The Hitting Zone

Game Two Lineup:

1 3B Jason Morris

2 1B Julian Wilson

3 LF Mahki Holstrom

4 CF Zeke Atkins

5 RF Antonio Perkola

6 2B John Roberts

7 SS Daniel Myers

8 C Kelvin Bender

9 P James Lohr

Noah and I depressingly looked at the lineup as the starters took the field. As the seeded team, we were given home field advantage again. Which means we bat last in the inning and coach got to pick the third base side dugout again.

"Take a seat boys." Mr. Miller slapped our backs and pointed at the bench. "Pay attention and try to learn something new."

Noah pouted. "What could I possibly learn? I know everything this is to know about baseball."

Mr. Miller slapped him upside the head, knocking his hat off. "It's that kind of attitude that will be your downfall. Watch. Study. See what you can learn. And improve." He walked over to Coach Wilcox.

Noah sighed and picked up his hat, putting it back on his head. We walked midway down the bench and sat with the other guys, getting a new point of view.

"The bench not good enough for you, Noah?" Chris sneered. He sat on the very end to watch the game.

Noah sat up righteously. "No. It's not. I'm not satisfied sitting here. Can't say the same for you though. You're probably happy you could still even be on this team."

Chris started to get up and move. I flinched back. Only a deep voice held Chris back. "Quit your bickering. This is a team. We're a team. No sense in dragging one another down." I peeked over to see Sean settling the fight. I didn't know much about him but he always laughed and joked with everybody on the team. "Watch the game. Let's cheer for our teammates."

I quickly turned to watch the game that was about to start. James was ready on the mound. I tugged on Noah's sleeve to try and distract him from angry Chris.

He looked at me. "What is it?"

I pointed at James who began pitching to the other team.

"James? Are you wondering why coach picked him over Dave and Garret?" His mood lightened up as I gave a nod. "James is a junk pitcher."

I raised an eyebrow.

"It means he can throw a lot of junk. He can mix in all kinds of pitches. His fastball isn't very fast, but he has a change up, slider, curve, splitter and sinker."

Can one guy really throw that many different pitches? This is just high school baseball right?

"The price of throwing all that junk when your body is still developing is too high. James doesn't care though. He likes to mess around with his pitches, trying for more movement than speed."

I didn't really get it. Why do it, if he knows it's bad for him? I studied the guy on the mound as he made batter one groundout. Then batter two pop out. And batter three groundout. As the team jogged back to the dugout, I watched as James walked back with his head held high, smiling. Then it hit me. We were similar. He pitches the way he wants, knowing the consequences, the same reason why I would still hit baseball in the batting cages even though playing baseball would make my mom angry: because we like it. He likes the way he pitches and he's just enjoying the moment. I found solace in the cages and enjoyed the comfort it gave me.

As I was lost in my thoughts, our guys had started their offense. Jason was the lead off man this time around with Noah sitting on the bench.

"Earlier, he went 0-2 with a sac bunt." Noah sighed. "And now he's taking my spot. The injustice."

I thought back to game one. Jason was batting sixth; he had grounded out, struck out, and did that bunt that allowed Zeke to score. "Shouldn't that be 0-3?" I mumbled, unsure.

"A successful sacrifice bunt does not count as an at bat, nor does it impact a player's batting average." Noah informed me. "If Zeke was unable to score at that moment, then Jason would be 0-3."

I nodded. Okay. That's understandable I guess. I looked to see how Jason was doing. He was fairing pretty well at the plate compared to game one. He connected on a pitch, and it turned into a bloop single just over the shortstops head. The center fielder was quick to react and returned it to the pitcher just as Jason reached first. Our team clapped in the dugout.

"That's Jason's first varsity hit." Noah smiled. "Not bad."

We clapped as well. Julian got up to bat next.

"He went 1-3 last game. His hit was a double." Noah reminded me.

I gave him a side eye and said in a low voice. "Double. Fly out to outfield. Groundout. No runs batted in, no runs scored."

Noah looked at me, impressed. "So you remember these details too. Good. It helps to have a good memory in baseball."

We watched as Julian smacked a hard grounder between the legs of the pitcher and sneak past between the shortstop and second baseman. Jason sprinted and safely made it to third, and Julian stopped at first base as the ball was returned to the infield.

Mahki came up to bat next. 2-3 last game, with one RBI, and one run scored. In terms of hitting, I would say he's only second to Zeke. Unfortunately, at this at bat, he hit a Nice grounder to the shortstop, who threw to second, to first. A 6-4-3 double play. Two outs. But thankfully Jason made it home as the fielders were focused on getting the two outs.

"Why did they ignore Jason?" I asked Noah, confused on why you would ignore a runner that would score. Especially when it was a grounder to an infielder. He could have easily thrown it home so Jason would be tagged out.