The bottom of the third would start off with Theo, Noah, and me. If I thought Theo's good pitching in the top of the third would translate to good hitting in the bottom of the inning, then I was completely mistaken. Theo had an ugly swing, but it made sense now that I think about it. As a sophomore who made the varsity team as a pitcher, that's probably where all of his attention and focus went to. He struck out swinging in three pitches.
Noah was only slightly better by making contact and hitting a grounder into play. It went straight to the first baseman though, who only had to scoop it up and tag first go an unassisted play.
Two outs, and I'm up with the bases empty. Like Coach had talked about, I needed to make the pitcher work. Only Zeke had made him throw more than seven pitches while everyone else did less. I stepped into the batter's box with my mind made up.
I worked myself up to a full count, and fouled the rest of them off. Even a call that would be 'ball four' was fouled down the line. As the pitcher got to double digits just facing me alone, I could hear his team behind him. They shouted out words of encouragement, trying to keep him spirited.
Unlike some aggressive pitcher, he never aimed for me and stuck with the strike zone. Finally he threw a ball that bounced before home plate, letting me earn that walk. I liked swinging and getting a hit, but it felt good to see the pitcher wipe away some sweat as I jogged to first.
The pitcher must have been at least a little fatigued by now, and started to show some sloppiness in his form. Mahki was able to send one to the outfield, pushing me to second while he safely reached first. I thought about making a run to third, but I know my limits, I'm not as fast as Noah and some other guys on the team. Plus, Zeke was up.
Zeke stepped up and looked comfortable in the righty's box. Anything close and he would swing. That's the pressure he gave off. The pitcher seemed to think so as well, starting off with a couple of balls to the outside, making the count 2-0. The pitcher tried one inside, but Zeke was apparently looking for it. He took a giant step forward and with the swing of his bat, he sent the ball flying.
With two outs, I was instructed to run on any contact with the ball. So I didn't bother to turn and look. I just took off sprinting, tagging third and going home. That's where I saw the home plate umpire waving his finger in the air in a circular motion. It was a home run!
I tagged home for the first run of the game and turned to wait for the other two. Mahki wasn't far behind me. He tagged home plate then waited beside me after we shared a high five.
As soon as Zeke tagged home, we pounced on him, slapping his shoulder and back. Zeke grinned down at me and patted my helmet. "You did well."
"You too!" I smiled back at him.
The three of us went back to the dugout together, where we were bombarded with cheers and slaps of happiness from our teammates. I maneuvered through everybody and got back to my bag.
"He crushed that one!" Noah said excitedly as he came back from the crowd. "You probably didn't see it as you ran, but it went well over the center field fence. That's gotta be his furthest one yet!" I realized that Noah took pride in everything Zeke did. But if I had a brother like him, I would too.
The inning quickly ended after that last spurt of action. Brian was the last out: sending a high, but short, fly ball to left field.
Top of the fourth. Theo continued to stay on the mound. At first that didn't look like a good idea to me after he allowed a double to the cleanup hitter. But after that, he had smooth sailing. Batter five hit a pop up just foul of the third base line, which was an easy catch for Jason, and an easy out for the team. Batter six hit a routine grounder to Noah at short, which was great since the runner didn't dare to try and advance. Batter seven ended the inning with a groundout to Jason at third.
Oddly, the bottom of the fourth went the same way. Jason led us off with a double, but then the rest of offense died. Sean struck out looking. Kelvin grounded out to second, also unable to advance our runner to third. But that didn't matter because Chris, who pinched hit for Theo, had hit a fly ball right to the center fielder to end the fourth.
Coach didn't keep Chris in the game after that. He just used him for hitting before giving that position in the lineup to a new pitcher. Dave.
Dave showed the meaning of a 'dominant performance' in the top of the fifth. Batter eight and nine had both struck out looking. The top of the lineup wasn't any better…he struck out looking. A clean inning for Dave! A perfect inning!
Dave strutted back to the dugout with his head held high. No doubt he could hear his parents cheer from the stands. Then he was complimented while everyone got back to the dugout.
"That was great!"
"Crazy!"
"When did you get so good?"
"I was always this good." Dave snorted, and started to flex his pitching arm. "I just can't hold myself back anymore."
Garret laughed. "It was against the bottom of the lineup. I'm not impressed. I could do the same thing if I was brought in to pitch only one inning."
Dave glared at him. "Who said I was only pitching one inning?"
"I did." Coach slapped his left shoulder. "Good work. Cool down properly. I don't want that arm to crumble before the end of the season."
Dave pouted while rubbing his shoulder. "That Burt Coach. Both inside and out. Why can't I continue? I thought I came in to finish it."
"I'm giving the rest of the guys a chance to get some game experience." His eyes narrowed. "And I heard you and Kyle had pitched quite a lot yesterday."
Dave expressed a look of guilt before shooting a glare at Zeke. "You snitched?"
Zeke didn't look bothered. "I told you guys to stop throwing so hard. You knew we had a game today."
Coach clapped his hands before Dave could start to quarrel. "Enough. We're still playing a game here. Noah, Jake, and Mahki, you three should already be prepared for your at-bats. Get helmets on and move. Everyone else needs to watch the game and stop the chitchatting."
Everyone started to move, afraid of ticking off Coach. We still had to perform well enough to not have practice this afternoon.
Noah was the quickest, grabbing his stuff and running out. I also exchanged my hat for a helmet and my glove for my bat. I moved to the on deck circle, watching Noah's at-bat.
