Lenny Puddock writes of his experiences as a Chicago Cub during the 2011 baseball season. Puddock is a 32-year-old physical therapist for the Indianapolis National Institute of Fitness and Health who attended Randy Hundley's Fantasy Camp. Part of the Fantasy Camp experience is his developing friendship with Gertrude Castellano, a waitress who becomes a singing star. They romance at a distance. Puddock is invited to the Cubs' Spring Training after an outstanding performance at the Camp. The Cubs offer him a contract with the Daytona Class A team and he accepts. Puddock is moved up to Class AA Tennessee in mid-May and is called up to the Cubs in mid-July. He was batting. 378. In mid-August Mike Quade resigns as manager. Ryne Sandberg, who had an escape clause in his contract with a Phillies Minor League team, becomes the Cubs manager. When Puddock joined the parent club, the Cubs were 10 ½ games out of first place. By the end of August they are four from the Wild Card spot. In the waning days of August the roster was two short due to injuries. Sandberg did not want to disrupt the Iowa or Tennessee playoff-bound teams, so he activated Greg Maddux and himself, thinking the roster had to contain the maximum 25 players. Plans were to activate two players before the August 31 midnight deadline but due to an intern's goof not recognizing the difference in Eastern Standard Time and Central Standard Time, the move came too late. In essence the Cubs would have only a 23-player Post-Season roster. The Cubs win their Division and League playoffs and enter World Series for the first time in 76 years. In an amazing ninth inning of the seventh game, the Cubs win the Series.
My Summer as a CUB
By R. Rathbone LeonardAuthorHouse
Copyright © 2011 R. Rathbone Leonard
All right reserved.ISBN: 978-1-4567-9413-2Contents
In Memory of Ron Santo.............................................vPrologue...........................................................viiIntroduction by Reid Duffy.........................................xiiiForeword by Joe McConnell..........................................xvPreface by Chuck Marlowe...........................................xviiChapter 1—2011 Cubs Convention...............................1Chapter 2—Hundley's Fantasy Camp.............................13Chapter 3—2011 Spring Training...............................33Chapter 4—April-May 2011 Season..............................69Chapter 5—June-July 2011 Season..............................97Chapter 6—August 2011 Season.................................131Chapter 7—September 2011 Season..............................155Chapter 8—2011 Division, League Playoffs.....................175Chapter 9—2011 World Series..................................185Chapter 10—Post 2011 World Series............................207Epilogue...........................................................209Actual Games.......................................................213Birth of Wild Card.................................................215About Author, Illustrator..........................................217Acknowledgments....................................................219
Chapter One
Friday, January 14, 2011 "This is Heaven on earth" was my thought as the taxi entered the Loop and my long ride, most recently from O'Hare to the Hilton and the site of the annual Chicago Cubs Convention, had transformed this windy, icy cold January day into a hazy, lazy summer paradise. That was in my mind's eye as I figuratively pinched myself to see if my dream were coming true, or is my dream just that— a little dream of a gangly youngster just twenty years removed from the roster of a Martin's Hardware Little League team.
For the third straight year for Christmas my girl friend, Joyce Lambert, presented me with a ticket for the annual mid-winter convention that attracts thousands of fans to the hotel just a relay throw from Lake Michigan. Next week I'll be in Arizona fulfilling my little dream as a member of the Randy Hundley Cubs Fantasy Camp. Who knows, for eight days and seven nights I can be Roy Hobbs, The Natural brought to actual life.
For just under $4,000 I'll become a make-believe Cub, no longer a 32-year-old physical workout specialist for the National Institute of Fitness and Health in Indianapolis. It'll be bats and balls, not Nu-Steps, Treadmills and bar-bells for a week.
I've pinched myself a dozen, nay a hundred times until I'm convinced this no longer is a dream. It's the real thing, I'll be in Cub shoes and in the blue and white. Put yourself in that spot, in those spikes and in the blue and white. And your first major league At Bat. With your teammates breathlessly waiting for you to bring in that runner from second base. You're no longer on that high school sandlot.
Before physical fitness beckoned in my direction, I had set a goal of being a high school basketball and baseball coach, and had three years of college preparing me for that. Maybe it's not too late. With my physical fitness background and what I learn at Hundley's camp, coaching should be a distinct possibility, especially if I complete college.
When I arrived at the Hilton I was greeted by Wally Hayward, a Cubs executive vice-president who wears many hats and it wouldn't surprise me that someday he'll become president of the organization.
I had known Hayward briefly when he was senior advisor for the Chicago 2016 Olympics bid. Our company, NIFH, had been involved in physical therapy plans for the Olympic Village. Hayward advised me to just soak up the Cubs atmosphere, to relax and enjoy myself and get my mind set on the upcoming experience of Hundley's Fantasy Camp. Knowing of my year of journalism at Ball State University, he convinced me to journalize the current experience and those baseball-related ones that follow with the idea of publishing a book. That's a long shot but, one never knows.
So for three days I'll just mingle and get acclimated with Cub players. There, make that acquainted instead of acclimated, I don't want to have my Little League readers giving up in frustration because they don't understand what I'm saying. When I discussed writing as a vocation with Professor McReady, that was a point he stressed.
Whereas Convention talk a year ago centered around the return of Greg Maddux, this year fans faced the sobering fact that Ryne Sandberg no longer would wear Cubs threads and that Ron Santo no longer would be among them.
Maddux, a four-time Cy Young recipient who won 355 games, 133 as a Cub, had his best season in 1992 with a 20-11 record and a 2.18 ERA. In his new role Maddux will rove the Cubs system searching out and developing talent.
"As I've always said about him," Cubs GM Jim Hendry stated, "as a player and now as an employee, when Greg Maddux walks in your front door, your organization became a lot better that day." I'm looking forward to batting against Maddux at the Fantasy Camp.
It was after the 1992 season that free agent Maddux left the Cubs, upset that they had refused to negotiate with him until the end of the season. Meanwhile early in the year they had given Sandberg a $7 million contract, highest in baseball at the time.
That was then and this is now. Sandberg was bypassed for manager in favor of Mike Quade who in his brief 2010 stint had a 24-13 won-lost record.
Just prior to Thanksgiving in 2010 Sandberg signed with the Phillies organization to manage in their Minor League system. That action followed by about eight months the slight given Sandberg by the Cubs media relations department which referred to their Hall of Famer as Ryan Sandberg in the 2010 Media Guide. Not all bad, I guess. It could have been Ryan Sandburger.
And one that puzzles me is Wikipedia's Wrigley Field rundown. The online encyclopedia states "groundbreaking March 4, 1914, opened April 23, 1914. "That means it took a whopping 50 days to build the ballpark. Fifty days? You do the math!
The day Lou Piniella resigned, I remember clearly Ryno saying, "The Cubs know how I feel. I'd like to have a shot at it." Casey Coleman is just one of several who Sandberg managed who swear by him, saying he is a great instructor and motivator.
In his Hall of Fame speech Sandberg lamented about the lack of respect now missing in the game. Was there some of that in his dismissal? What he said at the end of his speech, the final two words, he probably said again although with a different meaning.
"Go Cubs."
If I had the money, I'd go to the Phillies' Phantasy Camp. I have a hunch that Ryno will be a big part of it and that, if the truth be known, was the attraction that drew me to Hundley's camp when I applied several months ago. But as Cubs fans have been saying, there's always next year for crying out loud.
The current Convention, the 26th annual, is the first, the very first, that Sandberg has not been a part of. It appears his ties with the Cubs have been permanently severed, less than five years after he was admitted to the Hall of Fame. Here's his numbers:
Sandberg was Pacific Coast League Manager of the Year in 2010 as he directed the Iowa Cubs to the pennant. As a player from 1981 through 1997, Ryno...
