February 23, 2007

After much optimism, my Jack Cust story is now circling the drain.

It's frustrating, because I've put a lot of work into this, probably more work than I put into some of my "regular" Atlantic League and Eastern League pieces. That probably has a lot to do with this being the first story I've ever actually been assigned -- I can generally decide what I want to write about on my own in my regular beats.

So, I obviously want to prove to my boss that he picked the right guy for the story, and right now I'm not so sure that's the case.

The story is still missing quotes from Cust, and it's not going anywhere until I get that. I've left a voicemail for him myself, had his dad leave a message for him and even went as far as to contact the Padres (again) and ask them for their help (again). I feel more like a pest than a reporter right now.

As far as things to look forward to go, I've set up a Q&A with Long Island Ducks first baseman Rob Cafiero on atlanticleaguebaseball.com on March 5th at 7PM.

I'm also working on getting some big names for my season previews in both the Atlantic and Eastern Leagues -- if even one of them comes through for me, you'll be pleasantly surprised at who you'll be hearing from.

I also had my February notebook run in yesterday's paper, head on over to http://www.mikeashmore.com/022207.htm to check it out.