The Bullpen Gospels - Dirk Hayhurst [91]
Aside from a few new faces, the bullpen had mugs I’d come to know as friends through previous seasons. We’d been through a lot of battles together. Surviving the minors is a war of attrition, and we’d braved the odds at each other’s side, something that, in a game of production or extinction, is worth honoring. There was a feeling of belonging by suiting up with these guys again.
Beyond our individual histories, the Missions’ bullpen was a simple matter of ones and threes. One finger for the hard-sinking fastballs and three for nasty sliders. Everyone in the pen threw them, almost as if it were a fraternity requirement. If you had asked any of the boys about the suspicious absence of a changeup, they would have replied that changeups are for pussies.
I threw a changeup, incidentally.
We didn’t talk much that night. I was new and so I kept quiet, which was fine because I had a lot to think about. I tried to remind myself I was on the track to being a prospect again, even though I didn’t feel like one since talking to my folks. I told myself that their reaction was okay and that they didn’t have to be stunned by a promotion to Double-A right now. If I put up good numbers, they will be impressed. Besides, I could still walk up to anyone in this stadium with my uniform on and make his day. Baseball had power, and I was its wielder.
When the last out of the game was made, I picked up the stray catch balls littering the pen. It was my job, as the latest addition to the Missions’ bullpen staff, to wrangle up leftover equipment and cart it back to the locker room come game’s end. While I herded balls back into their bag, fans predictably called down to me in hopes of receiving leftovers.
I put each ball back into the catch bag except one, a chewed-up fifty-five footer, the victim of a slider that ate dirt before it found a mitt. I placed that ball in my back pocket, earmarking it to give away. I finished equipment duties, grabbed the pen bag and zipped it shut, picked up my glove, and started walking the stretch of warning track toward the lockers.
The entire trip back to the pen, fans begged—leaning over the rails, calling to me for the ball, any ball, including the one in my back pocket. I walked by them, disciplined eyes straight ahead, ignoring. Their anticipation turned to letdown and then their letdown to anger. They told me I sucked for ignoring them, which incidentally I also ignored. I’ve spent enough time in this game to develop insult immunity when I don’t meet fan expectations.
I was going to give the ball in my pocket out to someone; that’s the whole reason I kept it separate. I didn’t know who yet; I was waiting for someone to catch my eye. Passing out a free ball is tricky business. It can make one person happy and a whole bunch of others angry, like these fickle folks chewing me out. Everyone will say he or she deserves it, everyone has a kid at his first game, it’s everyone’s birthday, and everyone is a lifelong fan.
When I went into the underbelly of the stadium, onto the concourse running beneath the seats, I walked past a fenced section that exposed some of the stadium’s innards to the fans. The fencing came together to form a gate where carts and supplies could enter. A security guard manned the gate from my side, keeping fans who lined the links of the section in check on the other. They, too, called to me as I went past.
On the far side of the gate, I noticed a boy in a wheelchair. When I saw him, I stopped. I can’t read minds and I can’t search souls, but I wanted to give this kid the ball in my pocket. It just felt like the right thing to do. Moreover it felt like something I needed to do. I pulled the ball free and walked to the gate.
I asked the security guard to let me through. He obliged, opening it for me. I stepped