"Who is this guy? What the heck is going on?"

As you may have noticed from my previous post, I'm back and mostly recovered from the wedding; my college classmates and I all disgraced ourselves pretty thoroughly.  I was welcomed home with some excellent Cubs victories yesterday and Sunday.  

It seems, though, that I missed an amazing moment before the game.  I've been informed that Mike Fontenot and Z have developed a new little routine in which Z pretends to hammer Fontenot into the ground like a spike.  As they were delighting everyone with this yesterday, Fontenot took it a step further and leapt onto Z's back to get a piggyback ride.  Of course I was overjoyed to hear this, but very sad to have missed actually seeing it.

Sensing my distress, my friend Jessie kindly took pity on me and provided me with this article from last year's Tribune.  Here's the most relevant part, with the highlights, well, highlighted:

Fontenot arrived too late to get an All-Star invite, though no second baseman in the league is playing as well as he is right now.

Fontenot hiked his average to .408 with a 3-for-4 afternoon and barely missed becoming the first player this season to reach Sheffield Avenue with his 415-foot, fourth-inning home run off Jason Hirsh.

"I didn't know short men could hit the ball like that," Zambrano said. "He hit the ball like a man, you know?"

Fontenot laughed at Zambrano's comment. Do people underestimate him because of his size?

"I don't know," Fontenot said. "Nobody ever comes up to me and says, 'You can't do this or that.' "

Whenever the 6-foot-5-inch Zambrano high-fives the generously listed 5-8 Fontenot, he puts his hand as high as possible to make Fontenot jump up, like a dog trying to catch a Frisbee.

"That's one of his things," Fontenot said. "I kind of like it. I just slap him on the forearm."

If Fontenot's forearm slap ever becomes as ubiquitous as the fist-bump, you will know it really is the Cubs' year.

"Hats off to Mike Fontenot," DeRosa said. "What he's doing, to come up here and hit .400, is unbelievable. It's not even fathomable, to be honest …

"Every third-base coach has asked me, 'Who is this guy? What the heck is going on?' He's in a zone right now, but when you look at his numbers, he has hit all his life."

I don't really have much to add beyond that.  "Generously listed."  I think that may actually be my favorite part.  Can he really be shorter than 5'8?  I believe the reporter is trying to imply that Fontenot is actually about five feet tall. 

In other news, I've got about three weeks left until I start Jesus School, and OH MAN, THE EXCITEMENT.