Hungry Like the Wolf: TWTW's 9/2 Tigers @ Royals Preview, or, Why Some Men Refuse to Quit

Danville, Kentucky – In retrospect, my encounter with Randy Wolf seems almost dream-like. It was the winter of ’94. After my ban from Applebee’s, I undertook a nomadic voyage of the American heartland to rediscover my purpose in life. In my ’69 Ford pick-up truck, the open road was in front of me, a cooler full of PBR beside me and a host of irresolvable financial and marital problems behind me. I drove and drove till the familiar landscapes of cornfields and family values were in the rearview mirror, and liberal America lay before me. I visited my Uncle Truman in Bakersfield, California, a lone bastion of working-class values in the sea of leftist nihilism that is the West Coast. My wanderings led me to a nondescript In-N-Out Burger, where I struck a conversation with a young man who I later discovered shared my interest in baseball. This mysterious youngster sat by himself in a booth – it was late, and only lone wolves like myself were eating at this hour. The LA times called this kid the High School pitcher of the year in ’93, and he had a look in his eyes that told me he would one day go onto do great things. I saw a bit of myself in the young man named Randy that I met that day; I saw my work-ethic, my determination, and my hunger for not only bacon cheeseburgers, but also greatness. We sipped Coke and talked about whatever was on our minds – not least of which was the recently implemented NAFTA agreement which would destroy the livelihood of all kinds of folks like my Uncle Truman from Bakersfield.

Later, Randy and I sat in the back of my pickup truck and drank PBR. Folks, I’m overjoyed to learn Mr. Wolf is back in the game. At 39 years old, he has done enough time in the minors and deserves another shot at the big-show. Randy Wolf is every man. Every man who refuses to quit on their dreams; every man tasked with providing for a wife and kids despite the numerous obstacles placed in his path by an overbearing federal government hell-bent on regulation. Last night’s Verlander-Cueto matchup was a duel of aces – tonight, we will watch a game about every man. The ageless Randy Wolf will teach the good people of Kansas City something that not even an odyssey from Danville to Bakersfield can: what America is all about.