1964 Orlando Cepeda Topps trading card, although the Cal Tjader song, featuring Vince Guaraldi, was recorded live in San Francisco, in fall, 1958, the slugger’s rookie season.

b/w

Tribelines by Eric Hanson (Nina Simone’s former agent), annotated by The Editor, with a little help from Who’s Who in Baseball, 2014

Tribe not swept since late last summer

Happens here, would be a bummer*

Hopes that we, instead, might sweep

Faded fast when Morse^1 went deep

Sunday it was much the same

For our team, a one-score game

Salazar^2, a healthy start

Offense would not do its part

Cody Allen,^3 ne’er a run

Before this, a trusted gun

Buster P^4, a leadoff double

That would bring us fatal trouble

Walked their Crawford^5 to face Hicks

Wields one of their lighter sticks

But he caught up with one high

Throwing it back in our eye
1. Michael John Morse, of Ft. Lauderdale, FL, born March 22, age 32, R/R, 6’4” 230, 10th year in MLB, .281 lifetime percentage;

2. Daniel Dariel Salazar, of Santa Domingo, Domincan Republic, born January 11, age 24, R/R, 2nd year in MLB, struck out 7 Giants in 7 innings Sunday.

3. Cody Edward Allen, of Orlando FL, born November 20, age 25, R/R, 6’1” 210, 3rd year in the bigs, had 115 Ks in first 100 innings.

4. 2010 NL Rookie of the Year, 2012 NL MVP, Gerald Demp “Buster” Posey, of Leesburg, GA, born March 27, age 27, .308 lifetime b.a.

5. Brandon Michael Crawford, of Mountain View, CA, born January 21, Aquarius, played 149 games at shortstop for Giants in his third year. He had a leadoff double and was driven in my Pedro Sandoval, plus had a walk-off of his own a week before, setting up the decision to pitch to Hicks, who is relatively unknown and unheralded, or was. My original concept was to play on the word “hick” as in Cody went soft on a fellow Southerner, but am not sure if someone born in Orlando is country or not.

* Yet less a bummer than the 1954 World Series, also a Giants sweep over Indians.