when the ball squirted by into the outfield.**

The veteran players took a swing or two before retiring to give the youngsters a chance at spring greatness. The sun was out, but the breeze kept us cool. We watched the game, but I couldn’t tell you who won. It doesn’t really matter.

Photo from March 7, 2020 courtesy of Paul Hankes

The day didn’t end with the game. We went to hop in the pool and make dinner at my friend’s nearby apartment. We weren’t alone. We shared the communal grill with one of the Brewers’ team executives.*** He filled us in on some behind-the-scenes Spring Training logistics and gave us the names of a few players to watch.

In the morning, we made coffee. We sat on the patio at the Airbnb and made plans for the next Spring Training and the next.

We gotta come back next year!

Maybe for a whole week!

I may never miss another spring training!

Did you see Yellie’s swing?

There is a special kind of baseball magic at Spring Training. I felt it that day. We all did.

And then it was gone.

Three years later, I’m drinking coffee and listening to the Brewers play the Rangers in a mid-March game. I can feel the warmth of the sun and remember the sound of the ball hitting the glove. I remember hugging my in-laws goodbye and my wife standing in the driveway waving as they pulled away. Both of us painfully unaware of how our lives were about to change. I’m listening to Jeff Levering and Lane Grindle calling this game now, and for the first time since that day, I can feel that Spring Training magic in my future once again. Go Crew!

*In my younger years, I also cheered for the Yankees. They won games and were on TV. They were cool, but as an adult, I felt it prudent to focus my efforts on one team. When Derek Jeter retired at the end of the 2014 season, I went to a nearby park and buried my Yankees cap in the ground, retiring my fanhood with The Captain.

**For the record, I haven’t slid into a base since Junior League in the mid-1990s.

***It was current VP of Baseball Operations Matt Kleine, and he couldn’t have been a nicer, more gracious man to share a grill with.

If you want to learn more about how to brew a great cup of coffee or be inspired by the stories of coffee industry entrepreneurs, check out the Roast! West Coast newsletter on Substack.