An Open Letter To The University of North Carolina Baseball Team

Dear Coaches Fox, Forbes, Holbrook and Howell; dear Cardiac Heels:

Thank you for giving us a team like you gave us, a team we could love completely and obsessively and probably a little unhealthily. Thank you for making us love college baseball so much that the only place we'll be in June next year is Omaha. Thank you for getting thrown out of games on the force of your convictions; thank you for trusting your players enough to leave them in the lineup.

Thank you for being bad ass new gods and studs who hit bombs. Thank you for the black uniforms. Thank you for ERAs under 2.00 and double plays and catches made against the wall, for sacrifice bunts and doubles off the warning track and home runs when we need them. Thank you for the at-bat music that made us laugh, thank you for nicknames both of your making and our own.

Thank you, Joshie, for putting yourself on notice, for loving the the game more than anyone else in the world, for always smiling. Thank you, D.Ack, for being the best freshman in the country, for breaking aluminum bats on grand slams. (shep. would also like to thank you for being hot like burning.) Thank you, FedEx, for being the heart of the team, the one we always believed in no matter what. Thank you for proposing at the CWS, Benji, even if dex. did want to marry you herself. Wooten, thank you for wanting to always be on the field, and for the sacrifice of the tooth -- you're the one we want watching our backs in a fight. Thank you, R.Wood, for coming back for your senior year, for career victories, for the face you make when Coach Fox takes you out of the game. Thank you, little Timmy and Kyle, for being part of a freshman class that scares other teams. Thank you, Reid Fronk, for being the kind of lead off hitter we needed, thank you, Chad Flack, for swinging the big bat at the most crucial moments. Thank you, Mike Cavasinni, for coming back, for continuing to play, and for making a backup catcher at Georgia Tech think that shep. loves him.

And thank you, Andrew, for being the kind of player -- committed to his teammates above anything else -- that we're proud to have playing for our university. Thank you for being the bad ass new god; thank you for coming back with your head high and your fastball in the 90s.

Thank you for proving, over and over again, that the game is never done until the 27th out in the ninth inning is recorded. Thank you for being a team we could love like we do love you.

Regardless of what happens tonight -- thanks for being awesome.

dex.

An Open Letter to Matt Wieters, Starting Catcher for the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets.

I trust you to choose well, Mr. Wieters. And by choose well I mean, say yes to the Devil Rays during today's 2007 MLB Draft, if Tampa Bay decides they need catching more than pitching and pick you instead of David Price. Durham hosts a Devil Rays farm team! I'm just saying: you will not want for anything.


Anything.


Alternately, Baltimore! It would please dex., that's for certain.


stalkery-ly,
shep.

an open letter to the university of north carolina basketball teams, plural

I only have one word for the University of North Carolina men's and women's basketball teams right now. It's not a complicated word. It's not a word they'll have to look up in the dictionary, if they want to comprehend its meaning. It's a pretty simple, everyday, ordinary sort of word.

That word is finish. As in, finish off a game.

As in, don't collapse as the pressure goes up.

I watched last night's women's Final Four semifinal on the TV in my bedroom, with sort of a growing dread in my stomach for most of the second half. It was like a horror movie -- where the heroine is going to open the door/go down to the basement/run outside of the nice safe house, and there's nothing you can do to stop her except shout helplessly at the television.

When Carolina shot out to a 12 point lead with 7 minutes left, I could see it coming.

When Tennessee closed the gap to six, I could see it coming.

And when Ivory Latta started missing every shot she took, I put the covers over my head and turned the sound off, watching the last two minutes of the game with one eye, barely peeking over the top of my comforter, and only the sound of my own breathing for company.

It was like some horrible kind of deja vu. It was like watching the men collapse against Georgetown all over again, except worse: in the Final Four, with a starting lineup made up mostly of upperclassmen, against a team that's won more national championships that any other women's team. I mean, honestly, what's Pat Summitt going to do with her 7th trophy, put it in her guest bathroom? At least I could hope that JT3 could stop riding his daddy's coattails if Georgetown won the whole shebang on the men's side. Pat Summitt can win titles on her own, without any help from Sylvia Hatchell's team falling apart in the final minutes.

So seriously, basketball teams: what gives? So much talent, and so little ability to put an opponent away. Look, there's no shame in routs -- if you can rout a team, rout them. I'm a fan of the good old fashioned rout. It's harder to climb back from 25 down with four minutes left than from 4 down with 6 minutes left. But instead you guys never managed to give that final killing blow, and I just don't get it. And the photo of Ivory Latta on the front page of the Daily Tar Heel today made me cry.

And because I would be remiss to call these teams out without thanking them, as well: thank you both, for seasons that went above and beyond my expectations for fun, and heartbreak, and spectacular behind-the-back passes. Thank you for Ivory Latta, popping her jersey and flexing her muscles and running her team like a machine. Thank you for Erlana Larkins, and Camille Little, and LaToya Pringle. Thank you for Rashanda McCants, who reminds me of her brother more and more every day, and who's going to be a force to be reckoned with next year. Thank you, men, for bringing me a new appreciation of the running game, and for letting me love this team so much that my heart did break when you lost. Thank you for reminding me that there's always next year.

And thank God baseball started yesterday. If I'd had to wait for baseball after these last two Tar Heel games, I might have developed a bigger drinking habit than I already have.

An Open Letter to Bobby Frasor, Point Guard for the University of North Carolina Tar Heels.

Dear Bobby,


It's going to be okay.

No, really, it will be. It will! I doubt it feels that way right now; you may be a little more pessimistic than me, and you've certainly earned that right. But, all things considered, these last four and a half months were by no means a waste of time and effort. In lieu of all the obstacles you've faced, I think you did rather well this season. You did! I refuse to believe otherwise. I mean, come on. Stress fractures! Back spasms! Freshmen usurpers! (We all love him, but don't tell me he couldn't be seen as such.) That's rough, my friend, and I've never seen it get you down. You've weathered it all -- and now, in these last moments, this final heartbreak of a loss -- and it sucks. I know it sucks but I promise you, you'll get through it, and it'll make you stronger, and you will be amazing.

We don't know each other so this letter probably offers little in terms of comfort or reassurance, for either this season or the next, but I wanted to thank you. Thank you, Bobby, for 2007. Thank you for keeping your head high, for keeping your eyes open, for nailing those inside passes to Tyler, for sinking those three-point shots at the beginning of the season that were pretty enough to make me cry. Thank you for your bad jokes; thank you for busting on Wes Miller; thank you for laughing at yourself. Thank you for cheering just as loud as I did.

Next year, kid. I'll be there, cheering for you.