GaryMrMets
05-23-2006, 01:06 PM
http://philadelphia.comcastsportsnet.com/view_content_0p.asp?ID=30942
At 33, Coste Gets the Call to the Show
by Zach Berman
ComcastSportsNet.com
It’s not supposed to be like this.
Spend 12 years in the minor leagues, shuffling from Brandon, Manitoba to Akron, Ohio to Pawtucket, R.I, living the minor league cliché of rickety bus trips and value-menu dinners, and the first Major League baseball road trip should at least be a luxury plane ride with legroom and leather seats.
Chris Coste, though, is taking another bus ride.
The Phillies, who called up the 33-year-old Coste from Triple-A Scranton Wilkes-Barre after shortstop Alex Gonzalez retired, will play a pivotal three-game series against the first-place New York Mets. The trip will be up the Jersey Turnpike and not through starry skies. How fitting.
Coste is a modern-day Crash Davis, too acclimated with minor league ballparks and small-city living, not acclimated enough with locker rooms equipped with plasma televisions and wireless Internet.
But there he was, driving the 125 miles from Scranton to Philadelphia on his own, in a situation even he couldn’t believe.
“I’m waiting to wake up from my dream, actually,” Coste said. “I’ve honestly had many dreams where I’ve been in the dream playing in the big leagues, and then I tell myself in the dream, ‘It’s not a dream.’ And then you wake up, and you’re mad. So I kept thinking, am I going to wake up and be mad? But I think it’s real.”
Coste’s phone rang Sunday morning while he was, of all things, sleeping. He didn’t pick it up right away, checked the caller ID and saw it was former manager Gene Lamont. He didn’t know why Lamont would call, checked the message and realized it was actually Lamont’s replacement, Red Barons manager John Russell.
But Russell wasn’t clear on what the call was about.
“Triple-A managers like to be sly about these things, so he called me up and said, ‘Chris, give me a call, we have to talk about some things,’” Coste said. “I was confused. The big leagues were the furthest from my mind. Honestly, zero percent thought it was this situation.”
When Russell told Coste to pack his bags, he’s going to Philadelphia, Coste still didn’t realize it was because he was called up.
“When he said we had to talk about some things, he said it in a monotone, almost disappointed fashion,” Coste said. “I was thinking, ‘What did I do? Did I fail a drug test?’”
When he realized this was the real thing, he packed up the car and headed down the Northeast Extension. He had a ballgame to catch, and the speed limit turned into a speed option.
“I was going somewhere between 55 and 83,” Coste joked.
He arrived at the ballpark around 1:25 p.m., 10 minutes before pitcher Cory Lidle was scheduled to throw the first pitch against the Boston Red Sox. When he sat down in front of his new locker, the national anthem was playing. He watched the first half inning on television.
Hitting coach Milt Thompson greeted Coste with familiar words in the dugout. Coste’s trademark expression in Triple-A is “Fighty fight,” which he screams whenever a player fouls off a pitch with two strikes. Once Thompson spotted Coste, he screamed, “Fighty fight!”
His teammates looked toward No. 27, knowing it was Coste. They became used to his chatter – and his bat – during spring training when he hit .463 with three home runs and 11 RBIs in 25 games.
Coste’s standout spring made it a difficult decision for the Phillies when they pared their opening day roster to the required 25 players. He was the final player cut, forced to the figurative purgatory of the all-too-familiar Triple-A.
And Scranton turned out to be a far cry from Clearwater. Coste struggled with the Red Barons, batting .177 with two home runs in 147 at-bats. Even when the Phillies suffered injuries, including starting catcher Mike Lieberthal, it was catcher Carlos Ruiz and outfielder Chris Roberson who received promotions, not Coste.
“It certainly wasn’t a disappointment factor. If anything, I was trying too hard,” Coste said. “My first thought when I was driving away from here in spring training was, ‘Don’t go to Triple-A and struggle. Don’t be that guy that acts like, woe is me.’ I didn’t want to be that guy.
”But Gonzalez retired, Sal Fasano suffered a groin injury after a foul tip on Saturday night and the Phillies needed a catcher.
Twelve years in the making, Coste became a major leaguer. He’s even written a book about minor league baseball. Coste said Sunday warrants a new chapter.
He’ll have time to think of a title on the bus ride up to New York where Coste has already imagined his first at bat.
“Do I swing at first pitch, do I take it? I don’t know what I’m going to do,” Coste said.
Whatever he does, he’ll have to enjoy it day-by-day. Centerfielder Aaron Rowand is eligible to be activated from the disabled list on Saturday and Fasano’s injury isn’t projected to be serious. Phillies manager Charlie Manuel didn’t offer any insight about the duration of Coste’s stay, only saying the Phillies will go with the players they have and evaluate the situation next weekend.
So Coste will enjoy the bus trip and wait for a plane ride. Between now and then, he’ll enjoy life as a 33-year-old rookie.
“It could be two days, three weeks or five years,” Coste said. “Hopefully the five years.”
At 33, Coste Gets the Call to the Show
by Zach Berman
ComcastSportsNet.com
It’s not supposed to be like this.
Spend 12 years in the minor leagues, shuffling from Brandon, Manitoba to Akron, Ohio to Pawtucket, R.I, living the minor league cliché of rickety bus trips and value-menu dinners, and the first Major League baseball road trip should at least be a luxury plane ride with legroom and leather seats.
Chris Coste, though, is taking another bus ride.
The Phillies, who called up the 33-year-old Coste from Triple-A Scranton Wilkes-Barre after shortstop Alex Gonzalez retired, will play a pivotal three-game series against the first-place New York Mets. The trip will be up the Jersey Turnpike and not through starry skies. How fitting.
Coste is a modern-day Crash Davis, too acclimated with minor league ballparks and small-city living, not acclimated enough with locker rooms equipped with plasma televisions and wireless Internet.
But there he was, driving the 125 miles from Scranton to Philadelphia on his own, in a situation even he couldn’t believe.
“I’m waiting to wake up from my dream, actually,” Coste said. “I’ve honestly had many dreams where I’ve been in the dream playing in the big leagues, and then I tell myself in the dream, ‘It’s not a dream.’ And then you wake up, and you’re mad. So I kept thinking, am I going to wake up and be mad? But I think it’s real.”
Coste’s phone rang Sunday morning while he was, of all things, sleeping. He didn’t pick it up right away, checked the caller ID and saw it was former manager Gene Lamont. He didn’t know why Lamont would call, checked the message and realized it was actually Lamont’s replacement, Red Barons manager John Russell.
But Russell wasn’t clear on what the call was about.
“Triple-A managers like to be sly about these things, so he called me up and said, ‘Chris, give me a call, we have to talk about some things,’” Coste said. “I was confused. The big leagues were the furthest from my mind. Honestly, zero percent thought it was this situation.”
When Russell told Coste to pack his bags, he’s going to Philadelphia, Coste still didn’t realize it was because he was called up.
“When he said we had to talk about some things, he said it in a monotone, almost disappointed fashion,” Coste said. “I was thinking, ‘What did I do? Did I fail a drug test?’”
When he realized this was the real thing, he packed up the car and headed down the Northeast Extension. He had a ballgame to catch, and the speed limit turned into a speed option.
“I was going somewhere between 55 and 83,” Coste joked.
He arrived at the ballpark around 1:25 p.m., 10 minutes before pitcher Cory Lidle was scheduled to throw the first pitch against the Boston Red Sox. When he sat down in front of his new locker, the national anthem was playing. He watched the first half inning on television.
Hitting coach Milt Thompson greeted Coste with familiar words in the dugout. Coste’s trademark expression in Triple-A is “Fighty fight,” which he screams whenever a player fouls off a pitch with two strikes. Once Thompson spotted Coste, he screamed, “Fighty fight!”
His teammates looked toward No. 27, knowing it was Coste. They became used to his chatter – and his bat – during spring training when he hit .463 with three home runs and 11 RBIs in 25 games.
Coste’s standout spring made it a difficult decision for the Phillies when they pared their opening day roster to the required 25 players. He was the final player cut, forced to the figurative purgatory of the all-too-familiar Triple-A.
And Scranton turned out to be a far cry from Clearwater. Coste struggled with the Red Barons, batting .177 with two home runs in 147 at-bats. Even when the Phillies suffered injuries, including starting catcher Mike Lieberthal, it was catcher Carlos Ruiz and outfielder Chris Roberson who received promotions, not Coste.
“It certainly wasn’t a disappointment factor. If anything, I was trying too hard,” Coste said. “My first thought when I was driving away from here in spring training was, ‘Don’t go to Triple-A and struggle. Don’t be that guy that acts like, woe is me.’ I didn’t want to be that guy.
”But Gonzalez retired, Sal Fasano suffered a groin injury after a foul tip on Saturday night and the Phillies needed a catcher.
Twelve years in the making, Coste became a major leaguer. He’s even written a book about minor league baseball. Coste said Sunday warrants a new chapter.
He’ll have time to think of a title on the bus ride up to New York where Coste has already imagined his first at bat.
“Do I swing at first pitch, do I take it? I don’t know what I’m going to do,” Coste said.
Whatever he does, he’ll have to enjoy it day-by-day. Centerfielder Aaron Rowand is eligible to be activated from the disabled list on Saturday and Fasano’s injury isn’t projected to be serious. Phillies manager Charlie Manuel didn’t offer any insight about the duration of Coste’s stay, only saying the Phillies will go with the players they have and evaluate the situation next weekend.
So Coste will enjoy the bus trip and wait for a plane ride. Between now and then, he’ll enjoy life as a 33-year-old rookie.
“It could be two days, three weeks or five years,” Coste said. “Hopefully the five years.”