The Proximity Tax, Baseball’s Cruelest Currency

Baseball sells the dream like it's destiny, but for most, it's just debt in a different jersey.

When I met Donnie Hissa in Helena, Montana, he was right on the edge, just drafted (21st round -626th overall), fresh out of Notre Dame, big midwestern kid with a fastball in the mid-90s and the kind of quiet, unshakable belief you only get before the world starts chipping away at it. We sat down over breakfast, and he told me he just wanted to chase it…