Strike Three, You're Dead

by Josh Berk

  “Okay, okay, okay,” Other Mike started, getting up from the computer and pacing around like he always did when he was deep in thought. “I’m going to go ask my mom right away about that shock-mounted condenser microphone. We really shouldn’t waste any time.”

  I didn’t know what he was talking about. Time was one thing we had. It was a lazy Monday and there were weeks of summer vacation ahead of us. Every day we biked over to Other Mike’s house, being centrally located and all. Mike and I watched baseball, Other Mike read books about warlocks. We played video games. We put in some appearances at the library, and I read a lot of the baseball books. I even read one or two about history, but let’s be honest: I wasn’t exactly on pace for two hundred. How did someone actually read two hundred books in a summer? I shuddered to think. They probably went blind from eyestrain and possibly insane from boredom. They probably lived in an asylum now.

  “The deadline isn’t for three weeks,” Mike said. “It’d probably take you about three minutes to whip up a video.”

  “Well, thank you for recognizing my obvious skills,” Other Mike said, breathing on his glasses and cleaning them on his shirt.

  “You go rush off to Best Buy with Mommy,” Mike said. “Leonard and I are going to be on the lawn couch. Businessperson’s special today. Early game time: twelve-oh-five.”

  “But—but—but it’s Best Buy!” Other Mike said. He didn’t seem to understand that baseball games were not to be missed. And he really liked Best Buy.

  “Dude, we have snacks,” Mike sang. “Best Buy cannot compete with the lawn couch and snacks.”

  Other Mike agreed, reluctantly, and we cruised over to Mike’s lawn couch. It was plastic and had an “old shoe” smell due to being sort of damp all the time, but it was great. We flipped on the TV (using the waterproof remote control Mike’s dad made out of a regular remote and a sandwich baggie) and opened up some cheese balls. The TV was under an overhang, shielded from the rain and in perfect view of the couch. The first thing we saw when the tube flickered to life? The commercial for the Armchair Announcer contest. “You could be in the booth!” Buck Foltz’s ridiculous hair called to me like a sign from above.

  The Phils game was a good one. Famosa made a couple of throwing errors but got a big double and they won, 6–5. Day games are cool, but we weren’t quite sure what to do with the evening, but then Mike’s dad came out back. As always, he had a bag of snacks in his hand and a big smile on his round face. Also, this time, he had something else: a book.

  “Gentlemen,” he said. “I had to stop in at the library on the way home, so I picked this up off the new-book shelf. Looked like something you might enjoy.”

  He was right! Wacky Baseball Lists was the title—just the kind of book Mike and I loved. The first thing I noticed about the cover was that it included a picture of 1970s Yankees star Oscar Gamble—owner of probably the greatest hair in baseball history. The cover included a collage of other baseball personalities too. We knew most of them—Barry Bonds, Cal Ripken Jr., Joe Mauer—but there was one guy we didn’t recognize.

  “Hey, who’s that?” I asked. It was an ancient picture in the corner of the cover, a grainy image of a grumpy old-time lefty making a toss off a small mound.

  None of us had a clue.

  I found a page with a code explaining who everyone on the cover was. The grump in question was a guy named “Blaze” O’Farrell, who turned out to be a pitcher for the 1944 Philadelphia Blue Jays.

  “The Blue Jays?” I said.

  “That’s right,” Mike’s dad said. “The Phils were called the Blue Jays in the 1940s, for some reason.”

  “Weird!” I said.

  “Still stunk, though,” Mike’s dad said.

  Blaze sure did. The list he was on was “worst ERAs in history.” To figure out a pitcher’s ERA, or earned run average, you divide the number of runs he gave up by the number of innings pitched. It’s a major tool for measuring how good a pitcher is. O’Farrell, it turned out, was not very good.

  A one-page chapter explained that O’Farrell played in just one game. It was June 15, 1944. He made the team after a bunch of starting pitchers got sent to fight in World War II. After that one game, he himself got sent to war. He survived the war, the book said, but never pitched again. His whole career was that one bad game. That one very bad game. He got just one out after giving up seven earned runs in the top of the first. There were other guys on the list who had given up a run without ever getting an out, giving them an ERA of infinity, but no one in all of recorded baseball history had ever given up more runs on fewer outs than Blaze. Most guys have an ERA around 4. Blaze’s earned run average was a staggering 189—the worst of all time.

  “Why did they call him ‘Blaze’?” Other Mike wanted to know.

  “Couldn’t have been because of his fastball,” I said, thinking about his terrible record.

  “I wonder if he’s still alive?” Mike asked, and then quickly added, “Nah, he must be dead.”

  “If he played ball in ’44, he’s probably only about eighty-nine,” Other Mike said. Other Mike liked to do calculations in his head. He didn’t even use his fingers, just pointed his blue eyes up to the sky, like the answers were written up there. He thought it impressed people, but, shockingly, it really didn’t ever seem to.

  “Oh, only eighty-nine?” Mike scoffed. “Yeah, he’s probably still playing ball. He’s probably still in the minors, waiting for his callback to the big leagues.”

  “We should write him a letter,” I said. “I bet he doesn’t get a lot of fan mail.”

  “Especially not if he’s dead,” Mike said.

  “I’m sure he’s alive,” Other Mike said, rubbing his hands together. “You know how they say only the good die young? Blaze O’Farrell will probably live to one hundred!”

  At this, we all cracked up. Other Mike’s laugh is like a cross between a car horn and a lawn mower. Mike’s dad was laughing too. Even Mike’s little sister, Arianna, was laughing, although she probably didn’t get the joke. I didn’t even notice her come out and flop on the lawn couch. That’s how excited I was about the book and the tale of Blaze O’Farrell.

  “So, Lenny,” Mike’s dad said. “You gonna go for Armchair Announcer? When I saw that commercial, I thought of you right away.”

  “I might do it,” I said. “But I don’t know what I’d talk about in the video— Of course!” My voice cracked as I yelled this last part. Arianna laughed at me, but I didn’t care. Mike’s dad had just given me a gift even greater than cheese balls. Now I had the perfect moment to re-create for the contest: Blaze O’Farrell’s short trip to the majors.

  “Hey, Other Mike,” I said, breaking the silence. “Can you make a video look like it’s sixty years old on your computer?”

  “Sure,” Other Mike said. “I can generate some auto-grain and add random dust particles and drop the color out to sepia tones—”

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I said, cutting him off. “But I think I’m onto something.”

  “What?” the Mikes asked in unison.

  “Meet first thing tomorrow morning at Other Mike’s and we’ll totally win that contest,” I said.

  “Totally,” Mike said.

  “Totally,” Other Mike said.

  “Totally.”

  I headed back home in time for Norbeck family dinner. Or at least that was the idea. Courtney was gone, which was nice. Mom and Dad were there, eating, technically, but mostly running around the house shoving pizza in their mouths. Work was theoretically over for the day, but Dad had a meeting at the hospital that evening and Mom made it clear that she had exciting plans to retreat to her home office and read about ventricles or whatever she did in there. I grabbed a slice or two for myself and went up to my room, where I usually eat my meals. At least the pizza was good. Pepperoni from Angelo’s.

  I picked off the pieces one by one, announcing the act out loud. It was stupid, but it made me laugh. And Lenny Norbeck puts ANOTHER
piece of pepperoni into his mouth. The crowd goes wild! Ahhhh-ahhhh-ahhh! I can make a really good crowd noise by breathing through my hands in a certain way. It sounds great. Of course at that moment Dad looked in and shook his bald head at me. Clearly I had disappointed him again.

  “Can’t you do something productive with your time for once, Lenny?” he said. “Life is not a baseball game.”

  Shut up, Dad, I thought. I’m going to win this contest. Everyone is going to be in awe of my amazing announcing skills. You’ll ask me for my autograph and I won’t even give you one. Maybe life is a baseball game. And maybe I’m about to win it.

  CHAPTER THREE

  “This—this—this insufferable turd!” Mike stammered.

  As planned, we met first thing the next morning (or, you know, noon) at Other Mike’s house. Courtney kept trying to make me clean my room, so I had to get out of there. My room wasn’t even that messy. Sure, there were a few piles of clothes on the floor and books heaped everywhere, but I was supposed to be reading a lot, right? Other Mike’s room, however, was always very tidy. The clothes were on hangers and his bookshelves were well organized, filled with neatly stacked books and small statues of wizards. Maybe warlocks. I could never tell them apart.

  I had intended to present my plan for Armchair Announcer, but Mike was hunched over Other Mike’s computer and fuming at the screen. He had recently discovered BedrosiansBeard.com—a little corner of the Internet filled with crazy Phils fans. The name came from an old Phil, Steve Bedrosian. Steve Bedrosian was a pretty good pitcher for a few years a while ago and did have a nice beard, but I’m not quite sure it deserved its own website. But that’s the Internet for you, I guess. And, yes, you’d better believe that I know it’s a little ironic for me to call anyone a “crazy Phils fan.” We’re crazy, yeah, and we’re big-time fans, but some of these dudes were seriously nuts.

  “This jerkwad calls himself PhilzFan1 but spends all his time ripping ’em!” Mike said. “How can he possibly be the number one fan if he basically hates the team?”

  “Don’t let it bother you,” Other Mike said. “Putting a 1 after your screen name doesn’t actually make you legally the number one fan. Sheesh.”

  “But—but—but,” Mike stammered.

  Other Mike laughed. “You said ‘butt,’ ” he said.

  “Shut up! This isn’t funny! PhilzFan1 said that R. J. Weathers is on steroids and still is going to end up sucking,” Mike said.

  R. J. Weathers was a top Phillies prospect. He was only nineteen, but there was a lot of talk about him being the next great pitching star. He was tearing up the minor leagues with a ninety-five-mile-an-hour fastball and a unique pitch of his own invention that supposedly fluttered like a butterfly in a windstorm.

  We were completely in awe of RJ, even Other Mike, who didn’t really care about baseball that much. I definitely didn’t like PhilzFan1 saying that RJ was on steroids, but I also didn’t like seeing Mike get so worked up. He can get grumpy quickly, and I didn’t feel like dealing with Angry Mike.

  “Weathers hasn’t even pitched a game for us yet,” I said. “Relax.”

  “Then PhilzFan1 called Famosa a woman,” Mike said. “He said they should make him a special uniform with a dress.”

  “Well, even I find that offensive,” Other Mike said, frowning. “He’s clearly not a woman. Isn’t he the Mexican guy with the silly mustache?”

  “Why do we even hang out with him?” Mike asked me, pointing a stubby finger toward Other Mike. “Famosa is Dominican and his mustache rules.”

  “You hang out with me because there’s more to life than baseball?” Other Mike responded, hoisting a warlock statue hopefully.

  Mike gave him the most skeptical face in the world. Like you had just told him that sleep wasn’t important or that nachos were not the greatest food ever.

  “Dudes,” I said, shaking my head. “It is time to focus on our entry. We will win this contest, and whatever some schmuck on the Internet says will be way too insignificant to care about.”

  “I guess you’re right,” Mike said. But while he said it, he kept typing. I noticed his finger going a lot to Shift and then 1, which meant he was getting carried away with exclamation points again.

  “You’re flaming him right now, aren’t you?” I asked.

  “Why ever would you say that?” he asked, not even trying to hide the clatter of the keys.

  I looked at the screen. It said: “PHILZFAN1, YOU ARE A NUMBER TWO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

  I reached over and pressed the Off button to put the computer out of its misery.

  “Take a deep breath,” said Other Mike. “Walk it off.”

  “Let’s focus on the video,” I said. I told them my plan: “We go old-school for the Armchair Announcer. You know plenty of people are going to do re-creations of the World Series wins or something, but I want to do a moment no one else is thinking about. I want to do Blaze O’Farrell.… Although I’m not quite sure how on earth we could film something that would look like 1944.…”

  “Captain Magnificent Superterrific to the rescue!” Other Mike said, jumping into the air. (Captain Magnificent Superterrific was one of his attempts at giving himself a new nickname to replace Other Mike. Shockingly, it did not stick. He was the only one who used it.) His glasses slid off his face, and he scrambled to put them back on, talking quickly. “I just had a great idea! My new camera has the seven-point-one upgrade, which includes roto capability and comes bundled with a free green screen!” He started digging through his closet.

  “English, please,” I said. I again had no idea what he was talking about.

  “It means,” Other Mike explained, readjusting his shorts, “that we can film you against this green sheet and then make the backdrop whatever we want.” He held up the green sheet and waved it like a bullfighter’s cape.

  “That green sheet can make it look like I’m at the ballpark?”

  “Exactly,” he said. “It can make it look like you’re anywhere.”

  “Great,” Mike said. But he was distracted. Somehow he had turned the computer back on and thus had resumed yelling about PhilzFan1.

  “You really need to let it go,” Other Mike said.

  “I will not let it go!” Mike said. “Check out this one!” He read the next post from PhilzFan1: “This team is a disgrace. If you’re a real fan, you’d stop rooting for these losers to win again and would spend your energy hoping for something that actually has a chance of happening. Like pigs flying. Or a snowball fight in Hawaii. I was thinking about calling for a boycott of this pathetic excuse for a baseball team, but what good would a boycott do? We need more drastic action. Check back here for further instructions.…”

  “What on earth could that mean?” I asked.

  “ ‘Drastic action’?” Other Mike said.

  “ ‘Further instructions’?” I said. “Okay, that part makes sense. But ‘drastic action’? It’s almost like PhilzFan1 is actually making a threat.”

  The Phils were having a rough year and hardly winning as many games as we would have liked. But why was this guy so angry? I wondered if he was a gambler and had a lot of money riding on the Phillies’ success. Since they were losing, would he take “drastic action” to make sure they won? And what did he mean by that—blackmail? Or maybe even … murder?

  “Focus!” Other Mike said. “Let me in there.” He elbowed Mike away from the computer, and his fingers started flying. He always typed incredibly fast, and sometimes he even hit the right keys. Before long he had what he wanted. He found a great picture of Shibe Park—the old stadium where Blaze had his massive blaze of stinking. “Background done,” he said. “Now we just have to film you here. And then I can work my magic. It will look exactly like you’re at Shibe.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Now all I have to do is figure out what to say.”

  “Lenny Norbeck, the boy with the golden voice,” they both said at once. Then they looked at me and smiled, their Mike faces stretched and beaming
with what seemed like pride.

  Did they really have that much confidence in me? Or were they making fun of me? I didn’t feel that sure of myself. I could do a good announcer voice, yeah. And it was easy playing announcer on the lawn couch with the Mikes as my only audience. But this would be seen by judges! It could be my big break! I started to panic. I felt my heart climb up my throat. I didn’t think I’d be able to get any words out! I’d just babble and blather like a lunatic! Everyone would laugh at me.

  “How much time do I have to figure it out?” I asked. My voice squeaked at the end. I hated when it did that.

  The Mikes laughed.

  “It’s fine if you’re nervous,” Mike said, ignoring my question and patting me on the shoulder. “I still get nervous when I have to floss my teeth.”

  Other Mike and I looked at each other for a long moment. At the same second, we both cracked up.

  “Who gets nervous about flossing?” Other Mike said, sputtering, laughing so hard he could barely get the words out. I almost felt bad. Almost.

  “Shut up,” Mike said. “Sometimes it makes you bleed. Never mind. Whatever. Let’s get to work.”

  “We have time, Flossie,” Other Mike said. “We still have to find out some more stuff about Blaze and what exactly went down at that game so Lenny has something to announce about.”

  I breathed a sigh of relief. They weren’t making fun of me. The Mikes were going to help me. Of course they were—they were my best friends. And with their help, maybe I’d actually win this thing.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  The next day, I made Mom happy by telling her I had big plans to spend the whole day at the library. It was true, but not because I was trying to shatter that reading club record. I had research to do. Armchair Announcer research. I figured that we could get a little more information on Blaze’s story and then I’d know what to say.