“Let’s cut their dicks off and bury ‘em!”

Those were Steve Yeager’s words, just moments before our first game at Dodgers baseball fantasy camp. Our team is warming up, adjusting our batting gloves and stretching our old, tired muscles.

Yeager, the former Dodgers catcher and 1981 World Series MVP, as famous for his late-night partying as his cannon arm, is sitting on the bench watching the other team take infield practice.

“Look at these fuckers,” Yeager tells us, eyeing our opponents through his aviator sunglasses. “Let’s beat their dicks into the ground.”

Yeager does not mince words. He does not beat around the bush. He yells. He curses. He vocally throttles you. Yeager tells you exactly what he is thinking and if you can’t take it, or you whine, or you have a weak excuse, you are, I’m sorry to say, a pussy.

Yeager is our coach, our skipper. His team? Twelve hobbling men of varying ages and baseball talent who have spent a lot of money so that we can pretend — at least for one week — that we are major league ballplayers.

We are pretending, to be more exact, that we are Los Angeles Dodgers.

DODGERTOWN

For one week, more than 100 men attended fantasy camp in Dodgertown, Florida, the Vero Beach spring training home to the real major league ballclub. We played seven “real” baseball games, met dozens of former players from Brooklyn and LA, and lived in the very same camp where prospects and major leaguers live during spring training.

The camp I attended was the 50th fantasy camp and was supposed to be the last incarnation before the Dodgers moved their spring home to Arizona next year (though that may now be delayed). I attended with my best friend Blue and his dad, Big Papa), both of whom went in 2006 and convinced me that if I saved just $200 a month for two years I could afford to go.

Dodgertown is a sprawling campus that sports five baseball diamonds and is home to Holman Stadium, where the Dodgers play their spring training games. Attending camp there can be an insular experience since those of us without Blackberries can effectively feel cut off from the rest of the world (what’s this I hear about an election?).

We arrived early for Sunday’s optional workout. After a 2-hour drive from the Orlando Airport, we decided to walk around the campus that first night. All the roads are named after Dodger greats (Sandy Koufax Drive, Vin Scully Way) and were illuminated by giant light fixtures molded in the shape of baseballs.

I noticed our rooms were by the tennis courts and optimistically declared: “Hey, this is great, we can play some tennis while we’re here.”

Blue and Big Papa rolled their eyes.

“Just wait,” Blue replied, “you won’t feel like playing too much tennis once you start playing baseball.”

And he was right. The week would prove to be one of the most physically punishing weeks of my life (outside of trying to stop bullies from giving me atomic wedgies for wearing Voltron PJs when I was 10 at sleepaway camp). We were in the training room every day getting ice packs on our joints, Icy/Hot rubdowns, treatment for our blisters, and using their whirlpools, which had two settings: freezing and scalding.

By the time the week was up, we felt so depleted and drained, nursing our aches and pains, that Blue and I started stealing golf carts to get around the camp rather than perform the arduous task of walking.

But it would also be one of the greatest experiences of my life.

DAY ONE

The first Monday, our first full day, started with the rookies (about 70% of the campers) taking part in batting/fielding/pitching/drills.

We dressed in our home white jerseys. It took me some time to figure out how to put on a baseball uniform since I hadn’t done it in years. This proved highly comical since many of us found ourselves in the locker room asking whether to put our jock straps under or over our underwear. Sliding shorts? It would have been easier at that moment to flirt with Natalie Portman than to yank those tight thigh-huggers over my legs.

By the time we were finished dressing, I was exhausted and needed another shower.

My group started at the batting cages, where I began the task of deprogramming a swing corrupted by years of playing softball on the Mall. I took my first cuts and dozens of campers looked on. I popped up or fouled back nearly every pitch I saw. But as I kept at it, I started to hit the ball more solidly and felt better about my swing.

Still, I felt out of sync, like I had a hundred small parts all acting independently of each other. My grip was too tight. My balance was off. My stride was too long. I wasn’t watching the ball all the way in to the bat. Shit, is that Reggie Smith laughing at me?

The next set of drills was pitching and catching. A former catcher, I had resolved to try the position again and quickly remembered why I loved it so much. I caught a pitcher named Ken who would later in the week beat us in a crucial game.

I relearned the crouch, settling behind the plate by the “strings area”, where countless former Dodger greats learned how to pitch. As I caught pitch after pitch, Travis Barbary came over and told me I had good form and showed me how to keep my balance. A few minutes later, I approached Jeff Torborg, the man who caught Sandy Koufax’s perfect game in 1965, and listened intently as he explained where to stand on a relay from right field.

I was in heaven.

The last drills of the morning were the infield/outfield drills. I ran out to shortstop and took some ground balls while Maury Wills, one of the all-time Dodger greats who changed the way the game was played in the 1960s, showed me how to better pivot on a double play.

Afterwards, Rick Monday gave us instruction on fly balls. After a few pop-ups, I went to my spot to catch the next one when Monday decided that they had been too easy. He instructed Garey Ingram, who had been feeding the balls into a pitching machine aimed straight up in the air, to angle them higher and farther.

Almost without warning, he launched the highest fly ball I had ever seen straight above my head. I ran back and to my right, hoping I wouldn’t trip over my cleats let alone miss the fly ball. It carried in the wind further and further behind me. I kept my feet under me and as I saw the ball come down, I reached out with my glove and snared it — not just to my surprise but to that of Rick Monday’s.

“Atta boy!” he shouted as the campers cheered.

We all hustled back into the clubhouse for lunch.

FIRST GAME

During lunch, they posted the team rosters on the wall. Blue, Big Papa, and I were drafted on to the San Bernardino team (there were eight teams, each named after a city where the Dodgers or their minor league clubs played) coached by Steve Yeager and John Shoemaker.

Many of the veteran campers laughed when I told them I was on Yeager’s team. Yeager had a reputation for being tough on his players. “You just wait,” one camper warned me.

I had met Yeager 16 years ago when I was in my last year of Little League. He had come to our ballpark to sign autographs. Before leaving for fantasy camp, I fished out the photo I remembered had been taken of him with my teammate and me. One night, I showed it to Yeager.

He looked at it for a minute, asked how long ago it had been, signed it, and gave it back to me.

We changed in our road gray uniforms and went to Field 1. When I looked around at our team for the first time I quietly thought to myself, We’re going to suck.

We took some batting and fielding practice and then started our first game, facing the Ogden team led by Maury Wills. It was instructional pitch, so I knew I’d get a healthy dose of fastball strikes to look at.

Yeager batted me fifth and I came up in the first inning. I swung at the first pitch.

How many times had I been told never to swing at the first pitch? The ball sailed into left field and luckily bounced in front of the left fielder as I took the turn at first base.

One-for-one, I thought to myself. Batting a thousand.

The game was a seesaw battle as we exchanged leads with Ogden nearly every inning. I caught 4 innings and played shortstop the final two. In the ninth, I made what many considered to be the play of the day.

We had an 11-8 lead with a man on first and no outs. Everyone was tired and were looking to just get the last three outs before hitting the showers.

I was playing shortstop when an Ogden player smacked a hard liner to my right. I bounded to the hole and reached out, snaring the liner in my glove. I noticed that the man on first had started running toward second base and had stopped dead in his tracks. I wheeled around and fired the ball to first as he scrambled back. The ball got there a split second before he did and I doubled him up.

We got the final out easily and Bookie, our first baseman, handed me the game ball and said, “You deserve this.”

I ended the game 2 for 5 and overall felt good about my play. Blue did well, too, going 2 for 3 and playing second base. We were 1-0 and the team had played much better than I expected, batting 23 for 50 collectively and playing solid defense.

After the game, Blue and I went to the campus bar, where they showed the game we had just played game on the big screen. We got to watch ourselves bat and, I have to admit, I swelled with pride when I watched myself make a good play on TV.

DAY TWO

Blue and I woke up at 6:30 am. “This is not a vacation,” Blue said as he groggily walked to the shower. “It’s fun, but it is not a vacation.”

We played the Torborg-led Los Angeles team in the morning game and beat them 12-9 at Holman Stadium. Though Dodgertown has five fields, Holman is where the Dodger actually play all their spring training games. There is something magical about stepping into the batter’s box and seeing your uniform number displayed on the scoreboard beyond center field.

I got a hit in each of my first two at-bats, finished 2 for 3, and caught the entire game. Having been a catcher in Little League, I had forgotten how much fun it is to play that position, facing your entire team, touching the ball more than anyone, being the General of your defense.

At one point, on a pop-up behind the plate, I tore off my mask and made a tough play, saving the foul ball from hitting umpire Dutch Rennert by spearing it above his head. He thanked me and I patted his noggin, much to the amusement of my team.

My biggest thrill, though, came at the end of the game when we lined up to shake hands. Torborg, the last man in line, saw me, grabbed both of my shoulders, and said, “Hey, you catch a really good game.”

Holy shit, I thought to myself, the man who caught Sandy Koufax’s perfect game just told me that I catch a good game! I was elated. I was also stupefied as all I could muster was a sheepish smile and a “Thanks.”

There must have been a letdown from that morning game because in the afternoon contest, we really stunk, losing 9-4 to a Brooklyn team that would finish 2-5. I didn’t hit the ball out of the infield and, playing third base, managed to make two errors, including making an ill-advised throw to first on a soft grounder that sailed over Bookie’s head.

As I threw it, I knew it was the wrong decision. So did Yeager, who screamed from the dugout, “What the fuck!”

Dinner tasted a bit worse that night as I couldn’t get over the loss that dropped us to 2-1.

“Blue,” I told my friend, “I just can’t shake this loss.”

“Don’t be so serious,” he advised me, “it’s just one game.”

I have always been too competitive, especially in baseball. When I was young, I would throw bats and helmets when things didn’t go my way, unable to get over my bad mood.

Yeager, a passionate player, was the right man to manage our team. He made us play tougher than any of us really were. We wanted to play for him. We wanted to win for him.

After showering, we headed to the bar. I talked with Ken, the pitcher who had hamstrung us, over a few beers. We made jokes. I started to feel better. By the time dinner came around, and I heard former Dodgers tell us some amazing stories about their time playing ball, I felt better.

DAY THREE

I woke up with Yeager’s “What the fuck!” still ringing in my head. I had dreamed that night that Yeager had told me to grab my catcher’s gear and get behind the plate, only to find I was naked and couldn’t find my uniform.

The morning game was, I felt, instrumental to how we would play the rest of the week. I told Smoke that this game would show us what kind of character we had and to see how we would react after a bad loss.

Of all the great things about going to Dodgertown — playing real baseball games, meeting Dodger greats, playing on the same fields where the major league ballclub plays — something I did not consider was the camaraderie there would be between the players.

It is difficult to explain the bonding that goes on between a bunch of guys from different backgrounds who all share one huge thing in common: the love of baseball and the Dodgers.

My team, San Bernardino, was loaded with some truly great guys. Bookie, who played first all week despite losing sensation in his left fingers; Smoke, our de facto captain who had the locker next to me and was arguably the most complete player in camp; Druck, a 62-year-old dude who played like he was 22; GT, who led our team in hits and was always propping us up.

Jock, the workhorse pitcher who would be our MVP is there was a team award; Simon, a camp veteran; Z, Smoke’s dad who was our most passionate player, and the B Brothers, who proved you can play on hobbled legs.

Even in the locker room, guys busted each other’s balls, shared our successes, and ridiculed each other’s often comical misfortune.

The instructors would also get into the act. They would curse and yell along with the campers, talk about their own exploits, and autograph all of our memorabilia.

When I asked Rick Monday before the first game for some advice being on Yeager’s team, he said, “Two words: ear plugs.” When one of the B Brothers got a hit off Jerry Reuss in the Big Game, where the campers play the instructors at Holman Stadium, Duke Snider told him, “So? Thousands of other guys have, too.”

One morning, Ralph Branca had everyone in hysterics as he walked around the locker room naked yelling, “Who stole my pants?” It reminded me of the time Seinfeld’s dad was in the doctor’s office after he thought he had been robbed, running around screaming, “My wallet’s gone! My wallet’s gone!”

The game against Jacksonville started poorly as we couldn’t hit or field. Yeager told us we were pressing too hard and he was right. Sure, this was supposed to be fun, but damn it, we wanted to win.

We were down 7-1 early but started to chip away at the lead. Going into the 9th inning, we were down 7-4 and somehow scored three runs to tie it. With a man on third and two outs, Blue came up to bat with a chance to be the hero.

He hit a laser to left. We all got up and started to run in jubilation. The shortstop, though, had other plans. He extended himself to his right, went airborne, and backhanded the line drive that would have given us the win. It would end up as the Play of the Day.

After Jacksonville failed to score in the top of the 10th, we got a man on second with one out. Big Papa, who hadn’t gotten a hit all week until this game, hit a flare to right and we scored the game-winner on a close play at the plate.

We all rushed the field and hugged Big Papa like he had just won the World Series for us. We knew we hadn’t, but we didn’t care. We then went on to win the afternoon game 22-8 against a wild Gulf Coast pitching staff, pushing across nearly two dozen runs on only six hits.

We were now 4-1 and feeling like we had a shot at the pennant.

DAY FOUR

After playing four games in two days, everyone on the team was thankful to play just one game the next day. But it wouldn’t be easy.

We faced off against Las Vegas, led by Jerry Reuss, the only undefeated team at the top of the standings with a 5-0 record. It was a low-scoring game but perhaps our most complete game of the week.

We fielded like Gold Glovers, manufactured runs like the National Leaguers we represented, and Jock pitched 9 incredible innings to earn the 5-3 win. Now at 5-1 and in a three-way tie for first, we would be playing the next day against Midland, also at 5-1.

In the afternoon, though, we had the Big Game, where the campers play the instructors. Every camper got to bat once and take the field for two innings (8 teams and 16 innings made for a long game).

Before coming to the plate, I watched as two of my teammates struck out against Jerry Reuss, the big lefty who won 220 games in his career. With the entire camp watching, sitting in the stands at Holman Stadium alongside their invited friends and family, all I could think about was, Don’t strike out.

If you have ever played baseball, you know this is not the way to approach an at-bat. You should visualize the at-bat but never think while at the plate. You should consider how the pitcher might work the count and mix his pitches, but never get your brain involved. It’s a delicate balance.

I walked to the plate and tried to empty my head. I figured Reuss would want to avoid a walk and feed me a steady diet of strikes, so I didn’t think about how a hard-thrown pitch at my head could kill me.

His first pitch was over the plate and I batted it foul down the third-base line.

“There you go, you’ve seen it now, whadya say, whadya say?” shouted my teammates, encouraging me to battle a man who struck out more than 1,900 batters in his 22-year career.

On the second pitch, I swung and missed.

OK, he’s got you 0-2, I thought. He’ll probably try to get you to chase one outside. Look for the curveball.

Sure enough, Reuss tossed a breaking ball that floated outside of the plate for ball one. It was now 1-2, and I knew I’d get a fastball.

I adjusted my batting gloves, got comfortable in the box, and shifted my weight to my back leg. Fastball. Down the middle. I swung and hit the ball high and far into centerfield. In a campers’ game, it would have landed for a base hit. But in a campers’ game, Rick Monday wouldn’t be playing centerfield.

Monday got under it, caught it, and tossed it back to the infield just like it was one of the 3,978 putouts he made in his career. I trotted back to the dugout amid cheers from the other campers.

I had never been so happy to fly out.

DAY FIVE

Whenever a major league player goes down with an injury, I always bitch and moan about his inability to stay healthy.

Really, I thought before attending this camp, how tough can it be to not get injured in baseball? You bat four times a game, make a couple of plays in the field, and then go into the clubhouse for a beer and massage.

Now I see I was wrong.

Baseball is much tougher on your body than you think. Everyday, campers would go down with injuries — usually their hamstrings but also dozens of cases of bruises, strains, pulls, tears, and broken bones.

The human body is just not meant to do the things it does in a baseball game. A pitch is nothing more than an effective way of tearing apart the tendons in your elbow.

One guy, during the optional workout on Sunday, broke his left hand in the batting cages when a ball hit his bat and ricocheted onto his hand, ending his time at camp.

As the week bore on, my body started to betray me. Every morning I woke up in pain as I felt every grueling minute of my 32 years. I could only imagine how the older campers were feeling.

Blue and I started taking our time walking to dinner everynight, nursing our legs and whining about where we ached.

Sometimes, it seemed like baseball just added insult to injury.

In the last game, playing Midland for the pennant, we were the walking wounded. We looked like the soldiers from The Things They Carried, barely able to toss the ball around or run out a groundball. Even our pinch runners needed pinch runners.

Playing more aggressively, I started the game with a blooper to left. My second time up, I hit a rocket down the left-field line for a double that might have been more bases if the left fielder hadn’t run down the ball so quickly.

I walked my next time up and had also been pinch-running for our more hobbled players. Running around the bases all day, and all week, had finally started to take its toll.

My legs started to feel like they were being squeezed in a vise. Running was killing me but I promised myself I would keep going as hard as possible until the game was over.

Jogging in from center at the end of the 5th inning, Blue noticed my physical anguish. “How are you feeling?” he asked me when he saw me touching my left leg.

“It hurts,” I told him, trying to focus on my upcoming at bat rather than dwell on the dull pain in my thigh.

The pitcher must have heard me. My next time up to bat, on a 1-1 pitch, he threw a 70-MPH fastball. Directly at my left leg, smacking me in the very spot I hurt the most.

I fell to the ground like a bag of coal, gripping my leg and wondering if I would ever play the piano again. I actually started to enjoy the time off my feet while Possum, the trainer, and the umpire checked to make sure I was OK. Yeager finally came down the third base line, looked at me, and declared, “He’s fine” as he grabbed my hand and lifted me onto my feet.

To prove the point that I was OK, I ran down to first base, masking the pain I felt with every step. The pitcher waved his hand apologetically to me to indicate the pitch hadn’t been on purpose and I tipped my hat.

We had given up 7 runs in the first and though we made a late charge to get the score to 10-9 in the eighth inning, we ultimately lost the game, and the pennant, 13-10.

Yeager told us after the game how proud he was of us, how much we battled and that we never gave up on any of the games we played. We believed him.

That afternoon, Blue and I watched the Pop-Up and the Hitting Contests. I couldn’t participate and chose to relax, drink a few beers, and watch much healthier players compete.

That evening, the final dinner of lobster tail and filet mignon, was also the Awards Night.

Jeff Torborg, the man whose comments had meant so much to me earlier in the week, went to the podium to present the Pee Wee Reese Award, given to the best hustler in camp and named after the former Dodgers shortstop and team captain.

As he began to speak, he mentioned how early on in the week, some “kid” had come up to him during the catching/pitching drills and told him, “I can catch.”

Yeager, sitting behind me, smacked my right shoulder.

I wish I could remember the rest of Torborg’s words because a few seconds afterward, I was in for the shock of my life. Saying something about how well I played catcher, how much heart I had, Torborg uttered my name and told me to come up. The room broke into applause as my team stood up, cheering me on and giving me high fives as I walked up to receive my award.

Torborg handed me the plaque and I smiled, this time turning to him and saying, “Thank you so much, I can’t tell you how much this means to me.”

I think that’s what I said, anyway. The entire sequence has become a blur. In any case, I know I was thinking it.

CONCLUSION

Blue, Big Papa, and the rest of my team and the camp spent that last night at the bar rehashing all the games, laughing at botched errors and reveling in triumphant moments.

The next day, Blue and I toured the now-empty Dodgertown one last time. We walked to Holman Stadium and talked about our games there. We admired Field 2 and I thought about our win over Las Vegas. We went by the pitching strings area and I thought about Torborg, Barbury, and everyone else who told me I could catch.

I had ended the week batting .522 (12 for 23). Blue had officially batted .333 (7 for 21) but was deprived of a hit when a baserunner (me) ran back to second on a line drive instead of going to third, turning Blue’s hit into a fielder’s choice and robbing him of a .381 batting average. Sorry, buddy.

I thought about the words of Carl Erskine, the former Brooklyn and LA Dodgers pitcher who went 122-78 in his career, and who had told us that final night to savor the week, to enjoy the moments, because no one back home, unless they’ve been to fantasy camp, will understand how important it was for us to play pretend.

I just wish I could pretend a little bit longer.