The Baseball Project “Volume 1: Frozen Ropes and Dying Quails”
Simulation theory is interested in the idea that our reality might actually be a simulated reality, part of a computer program, designed and directed by some force beyond our comprehension. And while the premise reads like Hollywood, sci-fi mumbo jumbo, it’s hard to discount entirely. The inverse of simulation theory—the idea that we are the agents of power—the puppet masters at the center of events—is generally referred to as “narcissism.” Obviously neither view is particularly cheerful—on the one hand you’re powerless code and on the other you’re an intolerable monster. Personally, I’d prefer not to be either. And yet, the more I think about The Baseball Project the more I have to consider the plausibility that I’m either living inside an algorithm or that I’ve invented an Indie supergroup through the power my mind.
Seriously, how else to explain the existence of a band formed by baseball stats-obsessed, middle-aged, College Rock royalty who write songs about Harvey Haddix and Ed Delahanty? And how else to explain the very first song of their very first album, which asks, “So long ago, so long, pastime, are you past your prime?” Most of the nouns from those last two sentences (Middle-aged to College Rock to Ed Delahanty) could be hashtags for the index of my brain (#middleaged #collegerock #eddelahanty). And that lyric—the chorus from “Past Time”—could be the musical theme for this very website (“Past Prime”). I mean, sure, it’s obviously possible that Steve Wynn (of the Dream Syndicate) and Peter Buck, Mike Mills and Scott McCaughey (all of R.E.M.) could have—as their bio suggests—dreamed up The Baseball Project in 2007 at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Yes, I concede that it is possible that four middle-aged men (and importantly, one middle-aged woman, drummer Linda Pitmon) with an affinity for late Sixties Kinks, mid-Eighties Janglecore and Nineties Americana, could have decided to join forces and sing about Ted Williams’ indignation and the reclamation of Mark McGwire. Based on what I know about everyone involved, it’s all definitely possible. But, also, it seems slightly less plausible than Simulation theory—that they were manifested by some all-knowing thing and then served up to me algorithmically. Or worse, that they are a projection of my own delusions.
Though they debuted over fifteen years ago, and though every band factoid—from their raison d'être to their glowing reviews to their Letterman appearance—demanded that I check them out, I did not check out The Baseball Project. Not even once. I loved R.E.M. I really liked The Dream Syndicate. I absolutely enjoyed The Minus Five. But this thing—The Baseball Project—felt too personal. It felt much less like I was “being seen” and much more like I was “being exposed.” Was I that much of a middle-aged guy cliche? Could I be that easily influenced? Also, what if they weren’t any good? With all those perfect hashtags, would I even be able to tell?
So, in spite of every reason to abide, I spent more than a decade actively avoiding The Baseball Project. Honestly, it wasn’t very hard. They were only a part time concern and, in addition to all of the new music and old music in my life, I always had a pile of baseball-curious songs on hand in case I needed a fix. There was Jonathan Richman’s “Walter Johnson.” Warren Zevon’s “Bill Lee.” Dylan’s “Catfish.” And Billy Bragg and Wilco’s “Joe DiMaggio Done it Again.” Since Paul Simon name-dropped The Yankee Clipper in “Mrs. Robinson,” Rock and Pop had semi-regularly crossed over into the American Pastime. And the feeling has been occasionally mutual— Richie Allen made Soul music with The Ebonistics, Barry Zito makes Country music and Bernie Williams plays a hell of a guitar. If I could have my “Murmur” and my “Days of Wine and Roses” and my Warren Zevon baseball song and my Bill James, did I really need them all at the same time?
In time, I began to feel like the answer to that question was “yes.” I’m not sure exactly what changed inside of me. Surely it was several things. It was learning that, on the second Baseball Project record, Craig Finn joined the band for a song about former MVP and Minnesota legend, Zolio Versailles ("Don't Call Them Twinkies"). And also that they had written an ode to Gaylord Perry’s barely concealed but rigorously employed pitching aids (“Stuff). And another one about the psycho-trauma of John Lester and Chuck Knaubloch’s sudden and famous cases of “the yips” (“The Yips”).
It was all of those things. But most of all it was sitting on bleachers with my son at a Texas Playboys sandlot baseball game during the fall of 2023, hearing a tender ballad, sung in Spanish, played over the PA and gradually—through the dust of my high school level “fluency”—realizing that it was about Fernando Valenzuela and by The Baseball Project. All my avoidance had been pointless. They’d found me. I’d officially listened to—and quite loved—a song by The Baseball Project. In retrospect, it was unavoidable—just a matter of time. Simulation aside. Narcissism aside. It was time to check out the band that I’d spent fifteen years avoiding but a lifetime preparing for.
“Volume 1: Frozen Ropes and Dying Quails,” is an unmitigated statement of purpose. For one, there’s the title, which suggests that it is the first volume of many—in other words, that they have a lot to say on the subject. Second, “frozen ropes” and “dying quails” indicate that these guys and gal know their jargon. Third, every song is stuffed with fabulous factoids and apocryphal anecdotes, as though to prove and then reprove their bonafides. And finally, of course, there’s the music, which rolls from high end, Sixties Modpop to stripped down Paisley Underground to All-Americana Roots Rock with the grace of Willie Mays sailing between center, left and right. You can hear the R.E.M. of it all. But, in fact, they sound much closer to Steve Wynn’s solo stuff or—really—to Warren Zevon’s “Sentimental Hygiene” (which featured Buck and Mills). “Frozen Ropes and Dying Quails” is confident, muscular and (obviously) funny, but never, ever showy.
While they aren’t exactly Hall of Famers, Steve Wynn and Scott McCaughey are the subjects of indie fascination and the stars of The Baseball Project. On “Frozen Ropes and Dying Quails,” Wynn has seven writing credits to McCaughey’s six. Meanwhile, the actual Hall of Famer—Peter Buck—operates as a role player and drummer Linda Pitmon calls the pitches from behind the plate. In The Baseball Project, the frontmen are actually journeymen. Which, I think, is a big reason why the band works—because they are a team. Everyone is working in service of the same goal. And it’s a very specific goal: to make always witty, occasionally poignant songs about baseball’s great history. They’re not aiming for hits, much less home runs—they just want to play ball.
Which is exactly what they do. On “Past Time,” which opens the album, McCaughey name-drops Campy Campaneris, Oscar Gamble, Luis Aparicio and Denny McClain, who in 1968 recorded thirty-one wins and cut an album of organ music for Capitol Records. It’s offhanded wink after knowing nod—three minutes of “You know that one? So do we? You like this stuff? So do we?” And it’s also a heck of a song. There’s an ease to the hook—languid but plenty strong and not unlike the sport itself. It’s so competent, in fact, that McCaughey’s English accent somehow works. It sounds kind of like: “We love baseball. You love this baseball. We love The Kinks. You love The Kinks. So…why the hell not?”
As great as the opener is (it really is), it’s nearly bested by what comes next. “Ted Fucking Williams” lacks the hooky ease of “Past Time,” but as pure character study, it’s excellent—summoning the extreme confidence and resentment of the greatest, but least sociable, hitter of his time. Wynn starts off a little shaky—fouling off the first two verses. By the time he gets to the bridge, however, his swing—equal parts Marc Bolan and Splendid Splinter—starts rounding in to form. And then there’s the chorus—a three part, his, his, her harmony that simply goes “Ted…Ted…Ted Fucking Williams!” It sounds like what I imagine a major league home run to feel like. Ben Bradlee Jr. wrote a terrific, eight hundred page biography of Williams, entitled “The Kid.” But this song does a darn good job with the salient points, and it does so in three minutes.
The critic in me thinks that about half the tracks on this record are better stories than songs. Which is less and indictment of the songwriting and more a suggestion that it’s hard to come up with heartfelt lyrics about Satchel Paige or Curt Flood or Jackie Robinson while also crafting a melody equal to the subjects. On the other hand, there are some stories—like "The Death of Big Ed Delahanty,” who may have drunkenly fallen (or been pushed) into Niagara Falls—which are so fantastically funny that the music is secondary. There’s that pretty one about Fernandomania and the long, complicated history of Mexican Americans in LA. And there’s the one about Willie Mays, in which McCaughey recalls his idol playing in San Francisco, when he was young and able to leap tall buildings in a single bound. And then again in 1973 when, he was older and slower and let a routine grounder get through his legs. And then how—so many years later—he still dreams of The Say Hey Kid. If I had the talent to write a song—any song—I’d simply take this one, search and find “Wille Mays, Giants and Mets” and replace them with “Eddie Murray, Orioles and Dodgers.” The rest would still hold.
“Frozen Ropes and Dying Quails” is functionally a Folk record—a series of histories and yarns turned into fables turned into songs. Most—though not all—of these Folk songs sound like Rock songs. But in the one case when they do venture directly into the Folk idiom, The Baseball Project flirts (literally) with perfection. “Harvey Haddix” tells the story of the former Pirates’ hurler who retired the first thirty-six batters he faced—through nine innings and then three extra innings—only to lose his perfect game in the thirteenth. No major league player has ever been so perfect for so long in one game and yet Haddix’s name is not on the list of twenty-four pitchers in MLB history credited with a “perfect game” because of what happened to him in inning thirteen. It’s a near perfect song about a near perfect game that manages to list most of the aces who’ve retired twenty-seven straight, all while channeling a little Woody Guthrie and a lot of Jonathan Richman. Wynn and company sing:
Don Larsen in the Series in 1956
Why don't we add old Harvey to that list?
Appropriately, “The Closer” closes The Baseball Project’s debut. A heavy song about the relievers’ burden—about tired arms, bad attitudes and short fuses—it sounds like the bottom of the ninth inning. And it leaves you both with a sense of finality and wanting nine more innings. Or, at least, that’s how it left me—I think. That’s the trick with this band. It’s hard to tell whether I’m responding to the subject (absolutely!) or the songs (I think so). There is no part of me that believes this is a “great”—as in “important” album. It might be closer to clever novelty than great art. And yet, it contains so much that is so important to me. Possibly too important. And so much that is so familiar. And probably too familiar. Which of course makes me wonder why it took forty plus years of Rock and Roll for a band to commit themselves to our American pastime. And why that happened exactly as I entered middle age. And why there’s an uncanny something about the guys from R.E.M. and The Dream Syndicate singing about Ed Delahanty. So, either this is actually a very good album that is precisely up my alley or it is the product of a very smart algorithm or I made the whole thing up.