The Hitting Zone

Saturday morning, our team met up at the school to board the bus. It was just us so everyone got their own row and started to spread out. These were my favorite kind of trips.

When we got to the neutral location, we unloaded our bags from the bus and followed Garret to the field. The first game, we were considered visitors and would sit in the first base dugout. As we set our bags down and got unpacked, looking to change into cleats, Coach started to address the team.

"Today, we're facing a familiar opponent. We did a doubleheader with them last year and won both with ease. Garret did game one and the twins split game two." Coach recapped. "Today, we're going with Joey in game one. Game two will be Brian's." He looked at Brian. "But you'll pair up with Oscar so Mitchell can have a break."

Everyone looked towards Oscar, the only freshman on the team. He stared blankly back at Coach.

"Is that a problem, Garcia?" Coach called him out by his last name, looking for a response.

"Small problem." He answered, causing some of the guys to snicker. He ignored the laughs and looked at Coach, serious as can be. "Am I supposed to make the pitch decisions in game two? Or will I look to you in the dugout for the calls?"

"Good question." Coach nodded. "I'll make the decisions early on. If we get a good lead, I'll leave it up to you and Brian to figure out." His eyes drifted to me. "Jake, you'll start on the bench."

My lips twitched and I looked to Noah.

Noah reached out to pat me on the head. "Maybe you'll get a chance to pinch hit."

"You will too." Coach commented. "Anyone on the bench will always have a chance to pinch hit or pinch run."

Noah was stunned. "What? You're going to bench me too?" He saw that Coach was serious. "Who will be the middle infielders without the both of us? Dalton can't be in two places at once."

"Dalton will play short." Coach stated. "Sean at second." He looked to Jason. "Jason will cover first and Jesse will play third."

Coach had really thought this one through. Sean was the utility guy last year, abled to play anywhere. Makes sense that he can shift. Jason has already tried out first base just a couple weeks ago and there was no need to talk about Jesse, the former JV Defensive MVP.

Noah let out a heavy sigh. "I should have trained even harder yesterday."

Garret reached out to pat his shoulder. "Rest is good for you. Gives your body time to heal up. And from the bench you can get a new perspective. Maybe help Jake out with positioning or something."

"I'm glad you feel that way, Garret." Coach nodded at him. "Because you'll be on the bench with them. Korrey, Logan, and Tanner will be the starting outfielders."

"But Coach...I'm the captain." Garret was stunned.

"So lead by example." Noah grinned.

"You're such a baby." Kyle scoffed. "You might as well get used to watching games because when you get drafted, they're not going to let you be a dual-player." He looked at Coach. "Can I go to the bullpen?"

"Sure. Everyone but Garret and Dave." Coach stated.

"Coach, I've been off all week." Garret stood up. "Let me at least go to the bullpen for a throwing session."

Coach shook his head. "You may not have had any games or official practices, but I know you. You didn't rest this week. Don't worry, you'll be in the lineup on Monday." He looked around at the rest of the team. "Just because I'm benching the two best hitters on our team, doesn't mean I'm trying to make this a close game. No. We have a good team with a solid foundation. I'm giving everyone an opportunity to show why they made this roster. Don't prove me wrong."

"If it's close, we would still have a chance to see some action." Noah muttered under his breath.

I looked around and saw the guys being energized by Coach's speech. They were ready for the challenge even before warmups. Especially those that didn't see the field often. "Maybe Dave will take us to the cages tonight." Because I don't see us getting a chance to play today.

Noah nodded. Then he laughed. "Mom and Dad are lucky they didn't split up. I would have felt bad for whoever got stuck with our games to only not watch us play."

I nodded in agreement. Mom and Dad went to Stanford today to watch Zeke's game this afternoon and tomorrow afternoon. At first they debated whether they should go at all, then maybe if they should split up, to ultimately deciding that Zeke didn't have a whole lot of home games they could see often. They would be gone by the time we got home later today. Grampa would be in charge tonight to make sure that we get home and eat properly, with the added bonus of making sure Kyle was home before curfew. It was pretty much a given that he would be spending all his free time with Marie.

After warmups, Noah, me, and Garret were banished to the far bench, out of the way for the starters. Garret and Noah were great to have around for comments about the game, but when Dave came by, it just became a competition between him and Garret. Or him and Garret talking about Joey on the mound.

Joey had a great start for game one, not allowing a relief pitcher to take his spot out there. He shut down ACA, holding them to just three hits and no runs. With the help of our offense taking a ten run lead, the game ended after five innings. Mercy-ruled them real quick. Everyone had hits with Sean having the most RBI's thanks to a three-run home run. Joey had five strikeouts, averaging one an inning. He also gave up a walk, earning some lecturing from Dave and Garret.

Game two lasted longer, time wise. Not inning wise. It was another mercy rule, but Brian lost the shutout. I wouldn't say he lost to Joey in the stats department though. He also gave up three hits, yet he had more strikeouts at seven and had no walks. Tough to compare.

The bats stayed alive for the offense, not giving any of us benchers a chance to hit. We won game two 13-1. Sean had another home run, really padding his stats. No one in the lineup came up empty-handed, either getting hits, RBI's, or scoring runs.

Seeing everyone so happy, I no longer felt bad being on the bench. Coach was right to give the other guys some game time to get them in the spirit of things. Everyone looked confident as we reloaded the bus and went back to school in the mid-afternoon.

"I'm texting Mom that we're already heading home." Noah said. "If we had known that both games would be finished so soon, we probably could have gone to see Zeke play too."

I checked the time. "No way, his game today started at 2pm. It's already 3:30pm so it might even be halfway over." I went to pull up the box score.