“The balk call stands,” he says, “but let me worry about making the calls from now on.”
“Oh yeah, no problem, Blue,” Gino mumbles. “But he was balking.”
The umpire stares at the Pitcher as he walks back to our dugout.
“Jack Langford … unbelievable,” he says, shaking his head.
40
BABE RUTH SAID HE ALWAYS swung big with everything he had. He said he wanted to win big or lose big. I like that, you know. I’m not the greatest batter and figure I might as well go for it.
Here’s what happens: We come alive and tie up the game. The Pitcher moves our players around with Toby Yostremski at short. Toby makes quick work of a grounder with a double play. A throw down from the catcher to second ends the inning. I hold Tri City to a single hit!
The Tri City crowd grows quiet as we come up to bat again. They figure they will blow us out. Scores like twenty-two to nothing happen. But baseball is all about momentum. You lose the momentum and you lose the game.
So the Tri City side gets real quiet. They have been yelling stuff like:
“SIT DOWN. HE CAN’T PITCH. GO HOME.”
“HE CANT HIT THE ZONE.”
“HE’S DONE.”
Now we are the ones making a racket.
All we have to do is get our bats going.
Eric has been knocking them down and takes the mound at the top of the seventh. He takes out our first two batters with his cutter. He has a medium fastball, but his cutter really moves and pinches the outside corner. Our batters foul off twice and then he throws an inside fastball when they try to adjust. It works beautifully. Devin always told him to know what he was going to do before you get to the mound. He does.
Then it is my bat. The Pitcher and I never worked on my batting, but he said it required the same type of concentration. “You pick a spot. You have to see yourself hitting the ball. When I belted that homerun in the Series, I saw it before I swung. I had picked a spot over the centerfield fence and that’s where I hit it.” It was hard for me to believe anyone could pick a spot in a World Series and then hit the ball to that spot. But the Pitcher swore that’s what happened. And he did it.
“Two cutters, then an inside fastball is what he has,” he tells me outside the dugout, looking at Eric. “Just crowd the plate for that inside fastball and you’ll force him off his game.”
I walk up to home plate with my heart thumping and my hands sweaty. I tap the rubber with my bat, then snatch up some dirt and rub it into my gloves. Eric grins on the mound.
“C’mon, Eric … take it home!”
“One more, Eric!”
“You got this guy … one, two, three!”
I step out of the box and take a couple swings and feel my shoulders tighten. I roll my arms to try and loosen up. I take one more swing, then snug my gloves and go into the box. I stretch out the bat and extend toward the mound, then hunch down and bring it to my shoulder. Blue guns his finger and I watch Eric set himself. I move the bat in a tight circle, tensing my shoulders, locking on his hands. He looks over his mitt and stares at me.
I hear the catcher adjust his stance, shifting his mitt. I hear the umpire grunt as he bends down and the parents scream. “C’mon, Eric, bring us home! One, two, three, Eric! You got this, guy!” Eric breaks his hands and kicks high, then I hear that sonic whistle as the ball rockets past me.
“Streeeerike!”
I lose the ball. I blink and lose sight of it. I step out of the box and swing again, trying to loosen up my shoulders. Eric takes the ball back and spits toward me. I swing again. No more of that. His cutter will be his demise. The Tri City crowd screams.
“Way to go, Eric!”
“That’s one!”
“Two more, Eric!”
“You got him!”
I swing twice outside the box as the Pitcher motions me forward. Crowd the plate. Crowd the plate. He will give you two cutters and then come inside with his fastball. I pick up some more dirt from the ground and rub the bat with my gloves. I can smell the dirt on the bat like a wet field. I wonder what Mom is doing right now. Is she still breathing? Is she thinking about me? I see her in the hospital bed under the white sheets. She has all the tubes and wires and her eyes have the dark circles. Mom opens her eyes and speaks:
Keep your eye on the ball. Don’t swing at any flies, Ricky. Make him give you a good one. You can do this!
I step into the box and hoist the bat and stare at the center-field fence. There is a church steeple in the distance. That is my spot. Eric stares over his mitt and grins. I keep my bat moving, keep my legs bent, weight centered. My heart booms slowly. I move the bat on my shoulder as Eric kicks back and brings the heat. His pitch breaks down to the outside.
“Steeerike!”
Eric takes the ball again and shakes his head. I pound the plate and reset myself. I know with two strikes he could play games. I fully expect some off-speed garbage. The problem is I see myself getting the third strike. It’s hard to come back from a zero-and-two count. You feel like he already has you. I hear Mom again. She’s talking to me from the hospital bed in her pajamas with the small blue flowers.
Ignore him, Ricky. Play your game. You can do it, Ricky. Just concentrate.
I step out again from the box and make Eric break his set. I take three swings and hear the bat fan the air.
“HE’S FINISHED!”
“ONE MORE, ERIC!”
“HE CAN’T HIT!”
The Tri City team is on the fence and shaking it like crazy. I swing a couple more times and look at the Pitcher. Make him play your game. That’s what his slouch said to me. I step back into the box and lean across the plate. I remember the Pitcher once told me Bob Mariano tried to sucker him in the Series. He threw a couple by his chin to piss him off. He said he knew Mariano would give him one decent pitch. The Pitcher waited until he got the pitch and slammed the home run out of the stadium.
I keep that in mind as Eric throws three fast outside curves. I almost take the bait on the last one.
“Full count!”
I dig in close and lean over the plate. Eric stares at me. His catcher is giving him all sorts of signals, but he keeps shaking them off. I’m too far over the plate. If he tries the inside fastball, it will hit me. Eric looks over his glove, his eyes like two pieces of cobalt. I set myself and pick out the church steeple again.
Eric kicks into his windup and his arm whips over the top. The baseball blasts toward me like a white rocket. I swing from my shoulder, feeling the contact through my hands.
PING!
The bat rings like the perfect note of a symphony.
PING!
I know the sound. I have heard it before when other guys hit home runs.
PING!
You know when you hit the sweet spot of the bat.
PING! PING! PING!
You can hear it in the stands.
I watch the ball shoot for the moon and clear the back fence, heading for that church steeple. I run the bases like the Babe with small steps, taking my time. I see Eric with his mouth open, staring at the back fence. He turns around and watches me jog past third. I have just hit a home run in the high school stadium.
I tap home plate and meet my teammates flooding out of the dugout.
Just like the movies, man.
Then Gino strikes again.
41
YEAH, I LOOKED UP AT the coaches’ booth when I slammed that home run over the fence. I saw Coach Poppers stand and I felt like waving. I wanted to wave and make sure he wouldn’t forget me: the Mexican kid who just shot the ball over the fence. But I didn’t wave. I jogged those bases thinking Mom would have loved to see this. She just got so high, man, whenever I finally did well at something. It’s like all her hope would get bottled up and finally it could all just come out at once.
But then again, I should have known Gino wouldn’t just roll over. I don’t think Google has been such a great thing for baseball. I mean without Google you would
have to carry around the rules and most coaches don’t do that. And if they do carry them then they don’t read through to find the rule they can use against the other team. But search engines have changed all of that. All Gino had to do was punch in rules for batters in the KCBL. And the result:
Batters are not allowed to wear jewelry of any kind. Any violation is an automatic out.
So he waited until Eric threw that fastball down the middle. He waited until I tap danced the plate and my teammates flooded out and slapped me on the back and cheered. He waited until the high school coaches sat down in their booth. Then he rushed out pointing to my neck with his iPhone in one hand.
“Jewelry, Blue! Jewelry, Blue! Automatic out!”
I have this coral necklace Mom bought me when she went to Shell City. I usually wear it inside my jersey, but it had slipped up on my neck. The umpire stared at me and the Pitcher was out of the dugout. Gino screamed like a hyena.
“Jewelry, jewelry! No necklaces or bracelets. Automatic out!”
Now, the ump has his face mask off and is squinting at my necklace. Gino holds up his phone. Jewelry? I stand outside the dugout and all the parents are on their feet. This could be the game right here. I hope the umpire will tell Gino to get the hell back to his dugout. The ump slowly turns around. He looks at me, then his eyes go to the necklace around my neck. He hooks his thumb and shouts, “Out!”
The place goes crazy. People are booing. People are throwing things onto the field. Parents are screaming and Eric is grinning. It is dirty baseball, but there is nothing we can do. I turn and see Mrs. Payne by the fence. She is staring at me like she had planned it all. Mom said she had thrown a fit when she heard I had an MLB coach. She even called the league commissioner to see if it was legal.
I watch the Pitcher shake his head.
“Jewelry! Jewelry! Come on, Blue!”
The ump holds his hands out.
“That’s the league rule … no jewelry. Automatic out!”
Gino is grinning like crazy, man. It is pure Gino and I can see he got his mojo back after the whole balk thing. He’s the man with the rules and he just pulled off probably his greatest play. Nobody ever enforced the jewelry rule, but nobody played like Gino either.
“That’s pure bullshit, Blue,” the Pitcher shouts.
The ump crosses his arms.
“That’s my ruling and I’d like you to go back to your dugout,” he says, like he’s only going to say it once.
I can tell he’s not playing around. The Pitcher kicks dirt on him. He kicks it just like Lou Piniella, getting in his face.
“You’re letting this asshole play dirty ball,” he yells. “This guy is a joke, Blue, and you’re playing his game!”
“That’s it,” the umpire shouts, jabbing his finger toward the stands. “Go back to your dugout or I’m throwing you out!”
“C’mon,” I say, grabbing the Pitcher’s arm.
“He can’t throw me out,” he shouts.
“Don’t be a rockhead. Of course he can,” I tell him.
The Pitcher stares at me.
“Yeah. You’re right,” he mutters, walking back to the dugout.
Blue is still staring at him and I remember articles about Jack Langford’s temper and how he would argue and get thrown out of games. I don’t want him to get thrown out because we still need him. I need him. I know how Gino rolls and he wants nothing more than for our coach to get ejected. I have seen it happen before with other teams. I mean, I know the Pitcher played in the MLB, man, for twenty-five years and won the World Series and was the MVP.
But he’s never faced people who want their kid to make the high school team.
42
YOU KNOW WHAT MY BIGGEST fear is? That I really don’t have talent and I have been fooling myself and Mom and the Pitcher all along. Maybe making the high school freshman team is impossible. My arm is not special. I am not special. I am just like every other kid with big dreams. It happens, you know. People believe something their whole life that has nothing to do with reality. It’s like a big bluff. Maybe that’s me, because I’m blowing it again. And the worst thing is …
Eric has just come up to bat.
In the next life, man, I want blue eyes because you get a lot of things, you know. You get to be the Pitcher. I knew when they pulled back my home run there was no way a Mexican kid was going to push off a white dude. Same way with Mom. She knew when she passed that petition around at Target she was done and would lose her job. Now I understand why she did it. She must have done it for pride, you know.
For respect.
So I’m pitching for pride now. I’m pitching for Mom. It’s the bottom of the seventh. Even after they called back my home run, we manage to get up by one. Eric walks Jerry and Jerry is this Japanese dude who can really hit the ball. He’s good at short too because he’s so compact and low to the ground. The thing with small kids is it’s really hard to hit the zone. In fact it’s almost impossible for me, and Eric has the same problem. Then Ronnie steals third and Toby shoots one down the third baseline bringing Ronnie in.
Eric mows down our next batter.
So now I’m going out to pitch and, yeah, you guessed it, things are not going well. My head is like up in space somewhere around Jupiter. I take down the first two batters with a couple fastballs and a sinker. Then I start seeing Mom in those white hospital sheets and all those tubes and wires that are draining her life. I can’t stop thinking she’s dying.
My next pitch flies over Ronnie’s head and rings the backstop. The next pitch trenches the dirt and bounces up into Blue’s mask. Then I pinch the corners and Blue calls everyone. The first batter walks. The second batter clips one down the third baseline for a single. I ring the backstop on two fastballs and a breaking ball that puffs the dirt. My last pitch cuts the batter’s knees and he walks.
And now bases are loaded. The Pitcher stands there with his arms crossed by the dugout. To me he looks like he’s part of the dugout, part of the field. He belongs there. It’s me that’s the odd piece. And then Eric walks up to bat swinging his Titanium Slugger like he is Hercules. He swings outside the box, smacks the plate three times, then lines the bat up like he’s aiming a gun.
I’m staring him down and he’s giving it back to me with those weird blue eyes. The bat spins and hovers on his shoulder while the umpire hunches down. All I can think is Eric never strikes out. He destroys the ball. He creams the ball and sends it over the back fence like some kind of machine. He has logged hundreds, maybe thousands of hours in batting cages. He has a stout body and big shoulders that got bigger from weight lifting. He can smash the ball into orbit if he wants to.
And I have loaded the bases.
If I walk him I will tie it up. If I give him anything in the zone, I’ll lose the game. The worst thing is he knows my fastball. He has seen it a million times. Forget that I’m not even hitting the zone. If I do hit the zone then he will belt it for the stars, man. And all I can think about is Mom. I just want to go to the hospital and make sure she’s alright. I really hope the Pitcher will pull me and let somebody else blow the game.
But he doesn’t. He just stands there chewing, spitting, watching. I bring my hands together and try to clear my mind. Eric’s bat revolves like a serpent ready to strike. I take a breath and kick back and go for an inside fastball, but my release is too early and the ball nearly flies over Ronnie’s head. Eric stands up and grins.
I take the ball from Ronnie and look down. Take your time, Ricky. Take your time. I want you to breathe. You can do this. I set myself, breathing in the rawhide of my mitt. I close my eyes, take another breath, and throw a fastball down the line. Eric blasts it toward first base and the ball goes foul. He pounds the plate, then sets himself again. I throw a sinker down the middle. He chips it for the fence down the third baseline. Foul. Onetwo count. Eric’s nodding to me, grinning. Bring it on is what he says. I bring everything I have and throw wild and ring the backstop like the bell of a fight ending. And I f
igure the fight has ended, because it is the best I’ve had.
And all I can think about now is seeing Mom.
Two-two count.
Now I know what is going on. All the bad things are coming together. And I know I Mom is running out of time. I’m running out of time.
Then the Pitcher calls a time-out.
“You’re going to have to give this guy something else. He knows your fastball and the next one ain’t going to go foul.”
The Pitcher says that while he’s looking at Eric, smoking the dust with tobacco juice. He turns around and pushes back Mom’s cap.
“You got any idea what you want to do with this guy?”
I look down at the ball and shake my head.
“Well, you gotta do something.”
I look up into the Pitcher’s grey eyes.
“Mom is really sick … isn’t she?”
I ask him in a way where he can’t lie. The Pitcher doesn’t move even when the breeze lifts his hat. We both stand there in the dust whipping up from the infield. His lips protrude, his eyes becoming winter.
“Yeah,” he says, and he has to look away. I know then.
Mom is dying.
He looks back at me.
“But she wants you to finish the game, Ricky. That’s her wish.”
They come just like that. The tears sit on the oiled leather of my glove—the oil Mom had put on when she put my glove in the oven and baked it. We had a good laugh over that. The house smelled like warm leather. Now I’m thinking about the time Mom found me with my head against the refrigerator. I couldn’t stop crying because I couldn’t remember the signals in a game. Mom rubbed my shoulders and we went over the signals for hours.
And I remembered every signal the next game.
But now I can’t stop wondering, Who will rub my shoulders now? Who will teach me the signals, you know? Who will sit on the porch with me and go over my homework or make pancakes on Saturday morning?
I hold the glove over my eyes and breathe heavily.
The Pitcher Page 18