Normally, I’d agree with you.  But I’m doing a thing here.  Darren Daulton, in honor of some recent appearances in the area, is getting the royal treatment here at TBOH.  This is Part 2 of my extended lead-in to reviewing his book, “If They Only Knew,” which deals primarily with his foray into metaphysics. It’s been… interesting.

Read Part 1 here.  Other than that, buckle up.

I was perusing shelves of sports books by former and current ESPN analysts who were desperate to cash in over-amped sports nostalgia for a paycheck when I realized:  Wait, I’m looking for Darren Daulton’s book…  I think I’m in the wrong section entirely.

It’s not like I expected to find it anywhere.  There was a pretty thin demographic for an aging ex-professional catcher’s thoughts on traveling between dimensions.  My theory had been that if Dutch’s masterpiece was to land somewhere, anywhere, in public, it would be in a book store in downtown Philly, where he’s culminated the majority of his heroism.

But no.  Just more Jayson Stark, leaning to his right, smiling with a baseball in his hand.  Way to go, Jayson.  You made it.

I didn’t feel like getting slapped around by shipping and handling and tracking numbers, so my theory had been to check out local retailers to see if anybody had the sack to carry the book.  No.  Tey didn’t.

Maybe a library?

Do people still use libraries?  Or are they like VCRs and 2010 Eagles playoff hopes?  Not that it mattered, because a quick internet search told me that the only library in America with a registered copy of “If They Only Knew” was in Wichita, Kansas.  For some reason.

It looked like Dutch was getting twenty of my dollars.  Round one to him.

The reviews online were not always pretty.  Somebody commented on his repeated usage of the phrase “I know you’re not gonna believe me, but…”

Darren, I believe that you believe it; I sat through your jaw-dropping interview on CSN in its entirety, remember?  When you go from professional athlete to self-proclaimed metaphysicist, that’s all you can really ask of me.

But I couldn’t really let other people’s mean spirited bias deflect my opinion in one way or another.  I will simply read the book, and not expose myself to any third party analysis beforehand.

Oh god.  There’s a website:  www.dutch2012.com

You aren’t going to make this easy, are you Dutch?  He leans on his theories about 2012 pretty heavily on the site, bringing it up in the welcome message, the “About” page, and twice in his email address alone (2012@dutch2012.com).  Visually, you feel like you’re looking at a planetarium shortly before a lecture attended by only three other people.  In this lonely corner of the internet, Dutch is the king; your counterbalancing of his radical new interests with his contributions to Philadelphia baseball noisily derailed the further on you read.

He also refers to computers as “cyber machines.”

Despite people on the internet, my better judgment, a general disinterest in 2012 theories, the hope-shattering message of “A new copy is not available from Barnes & Noble.com at this time,”and an accidental almost-purchase of “If They Only Knew” by ex-pro wrestler Chyna, I bought it.

My first idea in actually reading “If They Only Knew” was to devise some sort of “WTF?!-ometer,” in that I could refer to the device every time I thought something  was strange, out of place, inappropriate, or batshit insane.

It’s not contemptible, I thought.  It’s not just making the same joke with different words.  It’s not just relentlessly cutting a man down for the sake of a cheap laugh.

It is those things, though.  It totally and meaninglessly is.

So what’s going to happen here, before I’ve even read the book and can officially have an opinion on it, is a play-by-play.  I’m going to tell you what I’m looking at in all truthfulness, and let the final decision go to you.  Because the easy route to take would be to sit in this chair and come up with all the snarky little bitchings about this book that are already filling cyberspace.

In that spirit:

What I’m looking at on my desk, miraculously only a mere two days after I ordered it, is a book.  In the cover’s foreground sits our boy Dutch, either crouched in a stretching position or sitting on a very low bench intended for children.  His hair is front and center, soaked in sunshine, and he’s smiling; Curt Schilling’s probably just shoved a pie in Chris Wheeler’s face just out frame or something.  His sunglasses give off the sense that he’s snuck into the park and ridden a sweet motorcycle around the bases the night before.

“DARREN DAULTON,” the text yells, followed by a harsh whispering of the title:  “If They Only Knew.”

We flip it over; instantly bombarded by what the photographer has told Dutch is an award-winning smile.  A blurb in the bottom left describes the book as “electrifying.”  Further below is the price, reminding you how much of your paltry paycheck you did indeed spend on this literature.

There’s not a lot else I can tell you without opening this thing.  Let’s begin.

Wow this thing is… quite poorly made.  One of the pages just came out when I turned it.

Here we go.

“’93 Phillies Highlights,” it says (talking about the VHS again).  It’s old, chipped, and has probably been watched way more times than necessary.  But for awhile there, all the Phillies Phaithful had was warm memories of 1993.  If you can track down the technology to view a video tape, you can see a team that was so in love with each other and baseball it almost got them a World Series title.

It opens with the familiar, dulcet tones of Harry Kalas.  It’s taped off TV and comes in a little bit too late to hear the entire introduction, so he’s already in midsentence:

“… who would’ve dared even dreamed?” HK asks of that unbelievable season.

“I would have, dude,” Lenny Dykstra replies.

I could sit here and type out most of the narration and outtakes by memory from a season of come-from-behind victories and a couple games of grab-ass.  The video retrospective illustrates those Phillies who were the blue collar, tough-as-nails bunch of guys who turned the summer of ‘93 into a Macho Row-powered thrill ride.

And the unquestionable leader was Darren Daulton.

“Dutch” could throw a lasso around that team and hogtie them a victory.  Jim Fregosi was the man with the plan, but his catcher was out in the trenches, making sure everybody was doing their job and doing it to the best of their ability.  It may have been easier because they were a team with no real divas or assholes or Brett Myers, but to have the admiration, trust, and respect of 24 other professional baseball players and the coaching stuff is no easy feat.  Dutch had been with the Phils for years and in 1993, he was hungry for a World Series title.  With this carefully picked squad of “gypsies, tramps, and thieves,” he would have a better chance than ever before at wearing a World Series ring; and not only could they win games, they could put on a show.

A very different show than the one Dutch performed on Comcast Sports Net on a sunny Sunday afternoon in April 2006; namely because this one had nothing to do with baseball.

“I started experiencing these different realms, these different planes of existence.  I know exactly what I’m capable of doing.  People talk about speaking with lizards and stuff,” he said, as Michael Barkann and living rooms full of Phillie fans across the region looked on in utter confusion.

I looked up from lying face down on the floor, pretending not to be hungover, and the rustle of the newspaper indicated that my father, on the couch, found the statement just as jarring.

When you hear something like this, your first reaction is to assume it was a mistake.  Some public figure has let a little bit of crazy fall out of their mouth, and we will all sit patiently and pretend it isn’t weird while they try to correct themselves.  It happens, especially when we live in a world full of famous people who shouldn’t be famous.

But Dutch knew exactly what he had said, and instead of hiding behind a curtain of suave ambiguity or changing the subject, he just kept talking.  You might say it was a trainwreck and you couldn’t look away, but the strange part was, he didn’t want you to.  We were embarking on an expedition to the fifth dimension.

And the unquestionable leader was Darren Daulton.

“Wow, what the hell is happening?” I asked.

“Language,” mom said from the other room.

Dad shook his head and checked the channel guide to make sure this was still Comcast Sports Net.  It was.  Dutch was just seamlessly transitioning from “How’s Cole Going to Fare Against a Hot Braves Lineup?” to “Made-up Science.”

Whatever.  It was now time to decide whether I was going to pay attention to this interview or go back to closing my eyes and playing the theme song from “ToeJam and Earl” on a continuous loop in my head.

“I like to astral travel, teleport; travel through time,” he continued.

…

Okay, Dutch.  I’m sitting up.

The internet was flooded with a wide range of comments, going anywhere from “WTF?! to “LMFAO!”  Michael Barkann himself seemed a little flustered after what was supposed to be a habitual interview took a back road into a Dr. Seuss story.  Imagine his reaction when they told him Dutch was coming aboard as an analyst.

But then, John Kruk stepped in and held up an index finger to the blogosphere.

“I’m not going to sit here and say he’s crazy just because that’s the popular thing to do right now.”

Kruk’s right.  It’s the easiest thing in the world to call somebody out for what they believe.  Sometimes, they make it even easier by talking in a public forum.  So in a way, you’ve got to respect Dutch’s commitment to what he thinks is the right thing to say and do.

In another, more illegal way, you should probably frown upon what he’s done in the past.  Like punching his wife, and then admitting it:  “I slapped her… absolutely.”

Just remember, being a weirdo isn’t against the law.  But domestic abuse is, Dutch.  Don’t try to paint the walls crazy just because you’ve got a temper.

But Dutch was taking his new system of beliefs out for a spin, so he did what everyone does when they’re out to prove they’re not crazy:  He wrote a book.

“If They Only Knew,” he called it, which could be referring to a lot of things:  The way he can control the weather with his emotions.  The way the pyramids are aligned with certain stars.  All the crazy things we as fans don’t know went down in that ’93 Phils clubhouse.

I’ve got to admit, I shrugged it off and assumed it wasn’t worth my extremely valuable time.  But, in honor of his recent Mount Airy appearance and “Celebrity Dart Night” at McFadden’s Ballpark on January 28, and to prove that I’m not as rabid as the stereotypical Phillies fan, I’m going to read it; if only to give myself a perspective on how a man who gave Philadelphia baseball so much is now engaged in metaphysics and not asking us to believe or even understand what he’s talking about.  He just wants us to listen.

He also wants $17.95, plus shipping and handling.