It's the dramatic, heart-rending vignette recreated dozens of times in Florida and Arizona near the end of every Spring Training, as it again will be in a couple of months.
A not-so-youngster with a number in the 80s on his uniform is called into the manager's office, and minutes later emerges with slumped shoulders after hearing he is being reassigned to Minor League camp -- again.
For many dedicated Minor Leaguers, the hope brought by spring repeatedly unravels into disappointment. The bus rides never end, even as the love of the game endures. The Majors are the object of their desire, doomed again to be an unrequited love.
There is a flip-side to the devotion, and it is the warm welcome always given someone who does reach The Show after an extended run in the shadows. His first at-bat or first pitch elicits inordinate cheers from fans, who get it.
The happy ending does happen.
Maury Wills beat the bushes for nine years and 1,100 games before stealing into the spotlight with the Dodgers in the early '60s. Chris Coste squatted in the Minors for a dozen years before surfacing as a key role player for the Phillies in 2006. Bengie Molina, another backstop, caught seven years in the Minors before getting a chance to do it for the Angels in 2000.
Only last season, Garrett Jones blew into Pittsburgh like a breath of fresh air ... air which had been circulating since 1999, when the 28-year-old outfielder had taken his first of 4,187 trips to a Minor League plate.
Just as does the heartbreak, the redemption happens all the time. The promise of that is what draws back the hopeful spring after spring.
"Opportunities are fleeting in this game and you never know when one might hit you over the head," outfielder John Gall had said last year while spinning through his 10th Minor League season, his sixth consecutive at the Triple-A level. "That's why I continue to play."
It is the lure of hearing what Rico Washington got to hear at the end of Spring Training in 2008, after 1,200 Minor League games: When the Cardinals went north, he'd be going with them.
"I thought I was going back to the Minors," Washington said. "I was just so stunned and I was very emotional. I didn't know what to say. It took me a minute to let it sink in. The day finally came and my dream finally came true. I was going to be in the big leagues for the first time."
Or the chance to leave a good impression that leads to getting the midseason phone call that Alan Zinter got in 2002, in the middle of his 14th professional season, calling him to the Astros after 5,000 Minor League at-bats.
"When they told me, I went totally numb. It definitely made the wait worth it," said Zinter, now a coach in the D-backs organization after a 19-year playing career of 6,556 at-bats in the Minors and 78 in the Majors.
Whose life pursuit will be rewarded in the coming months? Who will realize dreams first dreamt on bunk-bed pillows? The Spring Training camps opening this month will be overrun with candidates, both logical and not, both roster and non.
Will it be Maxim St. Pierre, the 30-year-old French-Canadian catcher who will be in Tigers camp for the seventh time and has spent 13 years in the Minors and not a single day in the Majors?
Will it be Jon Weber, the 32-year-old outfielder who goes to the Yankees' camp as a Durham Bull legend and with 3,974 Minor League at-bats across 11 seasons and nary a Major League swing?
Or John Lindsey, the 33-year-old infielder who will chase his first big league day in the Dodgers' camp after 15 years, 1,463 games and 5,186 at-bats in the Minors? Or Texas' Kevin Richardson, the 29-year-old catcher who has logged 1,933 at-bats in the Minors -- and six in the Majors? Or 31-year-old Houston catcher Brian Esposito, who has caught 610 games in the Minors and one inning in the Majors? Or the Phillies' Freddy Guzman, 443 stolen bases in the Minors and only a few stolen moments in the Majors?
Or how about the thirtysomething Mets duo of Val Pascucci and Mike Hessman with 2,680 games and 504 homers in the Minors -- and 230 at-bats in the Majors -- between them?
Or on and on, lined up at the door, hoping to find it at least slightly ajar. Looking for the slimmest encouragement, the weakest excuse for not relenting to long odds as old as Wrigley Field dirt.
Hessman can hear an eerie historical echo from Joe Bauman, who in 1954 slugged 72 homers for the Roswell Rockets -- the professional record broken in 2001 by Barry Bonds. In eight Minor League seasons, Bauman smashed 334 home runs and never saw the inside of a Major League clubhouse, and understood.
Reflecting once in The Los Angeles Times, Bauman, who passed away in 2005, said, "We knew most of us would never get to the big leagues. Some were bitter, some were philosophical and accepted it, using the Minor Leagues to get into doors that might have been closed otherwise."
Often, the big-league door stays shut. Scott McClain achieved a bittersweet pinnacle in 2008, becoming the only active Minor Leaguer with 1,000 runs and 1,000 RBIs -- and in 2009 was back in the Pacific Coast League, on the 20th anniversary of his first Minor League season.
"You hit enough to stay around for a long time time in the Minors, but not enough to stay up in the Majors. It's always the goal, every year. It's the reason why I sign back, to find a spot in the big leagues," said McClain, who did give up the ghost last spring after a month in Triple-A Fresno, returning to Japan, where he had earlier spent four years.
Often, a delayed breakthrough isn't a means to an end, but the end itself.
After reaching the destination of his 12-year odyssey, Washington shortly hung 'em up. Fulfillment quickly pulled the plug on a lot of careers, but no one's long tease came to a more instructive end than that of Glenn Williams.
And the lesson: Pursue the glow, and bask in it when it lets you in, because it can be fleeting.
The Australian Williams signed with the Braves as a 16-year-old in 1993, and for the next 12 years beat the American bushes -- a thousand games, four thousand at-bats, countless miles.
Then, a couple of months into the 2005 season, his latest organization lost its third baseman. So the Minnesota Twins paged Williams.
"To finally be able to get the opportunity after a lot of years of hard work ... It's good to be able to have some positive stuff coming out of my career for once," Williams had said. "I've always kind of said that I wasn't going to settle for being just a Triple-A baseball player."
His long-delayed arrival was dramatic. Record-tying, in fact: Williams matched a Major League record by hitting safely in his first 13 games, batting .425 (17-for-40).
Seconds after the record-tying hit on June 28, 2005, Williams had to dive back into first to beat a pickoff toss -- and separated his shoulder, never to be seen again in the Majors.
But he was seen. He had gotten there. The rainbow again awaits, on the horizon of Florida palms and Arizona dunes.
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