I’ve been thinking a fair amount lately about the Durham Bulls team of 2009, the first team I ever covered. Not the best, but certainly the most interesting player on that team, was Justin Ruggiano. Ruggiano was a decent player — by which I mean one of the thousand best in the world — who needed to get out of the Tampa Bay Rays organization in order to make a few million dollars in the major leagues. I think I learned more about the difference between the majors and minors from watching him play, and from talking to him, than from any other player I covered in six years in Durham.

It wasn’t just that “half this game is ninety percent mental,” as the famous Danny Ozark or Yogi Berra baseball axiom has it. It had something to do with attitude, and personality, and with taking it personally. I’ll probably write more about that, and Ruggiano, later, but the reason I do so now, as nothing more than a preface, has to do with the first time I saw attitude and personality and taking it personally in true action on a baseball diamond. It was something that happened between Justin Ruggiano and Jake Arrieta in 2009. Continue reading Bring Me the Head of Jake Arrieta →