I’ll be honest with you guys. When me and Hatty appeared on Yard Work back in May, I was really down in the dumps. The fans writing in weren’t happy with me, and I wasn’t happy with myself. I played it cool, like I always do, but I was totally bummed.

After the interview, I was supposed to start warming up for my start, but I wasn’t up to it. Instead, I went back to my locker, got out my iPod, and dialed up some Jamiroquai. I sat there in my sweatsocks, grooving to the tunes, and thought about how I was going to make my life better. A lot of baseball players and fans are spiritual people, just like me. In tough times, they look to Jesus or Buddha or Moses for guidance. It doesn’t matter where you go to get your answers, the important thing is that you find what you’re looking for. In these cases, I usually think about my Zen teachings, except this time, the answers weren’t there. It was scary because I had to pitch a couple of hours later — in a nationally televised game, no less — and instead of being focused on getting the Giants’ hitters out, I was focused on my own demons.

I expected the worst from that game, but I got through it. I took the loss but I thought I threw the ball well, giving up only two earned runs in 7.1 innings of work. I don’t know how I did it, because I was spiritually empty that night. How did this happen? At the time, I had no idea.

Since my Yard Work appearance, I’ve gone 8-4 with a 2.36 ERA. Our whole team is playing some amazing ball, and I haven’t pitched this well since winning the Cy Young award in 2002. I feel great, I look great (check out my picture — my clothes and hair are pure snazz) and I’ve regained the confidence I lost after a rough 2004 and beginning of 2005. I owe all this to Yark Work. After I appeared here, all my bad karma disappeared and my season was reborn. Don’t get me wrong — I’m not going to give up Zen and surfing. However, in addition to my existing beliefs, I’ve accepted the positive role that Yard Work has played in my development. For me, this place is a reverse jinx and has brought me nothing but good fortune since I was featured here.

Last week, after we beat the Angels 3-0, a bunch of us decided to party in downtown LA. We were in this wicked bar and I had tons of babes hanging off me. When a guy is giving off so much positive energy, which is what I’ve been doing lately, women can sense it. They love being around that type of guy because they soak up his vibes and it makes them feel good too. Anyhow, women couldn’t get enough of me and that’s when I got to thinking: what would Ben Folds do in this situation? Would he hang around with his buddies getting liquored up with all the hooch he could handle, or would he think more about others and less about himself? The answer was obvious — Ben would sit down at the piano and sing a song with words that came straight from the heart. The act of playing that song would free those words and melodies from his soul so that they could escape into the world. And once that stuff gets out there, man, it’s a gift from Ben’s heart straight to all of our ears, thereby making the entire world just a little bit better.

So that’s what I’m going to do. Yard Work gave me a wonderful gift and I want to give something back to the world. I’m going to make the world better by writing about players and teams around baseball that have been down on their luck and need a dose of positive karma. If all goes well, the powerful vibes from this site will rock their minds and reverse their bad fortune almost instantly, just like what happened with me.
.
.
Al Leiter

Everywhere Al has played, he’s been a winner. It bothers me to see a fellow lefty struggling with his command all year and putting up such disappointing numbers. Al, it wasn’t so long ago that my numbers looked a lot like yours! Now that he’s with the Yankees, he can make a fresh start. The way I see it, Al is pretty much the Dave Matthews of baseball. He put up years of solid work, but 2005 has been a bit rough. Dave’s album “Stand Up” is pretty much a giant stinkbomb, but you’d be silly to think that he’s washed up or that I won’t be seeing his shows in San Fran and Chula Vista next month.

Tampa Bay Devil Rays

When you play on a winning club, it’s your job to beat up on the bad teams. Every time we play the Devil Rays, we feel as though we need to come away with a sweep. Still, I feel sorry for these dudes. They’ve never had a winning season. They live in sunny Florida with all those sandy beaches and hot young ladies in bikinis, but they can’t enjoy that stuff because their manager is uptight and yells at them all the time. The Devil Rays need to head to the beach, take in the surf, and just chill for a week or so. They’d have to forfeit a few games but who cares, they’d probably lose them anyway. Just relax, soak up the Florida sun, and come back refreshed and ready to play. Believe me, man, I’d love to be doing that right now, but we’re in a pennant race.

Keith Foulke

This one is especially tough for me because he’s a former teammate. We used to jam together in my home studio and swap Zeppelin bootlegs on long road trips. I look up to him because he’s got a World Series ring and I don’t (yet). I have no doubt that he’ll be back better than ever, which I kinda hate to admit because we might end up facing him in the playoffs! Foulke’s ERA was around 6.00, but at least he was hurt — I was healthy! Imagine what mine would have been if I had a bad wheel too. Foulke’s one tough dude.

Washington Nationals

These guys used to be miles in front of everyone else in their division. They couldn’t put a foot wrong. Now they’ve lost a million close games in a row and can’t buy a break. Nobody deserves a run of bad luck like that — it just totally gets you down. But the Nationals are some of the nicest guys in the game. They have a lot of Latin players on their club and those guys know how to chill out proper. Jose Guillen gets a bad rap, but he’s totally misunderstood. When he played in SoCal we used to meet up and go to NOFX shows together when we needed to let off some steam. He’s an intense guy and he needs that outlet for his emotions. I don’t think he has a place to do that in Washington.

2002 Cy Young winner Barry Zito makes his next start on Saturday against Detroit.