It was a cold and barely lit morning. It was 9 A.M but it felt like 5 A.M because it was a weekend. We had a game today, so I was warming up my arm with a teammate. Coach walked towards me and asked, “Have you ever pitched before?”
“No,” I answered.
“Do you dare to try?”
“Sure,” I said. Truth is I had always dreamed of being a pitcher. Ever since I started playing baseball a couple of years ago I had great respect for the position and hoped some day coach would call me upon me to pitch. I had never stood on the mound and delivered a pitch towards home plate during practice. I had once in a pick-up game a year ago, but not once since.
I warmed up with the catcher, he was calm and nice, I looked up to him and had great respect for him because of the elegant way he played. I threw the ball from in front of the mound at first, then from behind, and then I got on it. I threw a couple of strikes that went right down the pipe towards home (four-seem fastballs), some that took a curved down and to the right (two-seem fastballs) in which I accidentally threw with my palm facing outwards, and some that started up and away for a righty which dropped nastily into the down and inside corner (which I wasn’t sure if it would be called a screwball or a sharp sinker).
We batted first, and the first two walked. I came up to the plate and saw four pitches, all balls, and took a base. Two more walks and a hit to short, left field took me from first to home. We batted around, so I came up to bat once again in the same inning. I took another walk, this time on six pitches. A hit to right field moved me to second, and I started for third. The ball beat me to the base for so much I turned around and prayed they would make a mistake.
The third baseman threw it to second, making me stop, and try for third again. It got to a point where I was five feet from third (and the third baseman), and the shortstop (and the ball) where five feet to the other side of me. If the shortstop tried to tag me, I would just run for third and hope for the best. If he threw it to third I would go back to second and continue the rundown. He did neither, and I inched closer to the bag until I was at a distance where I thought it was safe to make a break for it. I took off and slid feet first. The rocks of the infield scraped my leg, and I accidentally laid my weight on my arm. I was called safe, and the runner from first got to second. This I would call a heads-up play. My arm throbbed in pain. It wasn’t a scrape or a bruise. It was the bone. I came home on another hit, and sat in the dugout hoping I would feel better.
It didn’t feel much better, and now I had to pitch. I was given a couple of warm-up throws but my arm was failing me. I was pounded in the inning, mostly thanks to the first baseman because he couldn’t make rather two-out play that would have ended the inning with low damage. Instead they scored six runs on that. Another play was flunked by the first baseman and I got furious. I yelled a couple of phrases at him, nothing rude but I do admit it wasn’t on the best tone of voice. On the next play I got the batter to pop-up and thank god the first baseman wasn’t there fielding because I swear he would have dropped it.
I learned that even if you learn fast or think you can do something, you can’t do something in a game that you have never practiced. Also, luck can get the best of you in situations that matter the most.
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