19

The Freshman Fireballer

The Whippets won the game, and I worked Sunday night and Monday morning polishing my story, and made Roger Guppy a hero of the first order, a rookie hooker, a blazing young southpaw, a Whippet rifleman, a freshman fireballer , and Ronnie Piggott was a fleet-footed shagger who patrolled the garden and garnered flies, and the Perfesser became the veteran speedster and he came up to the dish and got a ticket to first, whereupon he purloined second and was in position to waltz home when Roger Guppy larruped a mighty sacrifice fly deep in the garden. The next inning, Roger snagged a scorcher at shoelace level and tossed the pill to shortstop Rasmussen to set up a 1-6-3 DP, erasing an Avon rally. The old spitballer Ernie (mound main-stay Ernie Sauer) came in for Roger in the eighth and toyed with the Avon stickman before giving him his walking papers. Backstopper Milkman Boreen became a slugger, a cloutsman, a lumberman : he applied the lumber to the ball, powering a homer and sending the Avon twirler to the showers. Our boys drilled the ball, they hammered the ivory, kissed the apple, aired the orb, pummeled the pill, pasted the pellet, rammed the radish, tore into the tomato, slammed the spheroid, overpowered the oval, bounced a beaut into the bleachers, sent one by airmail. They donned their spikes and crossed bats with the foe and brought home the bacon. They rang the bell, stole the show, and took the verdict. They jolted the Bards, squelched their rally, settled their hash, and wowed the fans.

 

 

The big sister was steamed over me breaking into print in the Herald Star and complained bitterly to Daddy that she was pulling more than her fair share of the load, dishwashing-wise. She watched my yardwork like a hawk for any sign of slackery and was overjoyed to point out a few incipient dandelions by the birdbath. She told Mother that there definitely was smoke on my breath. And she snatched up the paper on Wednesday and opened it to the sports page (“Whippets Limn Avon, 5-4, As Guppy Pitches 9-hitter”) and read it out loud, my first story, shrieking at every poetic turn of phrase. Portside flinger Roger Guppy twirled a nifty nine-hitter—“Twirled! Did he have a baton? Were there tassels on his hat? Why don’t you just say pitched?” I liked twirled because it lent some artfulness to the pitching. But there was no explaining that to her. Local baseballites were treated to a thrilling sixth-stanza swatfest by sticksmiths Piggott and Tommerdahl, who larruped the leather for back-to-back round-trippers, hoisting the home nine from the cellar to sixth rung in the New Soo circuit.

It was a small story, six paragraphs and box score, sandwiched between a column of Cards of Thanks (“The Joseph Schrunk family wishes to thank everyone at Our Lady of Perpetual Responsibility Church for their kindness and prayers during our father’s recent illness”) and an article from the state home-extension service about how to liven up your summer dinner table with colorful centerpieces made from milk cartons, and it was a real bell-ringer, including the line an auspicious sortie behooving incipient contenders as the Whippets thwarted the pliant Bards, to plaintive entreaties from the drowsy crowd.

I dropped by the ballpark Wednesday evening for practice and there was Roger in the dugout, rubbing oil into his glove. He offered me a cold beer from under the bench. I declined. He said, “Nice story about the game. I like your style, man. You really know your onions.” He finished with the glove and started oiling his shoes.

I would’ve gladly oiled them for him. My face burned from the compliment. I sat at the end of the bench. “Yeah,” I said. “It was a good game.”

He said, “Kate said you write other stuff.”

“Yes,” I said. “Poems. Stories. Different things. Whatever I think of.”

“I really envy somebody who can do that. Just make things up.”

“It’s not that hard once you get going.”

 

 

To the great surprise of all, the Whippets won their first three games, with Roger on the mound every time. He was a stomper. The opposition was accustomed to feasting on the big meatballs served up by the Whippets’ knuckleballer, Ernie Sauer, and instead, here was a barn-burning aces-high pitcher who tossed his hair back and wound up, his right knee tucked under his chin, and kicked and threw a hard one under your chin and one across the plate, low and slow, and a third one breaking up and in, and the umpire pointed you to the dugout and off you went, carrying the bat like you had never seen one before.

I sat in the press box game after game and tried not to breathe too much of Jim Dandy’s cigar smoke and gave Roger a nice write-up and also Ronnie and Milkman and Fred Schue and even the Perfesser if he didn’t mess up too bad. The others, like Boots Merkel and Orville Tollefson, there wasn’t much to say about. They were dead weight in the batting order, and in the field they were obstructions, like trees or boulders. Hit a ball at any of them, it bounced off.

Uncle Sugar waited for me after Roger won his third game (Lakeside Nine Brands Bulls, 7-4; Ragin’ Roger Fans 6) and asked, “What do you think of him?” I said I thought Roger had a fastball, a curve, and a change-up and was the best ballplayer on the team. And he was a good guy, with an appreciation of the English language.

“I wish I knew he were a Christian,” said Sugar.