Last night, C.C. Sabathia finally exorcised the beer leaguer from his Forrest Whitaker-like frame. He struck out 11 and gave up no runs in six innings, whittling his season ERA to a measly 10.12.
It was good timing. On Saturday, Sabathia hosts his long-planned “Slugger Sleepover” at Parma’s Freeway Lanes. Local organizations—including the Berea Children’s Home, Boys and Girls Club, Big Brothers Big Sisters, and the Coalition on Homelessness and Housing—have picked 300 underpriviledged kids between the ages of 10 to 17 to participate in the pajamas-and-sleeping-bags event. ...
"When I was a teenager I remember sleepovers as the time to do some silly crazy stuff but also really get to know my friends and talk about what was going on in our lives," Sabathia said, according to the event’s press release. "That's what we're going to do at my sleepover - a little bowling, some karaoke, some dancing - but also spending some time talking about what's really going on out there in the streets and positive ways to deal with it."
The whole thing might’ve been a little awkward if Sabathia was still mired in crappy pitching. It would’ve ruined the mood if the kids’ questions, instead of dealing with poverty and puberty, were, “C.C., is it a matter of mechanics?,” “Is Carl Willis working with you on your slider?” or, the most likely, “Why you suck but you wanna get paid?”
Sabathia will be joined by the Browns’ Braylon Edwards and up to a dozen other Indians, and plans to be at the alley until midnight. Any later and the talk-radio set will have fodder for a weeks’ worth of ranting—he’s starting against the Yankees at 1:05 PM the next day. – Gus Garcia-Roberts
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