Oh, the Places You'll Go!

Congratulations!

Today is your day.

You're off to Great Places!

You're off and away!

Except... you aren't. No, you're not the object of Dr. Seuss' wildly cliched popular book given at the beginning of life after ending your education. Nope, you're Drew Storen and the book you're given after your first Spring Training is titled, "Oh, the Places Drew'll Go Back To Needlessly Before the Places You Should Go!"

Look, the stats are there, and this quote is there.

"I've said it the whole time: We're going to play the best 25 guys that give us the best chance to win," Rizzo said.

Yet Drew isn't there. Where is there? In Major League camp and on his way North with the club outta spring training. Others have touched on the subject, and I fear that if I start down the road of justifying Drew's spot in the bullpen any more, I'll end up storming down Half St. with a flaming pitch fork, war paint, and screaming, "Off with Rizzo's fucking head!" So I'll leave it at this: My hunch is Drew is going to have to baby sit Stras through AA and AAA. Drew has already been in the Minors, and can help Stras in his tour down there. Is it fair? Fuck and no. Is it reality? Fuck and yes.
So, Drew, your first stop on the Places You'll Go? Hagerstown, MD, home of the Hagerstown Suns. Hagerstown is also the home of... nothing else. (Click pictures to enlarge.)

Yes, Drew, I hope you had fun in BFE, and hopefully you won't have to return.

The next stops on the Drew Express? Click "Read more" to see.


After Hagerstown, you headed to the Potomac Nationals. There you may have bonded with one of our Founding Fathers (nay - the GREATEST of our Founding Fathers - George Washington) and re-enacted one of his most famous scenes: The crossing of the Delaware.

(Would it have worked better if Georgie crossed the Potomac River? Hell yeah, but my ability to reshape history has yet to take shape. So just imagine Drew hanging w/George and saving the children. But not the British children.)

After rocking the (DC) suburbs, you were sent North, to Harrisburg, PA to play for the Harrisburg Senators. Harrisburg is the capital of Pennsylvania, and happens to be close to the Three Mile Island nuclear reactor. As you can see, the reactor may be leaking a bit...

It certainly does seem the gamma rays have increased Drew's size, a la Bruce Banner. Hope you've got that under control now, Drew.

Drew was then sent all the way out to Phoenix to throw in the Arizona Fall League. When not pitching, you could find Drew taking long walks in the desert observing native wildlife.

And that concluded your successful 2009. Where to after Spring Training? Well, back to the reactors, but then a quick promotion to AAA, we're sure. Enjoy your time on the sixth planet in the Hoth system. (NERD ALERT!!)

What? Syracuse doesn't really resemble Hoth? Fuck all that noise. I've seen pictures, and it looks just as cold, just as snowy, and just as full of AT-AT walkers. Hope you rented a good tauntaun, Drew.

But it'll all be worth it, though. Because the next stop? Yup yup. It's with the 24 other fine men (okay, 23 fine men and Willy Taveras*) in Washington DC. Just imagine yourself in the clubhouse...

There you are, breaking bread with Zim, Dunn, Willingham, Adam Kennedy, Nyjer---
Wait. Where are all the brothers and Hispanics in the picture? Damn, even Jesus Flores is missing? Shit... I guess I chose the wrong picture from my Google image search for "Jesus eating in the clubhouse."

So, Drew, after all your travels just know it'll be worth it. Because as Dr. Seuss himself said:

And will you succeed?

Yes! You will, indeed!

(98 and 3/4 percent guaranteed.)

Not 100%? Screw you, Seuss! Screw you in the face!

* I sure hope to Christ Willy Taveras isn't the starting right fielder, but as of this writing, he's in the running. Gah!
** Original source for the Drew picture is from Miss Chatter's Flickr set here. Read her blog here.