The Hitting Zone

Top of the third inning, our team took the field. Garret stepped on the mound and started to throw some practice pitches to Jordan.

"At least Garret is doing better than that Brett guy." Kyle commented. "One hit versus no hits."

Noah rolled his eyes. "Stop thinking like a pitcher and comparing stats. What we need is to score."

Garret was able to get the seventh batter to groundout to John at second. And then struck out the eighth batter.

"Now he's even beating him in strikeouts." Dave added.

Unfortunately, he couldn't keep up the perfect game and gave up a single to the ninth batter, bringing up Brett McCauley. For a sophomore, I felt that Brett was pretty tall compared to Sean. He stood in the box and faced down Garret.

"Get him, Gare!" Jason hollered. The rest of us bench guys clapped and cheered as well to bring life to the game. The stands only held parents since it was a weekend and the students wouldn't usually come, especially for a mid morning game.

Garret went at him with his cut fastball from the start, getting a couple of swinging strikes. Then he threw a ball to the outside, hoping to get him to chase but the guy didn't fall for it. With a 1-2 count, he connected on a fastball slightly out of the zone and got it past the shortstop, earning him a single and advancing the other runner to second.

"I could have gotten that." Noah huffed, then he glanced at the twins. "Look at you two, jinxing Garret. Now he has more strikeouts and hits."

The twins ignored him and watched as Garret struck out batter number two with ease.

"Not even shaken after giving up back-to-back hits." Kyle said.

"Averaging more than one strikeout an inning." Dave mumbled.

"Pitchers.." Noah just shook his head.

With our offense back up in the bottom of the third inning, we failed to even get on base. John grounded out to third. Daniel pop out to left. And Julian sent a long fly to center.

Top of the fourth, Katella High School up to bat. Groundout to second. Groundout to short. Then a surprising walk from Garret to the fifth batter. But nothing came of it as batter number six hit a soft roller to short, and Daniel lightly tossed it to John at second to get the runner. Three outs.

Bottom of the fourth brought up our better batters and it showed. Garret and Mahki both got singles and stood on second and first, respectively, as Zeke stepped up to bat. Zeke wasn't held down to just a single this time...instead...he smash another homer. His sixth of the season. Zeke made the score 3-0. The team crowded and congratulated him and the other runners as they made it back to the dugout.

"Finally." Noah let out.

I raised an eyebrow. "Were you worried?"

He gave me a weak smile. "Just a smidge. Can you blame me? Three straight scoreless innings stresses me out. Especially when you have someone like Zeke on your team. With him in our lineup, could you ever see us being shutout?"

I shook my head. "That would take a very good pitcher."

Noah nodded.

Alas, our offense died there. Jordan grounded out to second. Chris struck out looking. And Tony grounded out to third. The team switched to defense.

A sigh came out. I looked to the one looking depressed and found that it was Sean who had let out that heavy breath of air. "Are you okay?" I asked.

Startled, he stared at me, wide eyed. "Are you talking to me?"

I turned red with embarrassment, but was able to force myself to nod and continue. "You sighed. A heavy sigh. Like you're not happy."

Sean gave a tight smile. "I'm not happy. Tony is still hitless, yet I'm still on the bench. It's a hard life."

I scrunched up my nose. "That doesn't make your life hard...just a little sad. For a moment."

"Yea Sean." Noah jumped in the conversation. "You don't have a hard life. Just a hard moment you have to suffer through. You calling this a hard life is an insult to others who've been through something truly awful."

Sean patted his own head awkwardly. "Oh. Sorry, Jake. I didn't mean it so literally. Just an expression."

I shrugged. "I wasn't saying that to make you feel bad for me. Even I don't have a hard life. Just hard moments."

Noah smiled. "I'm so proud. Look at you talking to someone for so long and with such deep meanings."

I blushed and pushed him away, trying to put my attention back on the game. Garret got the first guy to groundout to short and the next guy to strikeout swinging, bringing up the ninth batter who had a single at his last at-bat. Strangely, Garret walked him by pitching all over the place.

Up next was Brett McCauley. And just like last time, there was a runner on first and two outs. Unlike last time though, he didn't chase Garret's cut fastball, and instead, patiently waited for a ball over the plate that matched up to his taste. He sent a line drive between Zeke and Tony in the outfield and took off running. The runner on base didn't waste any time either and hustled to third as the batter made it to second for a stand up double. The Katella dugout went wild, cheering for Brett's hit.

"He connected on all three of his at-bats versus Garret." Noah remarked. "He's good. No doubt."

I nodded in agreement. Although...I could connect against Garret any time on any pitch. But it's wrong to compare oneself with someone of lesser skill. Now, comparing our fielding, there isn't much to say since there wasn't much to see. As for pitching, he easily beats me. I struggle so desperately with arm strength, that I'm not even a cutoff man when I should be.

Garret didn't let it get to him, and still came at the following batter just as fiercely, getting him to strikeout for the third time this game. The dugout whooped as our team jogged back in.

"Gotta get that boy a sombrero!" Sean hollered our happily. Then stood up to clap Garret on the back for a job well done.

"A sombrero?" I asked aloud, more than slightly confused.

"It's when you strikeout three times in a game." Noah explained. "A golden sombrero is when you strikeout four times in one game. Platinum for five. Titanium for six. But those are super rare. The record for strikeouts in a nine inning game in the mlb is five. The players who got six, had extra innings. Giancarlo Stanton, from the Yankees, was the first major leaguer to record two platinum sombreros in one season. There have only been eight guys with titanium sombreros. But again...they all went in extra innings."

Noah started to rattled off weird stats that I couldn't fathom, and spoke of players I've never heard of. I didn't want to say anything, but I never really watched the MLB. I couldn't at home so it was only in passing in public locations, where you would be unable to hear the broadcasters. So...I nodded along and pretended to understand.