Geovany Soto and Joey Votto! Is that right? Do they rhyme?

Don't look now baseball fans (and people who should appreciate the sport more like the ubiquitous and eponymous Lisa H), but it seems that the Italian-American community might be coming on strong in America's pasttime through these two new guys.

Ba da boom!

If Andrew Dice Clay were performing, he would lay down a blue streak for these two fellow Amerigo paisani...

Dice Clay is Italian-American, right? Does the Pope like bratwurst? (I used to say "does the Pope like spaghetti?", but now that we have had two non-Italians in the Vatican in a row it has me rethinking the trite question. No offense to anyone by that. I think it's an attempt at levity.)

But anyway, these two guys appear to be the real deal, at least so far this season.

Geovany Soto has been pounding the ball for the Cubbies, and maybe the answer to the "maldicion del chivo" (that is Spanish for curse of the goat; my Italian is very limited).

He is a catcher, too, I believe, which is always good to see for production. Go Cubs! Kielbasa the curse!

Mr. Votto (I would like to know if it rhymes with Soto, a la songs sung in falsetto sotto voce by Adam Sandler: Opera Man!) made a statement today for the Reds by belting three homers in its runaway win.

Tre hom ronne, bambini!

En un matche! UNO. Que potenza! Que linguini!

Now THAT is Italian.

Well, American, really.

This is a baseball thing.

OK, Lisa? It's a great game. Most football players like it.

'Nuff said.

And speaking of Italian and baseball, who was the best Italian-American ball player of all time?

Joe DiMaggio? Yogi Berra?

Certainly the former had better numbers and romantic hype, while the latter inspired more witticisms and cartoon characters.

But if you think about it, our culture and history would not be the same without these three things, dedicated to Votto three dingers (powatzos) today:

1. Baseball.

2. Italian-Americans. Yeah, I'm talkin' ta you!

3. Italinan-American ball players.

So, forza Votto and Soto!

Now that I think of it, it is more likley that Soto is Latino, but who cares? Then again, maybe both of them are only 1/16 Italian, both of them might be Mexican or Puerto Rican. Does it matter?It's the thought that counts. Celebrate our diversity and fascinating mix of identities in baseball and America.

Si! That we can ALL capisce, no? Tutto!

Bona fortuna y ciao amici.

Clinch

Disclaimer: the eloquent and eponymous blogger Mean Dovine has read this and told me it was a "difficult read". I have considered the comment and I am still considering how to make it "easier". However, given that info, please try to read on and feel very free to give any comments, advice, jokes, critiques and stock tips if you so desire. The comment section, far below (secondary disclaimer as to this being my longest post ever) is functional as per usual. Merci!

My favorite athlete? Pick only one? OK, blog nation, try this one on for size:

Jack Nielsen

Do you remember him?

You shouldn't. Whole years of my life I haven't remembered him. And then I do remember...

The year was 1979, maybe 1980 or even 1981. I was born in 1970, so that made me--an impressionable youth. My parents were swell(yeah, that's old school for cool folk), but I don't think you could call them athletes or attribute fearless acts of derring-do to them on any court, field or arena of sports.

I craved those heroes as a youth. Don't we all? Maybe I did more than many. I was an only son with older sisters, my friends were baseball and football fans. And then there was basketball.

Bloomington, Indiana.

Do you know this place?

"The General".

Do you understand this term?

Once when I was 5 or 6, the Bob Knight All-American center Kent Benson did business at my parents' copyshop by campus--the tones in which they spoke of this 7 footer were between giddy squeals of a kid at Christmas and hushed tones of reverence and awe.

This was my home.

The last undefeated team in college basketball? See my childhood. (1976). Thirty years later and the names of Benson, Buckner, May, et al, loom ever grander in the national imagination...

But it's different in Bloomington.

Basketball is... Bigger.

Or was this imagined greatness only in my own head?

I lived across the street from a public park swimming pool. It was Olympic-sized and they did regular meets there during the warm months.

I took swimming lessons there early in the morning for most of my young years. Ages 5-10 maybe, and the lessons started at 5:45 a.m. or 6 something. Yes, I said early! We only needed to get out of bed, throw on a suit and cross the street. It was a good way to start a summer of no school... And in six weeks we might go up to "Advanced", after learning the dreaded elementary back stroke and learning life saving techniques, like tossing a flotable life saver ring...

Days were less organized, between returning to the park pool and playing, coming home and watching reruns of "Lost in Space", or catching Bill Buckner face the Dodgers on WGN-Chicago. Yes, the Cubs were most of my first vicarious lessons in baseball...

No wonder I was looking desperately for real athletic heroes! (Sorry Cubbies, I do look forward to the Apocalypse--I mean a Cubs Championship some day). Don't we all, truly?

Summers were long and the lifeguards at the pool were a big part of my big people examples/mentors. Most of them were young women, but they seemed old, mature and some of them embarrassingly beautiful to me...And then there was the boss man, Kevin.

In retrospect, Kevin was a typical 70s stud man (a lethal cross, at least in self-image, between Arthur Fonzerelli, Vinnie Barbarino, and Jake Pliskin) . He apparently was a real swimmer: he could dive well, swim the length of the pool both ways underwater holding his breath, yell really loud at rules breakers, blow his whistle really loud, and act confident in a Speedo, all the time, everyday(Think about THAT!).

The problem was, he was a cocky and a conceited jerk and there was no hiding it. He was no role  model! But we endured him, I suppose, as the females have to humor all boorish jerks, as us underlings in life have to "entertain" those people, male or female, who think that so much of life is about them and that life somehow cannot ever be about you! Do you get this concept? If you don't, you might think twice about your own attitude...

But I digress...(A preachy tangent is always welcome in my book). Well, this IS my book, so...

Has everybody seen the best Bloomington movie ever made, and one of the top sports movies ever, "Breaking Away?" Do you remember the swimmer jerk who beats Dennis Quaid (embittered former high school QB who couldn't make IU. IU!?)Kevin was that spoiled frat guy who had all the girls, just not as strikingly good looking, which gave him an even meaner edge!

But wait ladies and gents, there is a foil here, and we was and always will be...

Jack Nielsen.

No one ever made the name Jack cooler to me than this father of seven, soon to be eight.

Jack was a CES Coordinator by trade. This means he was educated in religion and education, and he covered a good portion of the Church Education System in Indiana, which entails directly teaching classes here and there and also administrating to dozens of others. He was an educator, not well remunerated, originally from Utah, probably a BYU grad (if not, another Utah school with a high LDS presence), furthering his education at Indiana and raising a family of pure women.

That's right: Jack had seven daughters, all of them 12 and under and all of them beautiful, a young man such as my self's dream family. He would have another girl before leaving town, and eventually got a boy on the ninth try(after moving back to Utah).

So what was so great (or tangibly athletic) about him?

One day in the humid, verdant, endless summer dominated by Kevin at the pool, the head honcho, as we would say, (probably an IU college scholarship swimmer, like the jerk in "Breaking Away"), Jack and the girls showed up at the pool. And I was lucky enough to be there.

Something possessed Kevin. Was it jealousy I noted?

"Hey, here's Daaady! He's going to jump off the high dive. What's Daddy gonna' do? Ooh, look, he's a big man!"

Now I have to tell you a little bit about steadfast Mormons: (LDS/BYU/ Church of Jesus Christ, all synonymous, more or less) we wear undergarments that are special and private to us, and we are counseled to keep them on always for safety of body and spirit, for lack of a better phrase. These garments help us remember our identity as followers of God and his commandments. Most of us will take them off when swimming, hooping it up, or participating in any other rigorous sports requiring sleeveless or otherwise inhibiting athletic wear. We believe that these outer reminders will "save" us in the sense that they can help us spiritually and at times physically maintain a higher standard, even save us from harm, moral or otherwise. It is a question of faith and attire, as many religions deal with their own traditions.

When Steve Young was asked for a "60 Minutes" interview if he would wear his during football games, he more or less said, "No, I don't feel that it is appropriate for me to get them all torn and dirty on the field of play." But he always wore them before and after, because he was a member of the steadfast or devoted, openly public about a  personal issue that is potentially no one else's business (like the UNC shorts under Michael's Bulls uniform pants).

And that is is how most Latter-day Saints are when it comes to swimming and other sports. Most Mormons do swim, and we go shirtless, which requires no undergarment in most cases. Same with basketaball jerseys, or in the case of football players like Young they hope that the protection promised from God works despite the temporary removal of the outer garments, sort of like when you get out of a seat belt in a moving car temporarily to insure the safety of your kid in the back seat...(is that a lame comparison?). Just trying to illustrate the point, not belabor it...

But not Jack Nielsen (or Brother Nielson, as most would usually call him).  

Oh, no. Jack, farmer-tan pale and with a short conservative hair cut (think military), would nonchalantly don his dark blue Hawaiian flower print matching top and bottom suit. The shorts were like clamdiggers; they draped well below his knees, because garment bottoms usually extend to the knee.

This guy was unafraid. And unimpeded by prevailing trends or attitudes.

And then there was big-nosed, cocky, Speedo-bulging Kevin and his immaculate swimmer's tan and his long 70s hair to his shoulders. The requisite white skin cream on his schnoz.

"Ooooooohhhh. Daaaady? What is Daddy gonna' do? Is he gonna' go off the high dive?"

He was jealous all right!

What would Brother Nielsen do?

He didn't have to say anything or talk smack.

Jack climbed the three meter bouncy board efficiently. His seven daughters cheered him on. Somewhere on the far concrete was his surprisingly fit wife and the youngest, still dry or in the kiddie pool.

Kevin was killing his boredom, or perhaps sensing a change in atmosphere.

"Oooooohhhhh! Daaaaady! Yeahh! Yah! Yah! Go Daddy. Go Dadeeeeeeee!"

The first one was a simple bounce, straight in feet first.

"Hahaha!Woooooweeeeee! Way to go Daddy!"

The whole world watched his sopping wet top- and-bottom-clad pale skinned, but energetic body pull up the side ladder from the diving well. In the far distance were the tennis courts and trees and sunbathers and joggers and frisbee throwers, some 8 blocks from campus on a sunny summer afternoon. Maybe some of them were watching from a distance. I witnessed this from across the pool, close to the bellowing Kevin and his bevy of gorgeous girl lifeguards. Did they think Kevin was cool? Was he the type of guy to emulate?

Who was I? Who did I want to be? I was just a big "Star Wars" kid, a baseball fan who played Bronco league ball where adults pitched; still afraid of committing, competing and failing in the "real" baseball, little league. I was a Mormon who didn't swear and was supposed to be a good example and stand up for the little guy, defend those who are different. After all, I was different. Jesus was different. But was he cool, after all? Bragging and swearing and being mean and tough were anathema to my beliefs, tempting as they were...

But could a religious guy be fearless and strong? Could an office working religious man, pious to his very swimming suit, be a man to admire?

The next jump was different.

Jack paced himself like a pro.

A couple of majestic steps measured, he bounced the end of the 3 meter board like a real athlete, like I was watching Antwaan Randle El as a sophomore sensation as the IU QB years and generations later, single handedly defeating the visiting Hawkeyes in the fourth quarter.

Like I was watching the most clutch college basketball player I ever saw in person, Jay Edwards, sinking a last second 30-foot plus shot to sink the eventual NCAA champs Michigan Wolverines, 1989.

36,000 arms shot instantaneously in the air that freezing wintry afternoon at Assembly Hall.

And back at Bryan Park pool, it felt like the air was charged with new ions.

Kevin tryed to contain his reaction in prideful stride, still keeping up his composure, macho coolness lost for a blissful moment... Eternity glimpsed for all of us...

Jack Nielson soared up into the moist blue air higher than I've ever seen anyone humanly soar. He did a back flip high above the clouds, because all our eyes were guided to the heavens. And did he dive in head first? Probably. All of it was pure power and grace. A dynamic one a half gainer, or some such impressive dive! (To this day the terms confuse me).

I can't recall all the details. But it was all you would never expect from that unassuming, devoted husband and father. He just smiled upon resurfacing and laughed it off.

No big deal. Happens all the time.

Was all this pure personally inflated hyperbole? Was it only in my head?

I suppose. But not really. Not really, to me: this meant a lot to little Eddie "Star Wars" kid, the only son with older sisters, trying to figure out what was right, who was good, who was heroic. Who do you emulate?

What is a great athlete, if not heroic? Can we separate their feats from their souls?

Can we? Dare we? Is it all simply window dressing?

Kevin was still loud, but he was changed.

"Whoo, Daddy! Hurrah, Daddy!" He meant it.

His voice was changed; his eyes were changed. We are all changed. I saw things a bit clearer then. My insides changed.

Not so much his seven girls and his wife. He was their hero, derring-do or no.

But for those who saw, and for those who remember, for us blessed lucky ones: we were the ones who witnessed a hero.

And yet there are times I forget.

And then I remember: a question is asked,a synapse is tripped, an amazing Michael Vick, or Albert Pujols, Steve Nash, or some other BIG name hero/idol does something to spark the youthful me from my current state of fatherhood and normaldom. And I recall with grace and understatement:

Jack Nielsen might just be my favorite athlete.

I have not seen him for 24 years.

I thank Our Father in Heaven for the afterlife. I'll thank him personally sooner or later.

Brother Nielsen showed a bit of Heaven to me as a young buck. I hope others noticed. 

I am grateful for a chance to relate the tale.

Thanks for being a hero, Jack.