Baseball
For twenty years grandpa played a sport that, in my opinion, can be very boring, yet at the same time engage someone like nothing else can. He started officially playing when he was eight, playing all the way until he was twenty-eight; he played on quite a few different teams, some of which he probably didn’t tell me he was on. Unfortunately a mind blowing concussion ending his baseball career and had a domino effect on the rest of his life, but we’ll get to that later.
He was the varsity baseball team captain his senior year in high school and led his team to a great season. Grandpa didn’t tell me whether or not it was a winning season, he just said it was a great one, leading me to believe that the team had a blast, and on top of that, it may have been a winning season. He recalls no specific games in high school, he simply doesn’t remember because it was so long ago. However, he does recall that he played on the same team with his best friend all through high school and college. It was a hot and steamy day at the Concord Prison, to the extent that all anybody wanted to do was jump in any body of water, and it didn’t matter where or what that may have been. My grandfather took his sweaty Weston Town Team baseball cap off and flopped it back on his head, as if trying to kill a spider that had been residing there the whole game. He stood confidently at second base, throwing his hand in his mitt, feeling that this next play was going to be perfect; he couldn’t have been more wrong. He watched carefully as the batter slid up to home plate, and as the catcher bounced on his feet a few times and slammed down into a squat. The park was silent, as if anticipating what would happen next, not that there were very many people there anyway. The pitcher gently placed his fingers on the red laces of the leather hardball. Grandpa unconsciously watched his every move, and knowing his pitcher, he knew that he was about to pitch a fastball. Suddenly, the ball flew out of the pitcher’s hand, a four-seam fastball, straight into the catcher’s forgiving mitt. Strike one. The catcher tossed the ball back to the pitcher, who quickly caught it, so he could turn around and think tactics with himself. |
The slideshow below is a few pictures from a fun family baseball game we had a few years ago
He stood there for a little while, facing my grandfather; the pitcher seemed to be wondering what to throw: a fastball, a breaking ball, a changeup, or something else? When he decided on the right pitch, he gingerly turned around to face the batter, who was practicing his swing as he waited. Curveball: the batter never saw it coming, and it was strike two. Grandpa was confident that this batter would strike out. Grandpa looked at the pitcher, expecting to see the pitcher still thinking; however, he had already thrown the next pitch. It was a zinger, a circle change; however, that didn’t stop that beefy prisoner from blasting the ball. Grandpa looked up just in time to see a baseball smash right into his face. My grandpa was down and out, and he would stay down for another 35 minutes. This last out of his baseball career had a domino affect on his life outside the park.
|
https://yale.prestosports.com/sports/m-basebl/new_yale_baseball_header.jpg?max_width=475&max_height=133&crop=true