Reading Hall of Fame Induction Reveals Double Agent

We haven’t spoken about the NLCS in a while, and I’m sure you’ve assumed that means one of two things.

• I have picked up and moved on.  We are closer to the next season than the previous one, so why not let all the negative emotions of 2010 fade away as we raise our hopes for the upcoming year.
• I have buried the memories of the event under a thick layer of denial and what doctors have described as “psychological homicide.”  It is continuously labeled a temporary solution and appears to be only a matter of time before the blanket of sanity is pierced through, and my outrage once more leaks into the room like a wave of cockroaches crawling out of a sink.

Well, the joke’s on you, buddy, because it’s the real answer is twice as crazy.Shane Turner is being let into the Reading Baseball Hall of Fame, finally, and he’s going in with the team we all recognize: The Reading Phillies, one of minor league baseball’s longest-running franchises.  I had to make that distinction so that I could have the context to tell you that there was once a team called the “Reading Pretzels.”  And they were the greatest team that ever lived (in Reading, circa 1911).

Anyway, the point is, Shane has no “Phillie” in his step anymore.  No, now the man who once hit .334 in 74 games for our Double-A affiliate walks with the inimitable swagger of a World Series champion as the minor league coordinator for the San Francisco Giants.

Turner clasps hands with other greats like Jo Jo White and Wade Miller as they ascend to the Hall, as well as those tasty 1911 Reading Pretzels.  The real question is, why was he not tapped during the 2010 post season to cause mayhem in the Giants organization?  Maybe have 10,000 pizzas delivered to AT&T Park during a Cody Ross at bat?  Drop kick the head of Lou Seal into a cement mixer?  No?  This didn’t occur to anybody else?

Congratulations to Shane and all the rest.  I suppose he will always be there, ready for that shady phone call that brings him back to the fold.

I am not delusional as to how baseball works.