Roberta Tipitina looked at the printed copy of the email again. Really? she thought. This is how you want to run this club? This is how you want to work with me? Damnit, Slummings, I deserve better!
She wadded the paper as tightly as she could and tossed it across the room. It landed just shy of the recycle bin in the corner of the Yuma Arroyo’s Front Office. Let it lie there, she thought. That’s the kind of response it deserves.
To shake off the anger spawned by the email, Roberta left the GM’s office—her office, since the retirement of long-term GM Swanfeld—and headed out into the Yuma sun. Even though it was early November, the sun was warm, the sky blue, and the sound of balls slapping into gloves wafted over the stadium walls to where she ambled along the edge of the Colorado River. The city’s Winter Youth League was about to begin, and though they played their games on the city’s high school ball fields, Opening Ceremonies and the first game of the season were played in the Arroyo’s Salt Lick Stadium.
The sounds of baseball calmed her, and she walked through the main concourse and out into the stands behind home plate to sit for a minute and watch the youngsters warm up.
Back in the Front Office, her assistant Denise returned from her morning tea break and found the wadded paper on the floor. She picked it up, smoothed it out, and, stepping inside the GM’s office, set it on Roberta’s desk. Then she returned to scheduling interviews with candidates for the various coaching jobs vacated by retiring personnel.
When Roberta returned to the office, she found the uncrumpled email and started to yell, Who did this? But she took a deep breath and reconsidered. Maybe, she thought, there’s another way to handle this. She picked up the phone and dialed.
“Taffy here, what is it, Roberta?”
“You’re not in jail, right?”
He laughed. “No no, haven’t seen the inside of … well, uh, it’s been a while now. House arrest. Very comfy, just, uh, y’know, like, uh, limited.”
“Which means you’re busy with team business, right?”
“Yeah, ‘course. Just sent you next season’s budget. You get that?”
“Yes, that arrived by email just after this …,” she read the title off the crumpled email, “Review of Season Goals.”
“What?” Slummings asked.
“A Review of Season Goals. You sent that, right?”
“Review? No, I don’t know what that is.”
“Got your name at the bottom of the page.”
“What? Really? What is it? What’s it say?”
Roberta read from the crumpled email.
“That doesn’t sound like me. What magazine?”I was reading a magazine that mentioned the team’s disappointing performance this year.
A performance like we had this year brings down the team’s reputation.
“Doesn’t say. What magazines do you read?”
“Me? Magazines? Used to read Playboy but then that got like … Never mind. I don’t read magazines, unless I’m like standing in line in the grocery store.”
“How can a record essentially the same as last season ‘bring down the team’s reputation’? Our reputation is that we’re cellar dwellers. How can we bring that down any further?”
“I don’t know, Roberta, I don’t know what to say to you. I didn’t send that. I don’t even think like that. Maybe one of them chatty robots wrote it.”
“Chatty robots?” Roberta couldn’t help smiling. “You mean ChatGPT?”
“Is that like a robot?”
“A chatbot, yeah. Simulates human language and speech.”
“Can it write a memo, or whatever that is?”
“Yup. Can do.”
“So maybe …”
“Taffy, someone still has to command the chatbot to write such a thing. Did you do that? Tell someone to send a review of goals?”
“Me? No, why would I?”
“So why’s your name on the bottom?”
“Did I sign it?”
“No, just a typed name.”
“Then I didn’t send it. And I sure as hell didn’t order anyone else, because who else is there to order? I’m under house arrest. The only people I see are the officers guarding me and the delivery girl with the groceries.”
“It’s a mystery then.”
“Yeah, I guess.” Slummings was quiet. Roberta waited. “What else’s it say?” Slummings finally asked.
“It says, ‘We need to get back to winning ways sooner rather than later.’”
Slummings laughed. Roberta chuckled too.
“Ludicrous, huh?” Roberta had to agree. “Winning ways? When have we ever had winning ways?”
“Oh, back in 2020 when we played in the championship,” Roberta said. “And a couple seasons after that, if I remember correctly. We didn’t become the perennial doormat of the league until ’25 or ’26, I think. And since then …”
“Yeah, since then …”
“‘A paragon of consistency,’ as one journalist put it.”
“Yeah, wow, that’s like …” Slummings couldn’t finish the sentence.
“So who can remember our winning ways way back then?”
“Not me. I wasn’t here.”
“I was, but it’s so long ago …”
“Yeah.”
“Yeah.”
“Roberta?”
“Yes?”
“Did the email come from me? I mean, from my email account?”
“Good question, let me check.” She brought the screen of her computer back to life, found the email and clicked on it. “No, it isn’t.”
“Who from then?”
“Some email address ending in @PEBA.com.”
“That’s spooky,” Slummings said, then added, “Let me contact the other owners and see what’s up. See if they got one of these … uh, what’d you say it was?”
“Review of Season Goals.”
“Got it. Anything else in it besides the, uh, y’know?”
“Plenty. An insulting comment about not understanding your request to improve the—quote—‘pathetic Runs Scored’—unquote.”
“I never said that. I don’t understand any of them new fangled stats. That it?”
“No. I’m also accused of alienating foreign fans by not bringing in international players.”
“Foreign fans? We got any of those?”
“Only if you consider Mexican immigrants to be foreigners. And we have plenty of Latinos in our organization.”
“Yeah, that don’t make no sense a’tall. What else?”
“It closes with a threat to fire me if I don’t ‘step up’ my game.”
“Fire you? That’s whacko! I’d never fire you—well, maybe I’d be forced to fire you if you like went and committed yourself to a mental institution …”
They both laughed at that.
“Right,” Roberta said, “I’m gonna follow in HIS footsteps!”
“Okay,” Slummings said when he stopped laughing, “I’ll ask some of the other owners about this and then I’ll like check with the Commish’s office. Maybe someone knows who is putting out these insults. I’ll get back to you.”
“Thanks, Taffy, I was worried that maybe …”
“It ain’t me, Roberta. I’d never. You know that.”
Roberta slumped in her chair. The tension was gone. The sound of players being introduced over the stadium PA system leaked into the office. It was a comforting sound, the sound of business, the sound of baseball. But she couldn’t help wondering, Who the hell sent such an email?