Here Today, Gone Sunday
Most of you probably had figured Outlaws pitcher Derrick Loop, obtained by the Boston Red Sox's minor league system earlier this week, left Dodge days ago. Yet it if you were at Nettleton for tonight's game, you might have been behind him in the bathroom line without knowing it.
Loop won't report to Lancaster Jet Hawks headquarters in north Southern California until Sunday night. Because the Jet Hawks have been on the road all week and won't wrap up their current series at the Lake Elsinore Storm until then, Loop has remained in Chico.
"I thought it was perfect how it worked out this way," Loop said while waiting for teammates in the plaza outside the Outlaws clubhouse after Friday's win. "It's given me the time I wanted to say my goodbyes, there's people in Chico I want to spend time with before I get going."
Loop will join former Outlaw teammate and 2007 GBL MVP Daniel Nava but doesn't expect to make many more friends in the Lancaster clubhouse.
"Oh, absolutely, it's dog eat dog when you get to that level," Loop said. "I'm coming in after I took some guy's friend's job. It becomes a business and I've got to be prepared for that mindset. Like I said, it's dog eat dog. That's the analogy I like to use."