The Pecan Park Eagle

My Saturday To-Go order from the health food store came back as # 216 – the same as Jose Altuve’s hit total thru Friday night’s games. Uh-Oh! “Very Superstitious – Writing’s on the wall!” (as Stevie Wonder says)

This is crazy! I’m now so caught up in the Jose Altuve quest for a batting title or two – and his constantly improving record MLB hit total for any Houston Astro or native Venezuelan who has ever played the game of baseball as a representative of either group at this level that the intensity and excitement is beginning to rain the same kinds of frogs of superstition that drenched me as a kid sandlotter.

Have you ever lost your only Stan Musial baseball card to your mom’s clothes wash after leaving it in the hip pocket of your blue jeans as a good luck piece at the sandlot game?

Have you ever carried your good luck rock in that same hip pocket locale and then found out the price you were destined to pay on your first sandlot butt slide of the summer morning?

Have you ever counted birds landing on a certain telephone wire from your top of the first inning position in center field as a predictor on how many runs your Eagles (team) were going to score in their bottom of the first inning time at bat?

Have you ever had a really good Saturday morning sandlot game – only to lose an argument with your mom at lunch over your desire to wear the same lucky dirty, but lucky jeans to the Saturday afternoon kids’ double feature, plus serial, at a movie theater like The Avalon on 75th Avenue in the Houston east end?

Thanks, Senor Altuve, for bringing it all home to roost again. In one short, depleted of many other things to cheer about 2014 season, your Star Trek-like bold journey into a territory where no previous Astro has ever traveled successfully has, indeed – one more time – fueled the compulsive edge of my early baseball life.

Around mid-day yesterday, I had finished some Saturday morning errands in the Town and Country area on the west side and was passing my health food store, James Coney Island. I was alone for the day, so it didn’t take much inner discussion with myself. I stopped in at JCI to pick up a to-go order.

It was only when I received my to-go order ticket number that I realized the full force of the powers that apparently were working on me.

As you may also note from the copy of that to-go 0rder slip that is posted as the lead pictorial on this column, my JCI service person had issued me an order slip that was identified as “No. 216!”

My eyes widened immediately as I awaited my two all the way chili cheese dogs with onions and the mandatory bag of Fritos that go with them.

“Order No. 216?” They’ve got to be kidding, right?” No, sir! No, Ma’am! – This was destiny talking – speaking in print on a not-so-random order ticket. Had I not arrived at precisely the moment I did, and ordered what I did, from this particular guy – not the other one – I would not have been designated as “Order # 216.”

So be it, but the thing I wasn’t sure about until last night was – Is this a good luck sign? – Or a bad luck sign?

I knew this much when I saw the order number: Had I come in actively thinking in silent conversation with the “baseball gods,” – “Please send me a sign of how many hits Altuve will have at season’s end!”

That would have been bad news for sure. Jose Altuve already had exactly 216 total hits at the time I got my to-go number 216. It would have meant that he was out of hits, but probably not out of empty times at. bat If this is for real, and he goes “O fer” the rest of the last eight Astro games, he may also lose the batting title to Victor Martinez!

It had not occurred to me at the time that other possible  explanations for a 216-hit total finish on 9/19 might have included injury or a simple decision to end his season early. In that case, Altuve may have prevailed over Martinez’s struggle to catch him by his own effort alone.

Fortunately, injury has not happened, so far – and backing into a title is  not our way down here in Houston.

Altuve stopping at 216 hits was still a bummer thought, but the salvation remedy seemed clear. – I didn’t walk into Coney Island with any specific question in mind. Seeing “216” could be a good sign. We just won’t know for sure until he gets another hit and proves that the printed number from JCI was not a statement of where he will end up with as a complete season hit total. – All I hoped for yesterday was that it was some kind of sign from the “baseball gods” that they were listening to the hopes and dreams of all us Jose Altuve fans who were out here pulling hard for him.

When I walked out of James Coney Island with my health food in the bag yesterday, I dared to whisper this thought into a gentle breeze that suddenly rolled its way through the parking lot: “If Altuve can pick up a couple of hits tonight against Seattle, everything is going to be alright.”

And so be it again. That’s exactly what he did. Read below for the details and draw your own conclusions – or not.

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THE PECAN PARK EAGLE DAILY MLB 2014 BATTING CROWN EYE:

NOTES, 9/21 AM: It’s Sunday morning. Last night, Jose Altuve collected two singles in four trips to raise his season batting average to .344. His season hit total is now 218, pulling his out of tie he shared with fellow countryman Magglio Ordonez for 24 hours as the two Venezuelans with the most hits in MLB history at 216. Now that Venezuelan record belongs only to “Senor Jose,” for at least the next year – through whatever total Altuve finally finishes with in his last eight games of 2014. Oh yes, the Astros blasted Seattle at MMP on Saturday by 10-1, thanks a lot to the five Altuve Astro teammates who each blast home runs. Meanwhile, Victor Martinez fell a peg yesterday, going one for four in his Tiger club’s win over the Royals at Kansas City, 3-2. Martinez’s average dropped slightly to .334 as Altuve’s rose a point to .344 and a full .010 point lead in the AL and total MlB batting races.

The Eagle Eye on Jose Altuve’s pursuit of the 2014 American League and MLB batting average championships will continue daily through the balance of the season. For now, it’s a two-man race between Altuve and Victor Martinez of the Detroit Tigers. Should that change, so will our reporting format. – Bill McCurdy

Tags: baseball superstition awaked by Jose Altuve

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