Sometimes, to fight the tedium of a six-month season, players create their own entertainment.
With that in mind, players on the Triple A minor-league affiliate of the San Diego Padres pulled off one of the most elaborate pranks in years, hatching a plot to convince a new outfielder that one of his teammates was hard of hearing.
The plot began when the El Paso Chihuahuas signed outfielder Jeff Francoeur, a veteran of several big-league teams, late in spring training after he failed to find a roster spot with the major-league Cleveland Indians.
So Francoeur, 30, did not know many of his future teammates when he reported to El Paso in late March.
The con job was hatched – and Francoeur fell for it to such a degree that he was trying to communicate with pitcher Jorge Reyes by using his pantomimed hand signals and mouthing words.
All along, coaches, players and team officials knew it was an elaborate hoax. At one point, when several players went to dinner with Francoeur in tow, they bribed a waitress to pretend that Reyes had a severe hearing issue.
“It’s pretty amazing that somebody could go that long without knowing the truth,” teammate Kyle Blanks said, laughing.
Blanks and several other players were interviewed in a hilarious video, filmed and edited by a teammate, that quickly went viral when it was posted this week. Included in the seven-minute clip is a snippet from Francoeur, commenting in oblivious sincerity about the obstacles that Reyes had to overcome to succeed as a deaf player.
One by one, the coaches and players in the video verbally jab Francoeur for falling for the gag, all in good fun. The title of the film: “On Jeff Ears.”
The good-natured Francoeur finally learned of the hoax in front of the entire team, an episode that also was filmed and included in the video posting.
“A complete, utter idiot,” outfielder Ryan Jackson said.
selling@thenational.ae
Company profile
Name: Tratok Portal
Founded: 2017
Based: UAE
Sector: Travel & tourism
Size: 36 employees
Funding: Privately funded
Will the pound fall to parity with the dollar?
The idea of pound parity now seems less far-fetched as the risk grows that Britain may split away from the European Union without a deal.
Rupert Harrison, a fund manager at BlackRock, sees the risk of it falling to trade level with the dollar on a no-deal Brexit. The view echoes Morgan Stanley’s recent forecast that the currency can plunge toward $1 (Dh3.67) on such an outcome. That isn’t the majority view yet – a Bloomberg survey this month estimated the pound will slide to $1.10 should the UK exit the bloc without an agreement.
New Prime Minister Boris Johnson has repeatedly said that Britain will leave the EU on the October 31 deadline with or without an agreement, fuelling concern the nation is headed for a disorderly departure and fanning pessimism toward the pound. Sterling has fallen more than 7 per cent in the past three months, the worst performance among major developed-market currencies.
“The pound is at a much lower level now but I still think a no-deal exit would lead to significant volatility and we could be testing parity on a really bad outcome,” said Mr Harrison, who manages more than $10 billion in assets at BlackRock. “We will see this game of chicken continue through August and that’s likely negative for sterling,” he said about the deadlocked Brexit talks.
The pound fell 0.8 per cent to $1.2033 on Friday, its weakest closing level since the 1980s, after a report on the second quarter showed the UK economy shrank for the first time in six years. The data means it is likely the Bank of England will cut interest rates, according to Mizuho Bank.
The BOE said in November that the currency could fall even below $1 in an analysis on possible worst-case Brexit scenarios. Options-based calculations showed around a 6.4 per cent chance of pound-dollar parity in the next one year, markedly higher than 0.2 per cent in early March when prospects of a no-deal outcome were seemingly off the table.
Bloomberg
Brief scores:
Juventus 3
Dybala 6', Bonucci 17', Ronaldo 63'
Frosinone 0
