Why I Want to Interview Jim Thome

If you follow baseball at all, then you know who Jim Thome is.  Easily a future hall-of-famer, Thome has racked up 604 home runs in a 20-year career—and he’ll be back this year to add a few more, hopefully inching further up the ranks.  Thome is by far one of the best players in the game and can be found in almost every batting record list.  Unfortunately, I’ve never seen him play, though I certainly would like to before he hangs up his cleats.  I almost bought tickets last season to his return game in Cleveland months before there were even the slightest of rumours of the Tribe trying to trade for him; had I known that was going to happen then I for sure would have snatched up those tickets.  The fact that Thome is such an amazing ballplayer is more than enough to want to interview him or even just talk to him for a few short moments.  That’s not the main reason why I want to talk to him though. 

After watching Moneyball last fall on opening night (my friend and I were the only people in the theatre under the age of 40), I was immediately inspired to write some kind of baseball story.  It only made sense that I would eventually write something about baseball, fusing two of my favourite passions.  I mulled on the idea for a few days, trying to decide on the right plot.  At first I thought about Ubaldo Jimenez who had recently been traded to the Indians by the Colorado Rockies, the only team for which he had ever played, in exchange for a handful of young players, including two of the Indians’ top pitching prospects.  I wondered what it must be like to spend an entire career with one team and then all of sudden, without any real warning, be traded to another team.  That’s a pretty life-altering thing.  But then I started thinking about Jim Thome who had just rejoined his original club, the Cleveland Indians, about a month prior.  What must it feel like to come back to a team where you spent the first half of your career, I wondered.  On top of that, when Thome left Cleveland, he faced backlash comparable to that of Lebron James.  Thome was after the same thing as James: he wanted that championship ring and knew it wasn’t going to come in Cleveland.  Not only was Thome coming back to his old team, but also to a city which he essentially betrayed.  Thome, though, was welcomed back to Cleveland with open arms, which I somehow doubt Lebron could ever get.  There has to be a lot of emotions there.  So that is what I wrote.

I wrote it fairly quickly (maybe even in one sitting—I can’t remember) and it isn’t very long, but “You Can’t Help But Be Romantic (About Baseball)” is probably one of my favourite things I have written (the title comes from a quote in Moneyball).  It’s a pretty simple short story, but I like it, and so have a lot of people who have read it.  It’s written in the first person and is a reflection of a five-tool Major League ballplayer who has rejoined his old club after having left for another team and the emotions he feels.  He concludes by saying that even though his fans felt betrayed, they had no right to judge him for doing what he felt was right for him and that only God can judge him.  I loved this story so much that I quickly decided that I wanted to expand on it, exploring the ballplayer’s entire career, from discovering little league in 7^th grade up until his retirement from professional ball.  Thome’s career has often times been described as being “storybook”, and I thought I might just try to write that story.

I want to interview Jim Thome to ensure that I get it all right, even if it is fictionalized.  I’m young, and only a recent fan, so I didn’t get the joy of watching Thome play in his prime in the ‘90s, coming within inches of helping the Indians win a World Series.  I would love to hear those stories straight from the source, find out the most significant moments in his career, so I can write the best novel possible.  With Thome’s help, I know I can write what will be the next great American novel.