• Abstract and Figures
• Public Full-text

For Fisher, Truck Day is best gig of the year By Anthony Castrovince / MLB.com | @castrovince | February 6, 2015 + 24 COMMENTS CLEVELAND -- It's a tough job. Ed Fisher spends more than 300 nights a year on the road as a driver for Andrews Moving & Storage. Day bleeds to night on those 11-hour-at-a-time treks on the American highway system, and life goes on back home without him. He missed Christmas this past year. First time in more than a quarter century that absence proved unavoidable. His wife didn't take it well. But once a year, this specific gig comes along. Load up the truck in the bowels of Progressive Field, drive the Indians' gear to Goodyear, Ariz., usher in the start of Spring Training. It's his favorite route of the year. "To be perfectly frank with you," Fisher said Friday, in the midst of the load-out, "it's one of the only jobs I really enjoy doing anymore. The guys are great, and they make you feel like you're a part of the team. It's comfortable. "... I think they realize that I take pride in my work, just like they take pride in their baseball team." The truck driver has his own overlooked but important role in the Major League universe. His job is both ceremonial and substantial. He's the groundhog who, on an annual basis, doesn't see his shadow. It is a credit to him that spring always arrives on time, come hell or congested traffic patterns. Fisher, 62 and a Tribe fan since birth, has handled the honor for the Indians for each of the last eight seasons. His first year was their last of training in Winter Haven, Fla. That drive would take about a day and a half. The Goodyear trek is 3 1/2 days, provided the weather doesn't get too nasty on Interstate 40 in Oklahoma, north Texas and east New Mexico. "Three years ago, I had to go down through Dallas, because 40 was atrocious," he said. "It's right in that zone where it's either snow or ice or both. And east of Albuquerque, there's a stretch of New Mexico that can get pretty nasty." Gas prices have come down, but the Cleveland-to-Goodyear drive was still set to consume about $1,000 of diesel. Oh, and $32.50 in tolls to cross Oklahoma. Fisher was driving the lead of two Tribe trucks (Steve Neely was behind the wheel for the other). His was the one with the huge Indians decal on the side, making him a target not just for truck-stop vandals but, one surmises, aggressive-driving Tigers, Royals, White Sox and Twins fans. In the back, precious cargo. At least, by baseball standards. Balls and bats and gloves and uniforms and luggage and fitness equipment and more sunflower seeds than you've ever seen in your life. Oh, and Indians manager Terry Francona's red scooter. Can't forget that. This isn't the most interesting stuff Fisher has moved. For the first part of his career, he did household moves. One guy had eight-foot-tall suits of armor on the turns of his staircase. Another was a retired Air Force pilot who had the 400-pound tail section of his plane in the garage. "If people have it," Fisher said, "I've probably moved it." One time, he was on a run for Andrews when he got summoned to Las Vegas. Victoria's Secret's "Angels Across America" tour had wrapped up, and Fisher hauled the runway models' wings back to the company headquarters in Columbus. "They were in a box," he said. "No models attached." Upon arrival in Goodyear, Fisher would have to wait for another assignment, another route to parts as-yet-unknown. "I wasn't home this summer at all," he said. "I was out a little over three months. Then I got home Sept. 10, was home for two days, left again and didn't get back until the 15th of last month. I've been gone a lot." His wife, Patricia, wasn't happy with the Christmas development, as you might imagine. "That was something she was always very insistent about," Fisher said. "We've been married for 23 years. We live in Parma. Well, she lives in Parma; I live in the truck. She puts up with my nonsense." And Ed puts up with whatever the road bears. When he first got called for the Indians job, it was pure happenstance, luck of the draw. Yet he handled it so professionally and worked so diligently at the loading and unloading that they've kept asking him back. "I've become a familiar face," he said with pride. The face -- and the right foot -- that brings us baseball. Truck Day gives Indians fans a sign of spring By Jordan Bastian / MLB.com | @MLBastian | February 6, 2015 + 14 COMMENTS CLEVELAND -- It hardly looked like spring in downtown Cleveland on Friday morning. The combination of bitter cold, a biting wind and piles of snow around Progressive Field made it crystal clear that winter is still very much in full swing at the corner of Carnegie and Ontario. Beneath the ballpark, it was a different story. Workers whipped around corners on vehicles, transporting pallet after pallet of packaged equipment for the start of Indians' Spring Training. Two 53-foot trucks were loaded and prepped for the 2,000-mile journey across the heart of the Midwest and to the team's complex in Goodyear, Ariz. Each year, Truck Day arrives with the feel of a local holiday. "I know it's a big day for Cleveland fans to have a sign of spring coming," said Tony Amato, the Indians' home clubhouse and equipment manager. "With the weather and everything, I think it's great for everyone here." The two trucks, provided by Andrews Moving and Storage, will began their trek on Friday and are expected to pull into Cleveland's Spring Training headquarters by Tuesday night or Wednesday morning. By Wednesday afternoon, Amato expects that the team's clubhouse in Arizona will be fully equipped and functional for the team's players. While a handful of Indians players have already arrived to the Goodyear complex, pitchers and catchers are not required to report to Spring Training until Feb. 18. Position players will follow suit on Feb. 22, leading up to the team's first full-squad workout on Feb. 24. The report date fell later on the calendar than in previous years, giving the team's equipment staff a little extra time to prepare for Friday. Amato said his staff begins the ordering process in October and November, using January and the first week of February to assemble and pack the variety of items heading to Arizona. Loaded onto the trucks this year were more than 30 bikes, 25 sets of golf clubs, 12 pallets of water and one pallet of mustard. Here are some more photos from Truck Day at Progressive Field. Only 2,034 miles to Goodyear. pic.twitter.com/mvvp6wwFLf - Jordan Bastian (@MLBastian) February 6, 2015 Near the end of the loading process, a worker buzzed down the tunnel on the red scooter that belongs to Indians manager Terry Francona. "I know we had over 50-some skids. It's probably a record," Amato said. "It seems like we were really heavy going down this year for some reason. A lot of personal stuff. Big on bikes. And then all the baseball equipment. I think we're fortunate with our facility in Goodyear that a lot of stuff can be shipped right there for the players' needs. We have someone there year-round." Along those lines, the Indians ordered 18,000 baseballs, but those are sent directly to the Goodyear facility. Each player also has 18-24 bats, so the team ordered roughly 600 in total. Many of those were sent to Cleveland, where the clubhouse staff spent time labeling them for the individual players before packing them for the trip. One pallet off to the side had "Kluber" written in black ink on one of the boxes. Pitcher Corey Kluber, who took home the American League Cy Young Award last season, had a highchair among the many items on his skid. Many of the team's players and front-office members send items for their families on the trucks each year. Amato said the strangest item he has shipped to date was a large safe for a member of one of the team's past coaching staffs. "[That] was a little bizarre," Amato said. "There's not anything unique that stands out this year." Andrews Moving, which had its original location beyond the right-field wall of the Indians' League Park decades ago, did make one change this year: one of its trucks included Indians art on the trailer. When the trucks roll into Tigers, White Sox and Royals territory during the trip to Arizona, people will know that Cleveland is coming through. "It's big. It gets the brand out there," Amato said. "It's great for both Andrews and the Indians." Tribe anchored by strong catching duo in Gomes, Perez By Jordan Bastian / MLB.com | @MLBastian | February 4, 2015 + 350 COMMENTS CLEVELAND -- Yan Gomes is not a fan of taking a day off, but he understands that is part of the gig as a starting catcher in the big leagues. During the first half last season, accepting the requisite respite was especially frustrating while Cleveland's backup situation was shaky.

Load more

  6

Copy Link