Paradise: There and Back Again. French International Baseball Tourney

Sunset in Marseille, France

Chillin in Barcelona

What is up my peeps? Well, I know I am going to catch hell from the comments that follow this post….SORRY DAMMIT. I will be posting more now since I am back in Rouen, so just bare with me. Love you guys and hope I still have some of y’alls attention. Goes without saying that I miss you guys so much and I wish you can see what I have seen these past couple of weeks.

Well, I have done quite a bit since I have left you. I have swam with beautiful women in Spain, climbed a summit in Marseille, drank Mango rum in Cannes, admired the beaches of Nice, and walked the streets of Monaco like I owned the place.
Cole, one of my best friends, came over here and we took a little Euro trip. He arrived on the 19th of September and we just took off from there. We started off in Paris….

Lemme tell you one thing. “Tous les truc en France est tres dificil.” Sp? (Everything in France is difficult). I say this because when we arrived in Paris, we just wanted to hop a train to Barcelona as soon as we got there…but…all the trains were booked for the next two days to get out of the country. It is the tail end of the vacation season here and it seems that everyone wants to get out of Northern France to catch the tail end of summer’s rays. So, Cole and I bit the bullet and bought two tickets for an over-nighter to Barcelona. So that meant we had a 7 hour wait in Paris.
I then said to Cole,

“Well….you wanna do Paris in a day?”
“Dude, yeah buddy.”

“Yeah, buddy” was the motto of pretty much the whole trip. So we hiked through all of Paris admiring the major sites. The Eiffel Tower, The Louvre, Monte Marte, Notre Dam, and the bridges over the Seine. A extremely tiring day, but we got it done. We knew we had a long train ride ahead of us that night (12 hours) so we bought a bottle of the cheapest rum we could have found and boarded the train. I will tell you now that I will never buy “Rum Blanc” ever again. We might as well just taking turns punching each other in the nuts until we past out. But…it did the job and we slept all the way to Spain.

Barcelona, Spain



The craziest town I have ever been to. The best word to describe this Spanish center is Alive. The streets were always filled with people, conga beats, and life. Cole and I took in all the sights as well as relaxed on its Mediterranean coast. I will say one thing…it maybe because I have weak spot for Spanish women, BUT…these women were absolutely beautiful. I have never seen this caliber before. Cole was saying that he felt sorry for the “o.k.” looking girls (which are 10’s in Spfld) because of the competition that is here. So we admired the food, sun, and feminine beauty. Now off to the French Riviera.

Marseille, France




This jewel of a town sits in southern central France with amazing beaches and cliffs that surround the area. The bulk of our Euro trip now was just pretty much beach hopping. So we scouted the area for the best beach and planted.
Just complete relaxation.
Our routine was to buy a bottle of coconut rum, a bakery sandwich, sun tan, listen to music, and toss the frisbee that I brought. Hahahaha, do you think these sun loving French people have ever seen how to really throw and catch a frisbee? Well, the answer is no. It was hilarious to see the looks that we would get when we would launch this bee across the beach. Cole would throw long bombs and I would track it down with laughter. It was absolutely great. I turned into a complete beach bum at this moment. The sun was our long lost companion accompanied by coconut rum leaving a taste of tranquility in our mouths. It is hard to describe the feeling. Laying on a beach, looking at cliffs that over hang the blue coast, and just thinking…..

“I must be doing something right to be able to see this."

Now off to the next paradise.

Nice, France.
Cannes, France.
Monte Carlo, Monaco.
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Nice, France Beach

Nice at Night

Cannes, France

Monte Carlo, Monaco. My ride, Lamborghini Diablo.

Paradise. I have to tell you that I needed this relaxation. Just complete bliss. I really wish I could have lent you my eyes during my time on these beaches. Cole and I shared laughs of old times and reminisced about memories of all of our family and friends. If you guys didn’t know, you guys were laying with us on those beaches.

Now back to reality. Cole went off the Switzerland and Germany while I headed back to Rouen to play in an International Tournament in Paris to give us some warm-up before the French playoffs start. So we split ways. Cole will spend the tail end of his trip with his girlfriend, Jen, in Switz and Ger and end up in Rouen with me for his last couple of days.


Paris, France. International Tournament.

There were 5 teams in this tournament. Bois Guillaume, a team from England, two teams from the Paris area, and team comprised of Hispanic ball players. Let me start off by saying, I would like to have punched whoever was in charge of our schedule right in the fucking mouth.
Saturday morning start time 11:30. Triple Header. Back-to-back-to-back.
First game was against PUC. Paris…U…ummm…C. That’s all I know. We came out really strong. Eric Coutu, a Canadian, took the mound for us and pitched really well. It was good to see that we hit really well despite the fact we have had a two month baseball hiatus. We killed them. 13-2.
Next game. The English team. They were the strongest team in the tournament that we faced. It was kinda funny because they only had one guy on the team who was actually from England. The rest of the players were either American or Canadian. I got the start on the mound for us. I pitched really well keeping them off balance with the ol’ knuck. We just crushed them. 11-5. I was kinda worried about not hitting after a while but I was just knocking the damn cover off the ball. It was also just incredibly cool to be able to bullshit with the other team. I was just chattering up a storm with everyone of their players. Giving and receiving compliments. A good hearted team and an even better win.
Last game of a horrible Saturday was against the other Paris team. Killed them….8-1.


Once our grueling day was over, we marched back to our hotels with the feeling of just complete soreness and fatigue. We were all just bushed. We had an oriental dinner at a shitty buffet and collapsed in our hotel beds once our hunger was satisfied.


Day 2. We were only going to have two games today. Thank god. We guaranteed a spot in the Championship game due to our triple-header sweep the day before. So the game against the Latinos was…well…….not so serious. We switched everyone around, putting guys in different positions, and just really played half-asleep. I was so fucking tired I told Jean Luc I was going to sit this one out and just coach on the base path. We lost the game against the Latinos…it seemed it was a huge victory for them but we could really give a shit to be completely honest.

Championship Game
Bois Guillaume Woodchucks vs Courdan Pirates
Game Time: 3:00 pm
Weather: Sunny
Attendence: a good 150.

Now this is the same English team. I have to start by saying I was just completely fucking pissed. This tournament was fucked up from the get go. We walked all over everyone in the tournament but if we lost to this English team, we would get second. Just complete bullshit. Oh, and one other thing.
We were the only team using wooden bats.
A fucking joke. This is baseball ladies and gents. Not fucking beer league.
Anyway, Bernie got the start for us. First play of the game set the tone for the first 3 innings. A ground ball to me deep in the hole….I gun it over to Arthur…it pulls him off the bag a bit but 3 steps ahead of the runner….the runner runs completely out of the base path and dives in avoiding a tag.

“SAFE.”

I was fucking livid. I was shouting shitty French at the umpire explaining to him fundamental baseball rules that you can not run outside the line on the way to first. The call stood and I was just completely pissed. I will say that it was the first time, since that I have been on a ball field here, having the attitude of…
Fuck this place. Fuck these people. I want to go home.
We made three more errors in the inning going down 4-0 in the first inning.
We were dead the first three innings. I was not saying a word being a little baby bitch and our team chemistry was awful. It wasn’t until the 4th inning that something game changing happened.
I know I have told you about Eric Coutu before but I am going to take time to tell you what he did in this game. He took me aside and told me,

“Tony, we need you. You are not here. We can not win unless you pull us together.”

I gave him a dejected knod.

He strode up to the plate in the bottom of the 4th with two runners on and two outs. He got down 0-2. I was getting my glove ready to take the field after the third out but I then heard the crush of wood on a baseball. Eric hit an opposite field double scoring in two runs. He slid into second safely but at a cost. He badly twisted his ankle. He gave his all that at bat. He put us back into the game, but more importantly he brought me back to into the game and into sanity.
We had to substitute a runner for him and Eric was greeted by high fives when he limped off the field. It was the spark we needed.
Bernie’s arm was hurting him so he came out. I decided to pitch my second game in two days. I know your guys are just pissed right now knowing that I threw on 10 hours rest but my arm was good. I threw about 40 out of 60 pitch knuckle balls the day before, so I was good. Relax…Alex. Don’t want to hear it. So I took the mound.
They scored in the top of the 5th off a couple of errors giving themselves a four run deficit again. In the bottom of the inning, I snapped out of my mood and hit a 2 run triple to narrow the lead back to 2. 6-4 going into the last inning.
I strode up to the mound again…tired, hungry, but focused. I struck out the first two guys but our defense and a badly placed knuckle ball let them score two more runs almost putting the game out of reach 8-4 going into the bottom of the last inning.
6,7,8 hitters up for us. You would be right in thinking that in our minds…the fire was sputtering out.
First two batters for us. K’s.
Two outs with Charles Paturel, 8 hitter, up. He draws a walk. 9th hitter for us gets a hit by pitch. The fire was rekindled just a bit…
Olivear hits a hard ground ball to the short stop that avoids his glove for an error. We score one run putting the score at 8-5. At this point I was on deck with Arthur ahead of me. Bernie is telling me that he sees it in his mind that Arthur will get on base and I will hit a game ending grand slam to give us the Championship.

First pitch to Arthur.
Hit by pitch.

8-5. Bases loaded. Two outs. Bottom of the ninth. Your truly comes up to the plate.

They make a pitching change.

The hurler for the English team threw some gas but the problem was that he didn’t know where it was going. So when I took the plate in hopes of a walk off HR, but I got the first pitch right on the ankle. It hurt like a bitch.
O.K. Now, 8-6. Bases loaded. Two outs. Bernie the 40 year old machine comes up.

First pitch comes.
Bernie swings and makes contact….

It is a seeing eye ground ball through the diving 2nd baseman’s mit tieing the game 8-8.

The BG team is just going nuts and the crowd is just loving it.

So there I am.
The game winning run, standing on 2nd base.

Romain, our 3rd baseman, comes up. He gets down 0-2. The pitcher then fires another mistake and plunks Romain in the arm.
I’m standing on 3rd base now with the game winning run in my head. I have to tell you this now. I saw what was going to happen before it happened.
I thought…

“A pitch in the dirt….I’m taking off if it goes anywhere but the catcher’s mit.”

First pitch comes to Vincent, our CF.

I see that it is headed downward into the dirt.

It ricochets off the catcher’s chest into the air.

I take off towards home.

I was hoping he was going to turn the wrong way to find the ball but he spotted it immediately.

He was about 3 feet aways from home plate and I was about 5.

I dive...

He dives....

I feel my finger tips feel the base before we crash into each other………
………………

“SAFE!”

We won the tournament. 9-8.
I was then mobbed at home plate by the team. Everyone just cheering on the top of their lungs. It was great. Such a memorable moment. The crowd was on their feet and the beer started to come out. The tournament officials handed us the Cup and a bottle of Champagne. Eric then filled the Cup to give me the first drink.
I then said.

“There is no way in hell I am going to take the first drink.”

I tipped it up to Eric’s lips and saw the champagne poor down his face. A great metal picture. I loved seeing the joy in our guys eyes.



We then gathered our equipment and shared beers with the England team. Really nice guys and we were all laughing about if I was really Safe or Out on the last call. I told them…

“Fuck yeah I was safe.”

They all burst into laughter.

We all got in our cars and headed for Bois Guillaume.
Olivier drove Eric, Vincent, and me back to Rouen. We shared hilarious dirty jokes to one another and played the funniest game of 20 questions ever.
I have to write this down just so I won’t forget it. We were playing 20 questions and it was my turn. The category was Animals of course.
The animal I thought of was just a bear.
Vincent asks the question, “Does it eat fish?”
But the way it was interpreted in English was if the animal goes fishing. Like with a fishing pole. I had the mental image of a bear sitting next to me at the lake with a beer and pole in hand. Maybe it was just fatigue…but we laughed about that all the way home.
I love you guys and will talk and see you soon. Can’t wait to see you Nena, Phyll, Mom and Dad when you get here. Love you guys. Good night.