Grand Slam

by Tim Green

  32

  JALEN HESITATED ONLY A MOMENT. “Does a bear eat in the woods?”

  She grinned, and gave him knuckles.

  Gertzy was in his curving driveway, shooting baskets. His long jump shot got nothing but net, and he set the ball on the lawn before hoisting his gear bag from the back hatch of a Mercedes SUV. The house wasn’t as big as the mansion Cat lived in, but it rivaled JY’s place for sure. Gertzy’s mom came out to meet Cat’s mom before they set out for Yankee Stadium.

  The three friends started talking baseball, giving opinions about the problems the Orioles could create and the answers the Yankees might have.

  “Wait till you see Jalen solve Jake Chan like a Rubik’s Cube,” Cat said.

  “I saw him do it to Chris Gamble, but doing it to a big-league pitcher in Yankee Stadium?” Gertzy said, leaning closer to Cat. “This is gonna be awesome.”

  They got off the expressway, slowing down in some traffic before taking a turn into a closed street. Mrs. H held up a pass on her dash, and a police officer waved them through. She cruised to the garage near Gate 2 and parked.

  Jalen then led them proudly into the Legends Suite club, where they ordered complimentary food from an almost endless menu of choices. From there they went up into the stadium.

  Jalen could feel people’s eyes on him. One man grabbed his son and said, “Look, it’s the Calamari Kid.” The air was warm, but the windy sky above swelled with gray clouds that seemed to promise rain. Maybe the weather was the reason there was just a small crowd, or maybe it was the afternoon time. Jalen could feel the lack of buzz in the air. It dampened the thrill he had enjoyed other times he’d come to help JY. Cat’s mom gave the usher their tickets, and he passed them through with a smile.

  The owner’s box, right up against the low concrete wall with only dirt between them and home plate, had a lot of empty seats. There might have been room for Daniel, and Jalen kicked himself for not asking if he could bring three friends, but then he remembered Daniel’s sister and he felt better.

  Gertzy hustled to sit next to Cat. Jalen frowned, taking a seat on her other side, putting Mrs. H on the aisle.

  “Man, are you livin’ right,” said Gertzy. “I can’t wait until the food comes.”

  Jalen bit the inside of his cheek. “It’s not bad, is it?”

  They all stood for the national anthem. JY turned back toward them from his spot on the right field line, giving them a smile and a discreet wave before heading out to second base.

  “Are you kidding?” Gertzy said under his breath to Jalen. “James Yager just waved at us.”

  “Yeah,” Jalen said.

  The way Gertzy looked at him made Jalen feel proud, but the way he kept looking at Cat gave Jalen a twinge. Their food came. The game had started, but watching what was going on between his friends, Jalen had a hard time concentrating.

  In the top of the first, there was one out and an Orioles runner on first when JY electrified the thin crowd with a leaping grab of a soft liner and a rocket throw to first to complete a double play.

  JY tipped his cap to the cheering fans as he jogged toward the dugout. When he winked at Jalen before disappearing down the stairs, Jalen knew he had to grow up and be like JY. He had to have a big crowd—thousands of admirers—cheering for him.

  The Orioles took the field. Jalen studied Jake Chan on the mound. Chan was no “surefire” thing. Drafted in the thirty-sixth round after high school, he went to college and shot up to only the eleventh round. After four years in the minors, he developed a fastball-slider-changeup repertoire good enough to make the all-star team.

  Switch-hitting Aaron Hicks led off, only to punch out chasing a sharply breaking slider that nearly hit him on the back foot.

  “Holy cow, I wish I could throw a pitch that breaks like that,” Gertzy said.

  “You got it yet?” Cat asked Jalen.

  “I’ve only seen five pitches, Cat. And he scrapped his windup. His throwing every pitch from the stretch complicates things.”

  “I know, but sometimes…” Cat’s voice faded away.

  “How’s it work?” Gertzy asked, quickly back with the program.

  “It’s hard to explain,” Jalen said. “I have all these numbers in my head, stats, even from the minor leagues. Then I just clear my mind and watch the pitcher. Sometimes it takes five or six pitches, sometimes it never happens. Mostly, it takes around ten or twelve, and I just feel it.”

  “That’s so sick,” Gertzy said.

  Jalen only nodded. Aaron Judge was at the plate, and Chan was studying him. Jalen tried to keep his focus on Chan, but his eyes kept straying to Judge’s stance. The man was a phenomenal hitter with great plate discipline. Jalen wanted to get that kind of reputation.

  Chan threw a four-seam heater low inside. Judge let it go, stepped back, and turned to see the umpire make a punching motion and call a strike. Because his six-foot-seven height was so hard for umps to adjust for, Judge got more low pitches called strikes than any other player in MLB. He gave the ump a quizzical shrug before stepping back into the box.

  Chan threw a curve next and Judge nicked it foul.

  “Here comes that slider,” Jalen said.

  Chan wound up and threw what looked like a fastball until the last instant, when the ball cut down and across the plate and out of the strike zone. Judge swung but the ball only dribbled to the second baseman, who made the easy toss to first for the out.

  Gertzy reached across Cat for a fist bump. “You did it. You got this now, right?”

  33

  “I THINK,” JALEN SAID.

  “Sweet,” said Gertzy.

  Jalen wanted to explain that one correct call didn’t mean he had his groove. In fact, it could have been a lucky guess. But he wanted to impress Gertzy, so he said nothing more.

  Tyler Hutt was up next. As the Yankees batter stepped into the box, Jalen said, “Fastball.”

  Chan threw a fastball that Hutt got ahold of and bounced off the left-field wall for a double.

  “My man!” Gertzy high-fived Jalen and Cat. “That’s what I’m talking about!”

  Spencer Tollis left the on-deck circle and approached the right-hand batter’s box. Jalen was on a roll, but he still didn’t feel it the way he should if he were really dialed in. He thought Chan would throw a sinker—his least-used pitch—but he didn’t know for sure.

  “Curve,” he said instead, a moment before Chan wound up.

  Tollis’s time was off on what appeared to be a four-seam fastball coming out of Chan’s hand, but was actually a slow breaker. Tollis got wood on the ball, but it bounced weakly before landing in Chan’s mitt, making the throw to first an easy out.

  “Did you see that filth?” Gertzy was so excited, he jumped out of his seat.

  “Easy, Gertzy,” said Cat. “We’re Yankees fans, remember?”

  Gertzy looked around them at all the frowning faces and melted into his seat. “Oh yeah. Sorry.” He busied himself with his smoothie.

  Cat leaned toward Jalen. “You got it now, huh?”

  “I think.”

  “You said that before, but you called the last three pitches,” said Cat.

  “I guess I like to play this safe,” Jalen said.

  Top of the second, and the Yankees were out in the field again. From second base JY gave Jalen a thumbs-up signal right after a thumbs-down. Jalen answered JY’s questioning look by holding his hand sideways with his thumb out and waggling it up and down, signaling maybe. He could see the frustration on JY’s face, but he knew better than to guess. JY had strictly forbidden it.

  To make matters worse, JY made a wild throw to third base that allowed a runner to score before Tanaka struck out his third batter, ending the half inning. JY jogged into the dugout and emerged wearing batting gloves and helmet. He took his spot in the on-deck circle with Greg Gonzalez, his lips clamped tight and looking grim.

  Jalen tried to ignore him and instead focus on Chan as he threw a handful of warm-up pitches. Wh
en Torres dug in, Jalen knew Chan would start him off with a fastball but didn’t say it out loud.

  “What do you think?” asked Gertzy.

  “I gotta concentrate, Gertzy.” The words sounded sharper than Jalen intended. When the phone buzzed in his pocket, he hit ignore without looking. He was trying to focus entirely on the Orioles pitcher.

  Chan shook off whatever the catcher signaled, then gave a nod and wound up before throwing what had to be a fastball, only it wasn’t. The pitch was thrown to look like a fastball but was noticeably slower, a changeup. Unfortunately for Chan, his changeup had no downward tilt. It floated in the strike zone rather than dropping out of it.

  Gonzalez launched that cement-mixer pitch into the left-field seats. The few fans there jumped to their feet and roared.

  JY was up to bat, and Jalen was shaken. His phone buzzed insistently and he wrenched it from his pocket to turn it off. Gonzalez was soaking up the cheers and taking his time rounding the bases. When Jalen saw that the caller was his mom, he answered without thinking.

  “Mom?”

  “Oh, Jalen. I’m sorry to bother you, but I’m so excited.” She was nearly breathless.

  “About what?” Jalen asked.

  “Well, it was George’s idea, really.” Her laughter danced through the phone. “Jalen, we figured out how to tell your father about me!”

  Jalen froze. Were they at the Silver Liner?

  34

  CAT GRABBED HIS ARM, PULLING him back to the game.

  JY tossed the weighted bat doughnut on the ground and gave Jalen a look of hope before marching toward the plate.

  “Mom,” he said quickly, “I can’t talk now. I’ll call you back?”

  “Of course! I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to pester you.” She sounded hurt. “You’re busy, and here I am…”

  JY took a couple of practice swings outside the batter’s box, but his eyes were on Jalen.

  “I gotta go!” He disconnected his mom.

  He thought Chan would throw a fastball, but he wasn’t sure of the pitch and could only offer JY a weak shrug of apology. When Chan threw a slider, he knew he’d done the right thing, even though JY had swung and missed. Cat saw the look that JY gave Jalen, and she squeezed his hand.

  “It’s not the first time I haven’t been zoned in during his first at bat.” Jalen was talking as much to himself as to Cat.

  “Maybe it’ll come to you while he’s still up,” Cat said hopefully.

  “Maybe.” Jalen had his eyes glued to the pitcher, but his mind was on his mom.

  He thought slider again, but Chan threw a four-seam fastball inside. JY let it by. When the umpire called a strike, JY stepped back and howled. Jalen knew the theatrics were to give him time to figure things out, but he was no closer to knowing the pitches. In truth, he was still shaken by his mother’s call.

  JY let the next pitch go, a changeup in the dirt. On the 1–2 count he swung at and missed a slider that broke sideways and down. He retired to the dugout without so much as a glance at Jalen.

  “It’s okay.” Cat patted his leg, then leaned over to Gertzy. “Sometimes it takes a little longer.”

  “Oh, I know he can do it. He did it for me on Sunday.” Gertzy spoke with as much enthusiasm as Daniel ever had, and that comforted Jalen.

  Jalen turned his attention back to Chan. The Orioles pitcher struck out the next two Yankees batters with pitch sequences featuring a frustrating mix of heat and unhittable off-speed pitches, but still Jalen was no closer to an answer.

  Inning over, he turned to Cat and told her about the call from his mom.

  “You didn’t sound rude at all to me,” Cat said.

  “Yeah, but I just hung up on her.”

  “Well,” Cat said, “call her back. You’re going to be distracted until you do, and the Orioles are up anyway.”

  Jalen pressed his lips tight but nodded in agreement. He excused himself, found a quiet corner in the VIP lounge, and called his mom.

  “Hello?” she said.

  “Hi, Mom.”

  “Hi.”

  “I’m really sorry about that. I’m at Yankee Stadium and I’m having a hard time,” he said.

  “Oh, I said I never wanted to bother you, and I meant that. I wasn’t saying it willy-nilly,” she said.

  Jalen looked at the clock on his phone. “I’ve got to get back for the next inning, but I felt bad and wanted you to know that we can talk later about how to tell Dad. Okay?”

  “That’s fine, Jalen. Whenever you want, son. I only want to help. Just know I’ll be busy tonight. I’m singing at the Jazz Forum!”

  Jalen felt a sudden hope. The fear that his mom—and George—had gone to the Silver Liner without him was gone. Worry had made it impossible for what Cat and Daniel called his baseball genius to work. Maybe now he could get back to the game and do what he’d come to do.

  “Thank you, Mom,” he said. “You’re awesome.”

  There was silence at the other end of the connection, and when his mom finally spoke, her voice trembled with emotion. “I’m hardly awesome, Jalen.”

  “You are to me.” It was the nicest thing he could think of, and she rewarded him with a happy sigh.

  Back outside, he saw the Orioles had added another run and there were runners on first and third with only one out. Chris Davis topped a Tanaka curveball, driving it into the grass halfway to the pitcher’s mound and sending it high over second base. With incredible quickness, JY bolted underneath the ball, made a barehanded grab, and flicked it to Gonzalez, who was covering second. Gonzalez also snatched the ball barehanded and made a red-hot throw to first for the second double play of the game.

  The crowd went wild, including Jalen and his friends.

  Gertzy high-fived Jalen and Cat. “He’s still got the mojo. He’s still JY! What? You don’t think so, Jalen?”

  Jalen realized he’d been frowning. “If JY’s gonna fend off Foxx and stay with the Yankees, he needs his bat to be as good as his glove.”

  “That’s where you come in, buddy.” Gertzy patted him on his shoulder.

  “Yeah,” Jalen said. “That’s where I come in.”

  Darker clouds massed above the stadium. The warm breeze whispered the promise of rain. Jalen wondered if a rainout might not be the best thing that could happen, but he also remembered seeing a forecast that said the front wasn’t due till midnight.

  He tried to clear his mind. He needed to be ready. He ate some nachos and began working on a hot dog while he watched Chan shut down the bottom of the Yankees lineup. As the Yankees took the field, Cat asked, “How you feeling?”

  “Like I’m almost there,” he said.

  Unfortunately, Jalen wasn’t almost there. Far from it.

  * * *

  The situation with his mom would not quit haunting Jalen. The Yankees cycled through the entire lineup twice, and then some, with JY striking out twice, before Jalen bolted upright in his seat and said, “I got it.”

  “You got it?” Cat clapped her hands repeatedly.

  “You got it?” Gertzy bumped knuckles with Jalen.

  Jalen couldn’t wait to signal JY, but the inning ended before JY was up, and he didn’t look Jalen’s way once while he was in the field.

  It was the top of the seventh inning. The score was tied at 4–4 and there were two outs before Hanser Alberto saw a split-finger fastball with no life. He went yard on Tanaka with runners on second and third, giving the Orioles a 7–4 lead. The Yankees sent Chris Pagonis to the mound, and he methodically struck out the next batter.

  Chan was still on the mound for the Orioles, and Gonzalez was up. JY looked grim in the on-deck circle until he saw Jalen give him a thumbs-up. JY seemed to swing with more purpose, and even though Gonzalez grounded out, JY approached the plate with his shoulders straight and his head high.

  Jalen looked at Chan briefly, then signaled fastball to JY. The ballplayer stepped up to the plate. Chan wound up.

  Jalen closed his eyes.

  35


  THE CRACK OF JY’S BAT smashed the silence. He’d crushed one.

  Jalen’s eyes popped open in time to watch the baseball sail over the left-field fence and get swallowed up by the stands. All four of them, including Cat’s mom, flew out of their seats, cheering as JY rounded the bases.

  “That’s two dingers in two games!” Cat hollered as she slapped everyone high fives.

  Gertzy hugged Jalen. “Unbelievable!”

  JY tipped his cap to the crowd and enjoyed the slaps from his teammates, but he didn’t disappear into the dugout before rewarding Jalen with a wink and a smile. Jalen pumped a fist in the air, returning the show of teeth, until he realized what the Orioles were doing behind the backs of the celebratory Bronx Bombers.

  The Orioles manager, Brandon Hyde, took the ball from a stoic Chan and waited for relief from the bull pen.

  “I guess be careful what you wish for,” Jalen muttered.

  Cat wrinkled her nose. “What do you mean?”

  “That home run ended Chan’s day,” Jalen said, “and now I’ve got to start all over.”

  Gertzy squinted at the Orioles dugout. “Do you know who that even is?”

  “Unfortunately, I do.” Jalen sighed.

  “Who? He’s like seven feet high.”

  “Close,” Jalen said. “It’s Mick Connor. He’s six foot seven, and he’s got a killer sinker.”

  * * *

  The three friends stared as the Orioles relief pitcher warmed up.

  “Look at that funky release,” Cat said.

  “Looks like a catapult,” said Gertzy.

  “He throws that sinker ninety-seven miles per hour.” Jalen removed his Yankees cap and scratched his head. “If that wasn’t enough, he throws a slider out of the same arm tunnel.”

  Gertzy swallowed a mouthful of smoothie. “What else has he got?”

  “That’s really it.” Jalen turned his attention to Castro. “He’s got a changeup, but only for lefties.”

  “Won’t that make it easier to figure him out?” Cat asked. “With only two pitches, I mean?”