Aftermaths

The rest of the game feels almost like an afterthought, at least to me. When play resumes, Khatri has trouble getting his arm loose at first. His allotted number of warm-up throws don’t seem to be enough to do the trick, and his command is off. His 1-1 pitch to Grant is a curve which he bounces in the dirt; it gets far enough away from the catcher for me to take second. Grant hits the next pitch fairly deep to right, but foul. In a lot of parks, it would be into the stands, but ours has a lot of foul territory, so their right fielder is able to catch it at the wall. He has his back to me; when he catches the ball, he doesn’t immediately turn and throw, so I take off. The crowd roars, of course, and he spins around. He sees me running and rushes a throw to third, which is far enough off-line that Khatri cuts it off. Duke follows with a single up the middle, and it’s 3-0. By now, Khatri is pulling himself together, and though Greg Jefferson, our first baseman, gives him a battle, the sixth pitch of the at-bat is strike three, swinging.

The next time I come up, there are two on and two out, and my focus is still shot. Khatri strikes me out on four pitches and makes me look silly doing it. The crowd is silent; I haven’t been around very long, but they already find that unexpected. The time after that, though, I take a good pitch—a changeup low and in, a ground-ball pitch—and split the outfielders with a high liner to right-center. Khatri gets the ball back, stares at me for a moment, and tips his hat to me before turning to the next batter. Our fans cheer in delight, but he ignores them. He fans both Grant and Duke to strand me at second.

Fortunately for us, Doug keeps dealing, and the Colonels don’t get a runner past second until late in the game. They manage to scratch out a run, but that’s all they get, giving us a most unexpected 3-1 win to open the series. I’ll take our Saturday and Sunday starters over theirs any day, so our chances look pretty good. I ought to be happy—3-4 with a pair of doubles and two runs; I did my job out there and contributed to a big win—but I’m not. The only time I smile is when Doug comes over to my locker and says, “Hey, Rocket, you gotta hear this. Some reporter asked Khatri about you, and he scratched his head, kinda grunted, and said, ‘That sonofabitch is hard to get out.’” Doug laughs delightedly, and I join him. I thank him, with an honest grin on my face, and he slaps me on the back and wanders off.

I think about nicknames for a moment. The Colonels call Rick “Woody” because he doesn’t like it, as much as anything. The guys here dubbed me “Rocket Man” on day one because of my foot speed (or lack thereof), but as I kept hitting, it changed from a teasing comment on my speed to a respectful—and maybe even affectionate?—acknowledgement of how hard I hit the ball. That may be in part why it’s more and more just “Rocket,” though that’s probably mostly just typical elision. Still—I’d rather be me than Rick, and not just because I’m uninjured.

As I’m getting ready to leave the clubhouse, I hear something that reinforces that thought. Chad Jackson, our center fielder, is talking to somebody, sounding puzzled. “They were real evasive. The media kept trying to get Garrido to tell them how long the kid would be out, and he wouldn’t give ’em a straight answer for nothin’. He just wouldn’t talk about it. He did talk about the wrist injury and how long that would take to heal, and he talked a little about the head injury, but whenever they tried to get him to tell ’em when he expected the kid to play again, he clammed up. Kinda weird—makes me wonder if the head is worse than they’re lettin’ on.” It makes me wonder if it’s because Addair talked to Garrido, I think; but I can hardly say that.

Heather meets me outside the clubhouse with a smile that eases my heart. I take her hand and we head out to her hotel room.