Big Red flipped the bat and stood at the plate, watching the mammoth blast leave the ball field. Only then did he break into his home run trot, grinning at each of the slack-jawed Orioles infielders as he went by. It was the slowest home run trot any of them had ever seen, possibly the slowest in league history.

“Look at that big jerk!” said Joey, walking out to the mound again. “Who does he think he is? Big Papi Ortiz? Prince Freaking Fielder?”

But Robbie didn’t much care how long it took Big Red to circle the bases. When you hit ’em that far, you deserve to celebrate, he thought. That’s what I get for throwing that slow slop up there. And leaving it out over the plate.

The realization made him wistful. He wished he could have faced Big Red with his old fastball, the one that had batters swinging at air all last season. The one that dazzled everyone at the Brooks Robinson Camp, including all those hoary coaches.

Big Red was obviously big and strong, and a good hitter. But could he have caught up to Robbie’s old heater? Could he have turned on a seventy-mile-per-hour Robbie Hammond lightning bolt up around his eyes?

“Guess we’ll never know,” he murmured to himself.

When Big Red finally crossed the plate, he looked back at Robbie and sneered.

“That’s the best you got?” he yelled. “Because that was weak! My grandma throws faster than that.”

“Play ball, son,” the umpire barked. “Save the trash talk for someplace else.”

“Sure, ump,” Big Red said, flashing a sarcastic smile. “Whatever you say.”

“Really?” the umpire said, ripping off his mask. He was steaming. “In that case, I say this: one more word out of you and you’re gone.”

The big kid snapped off a yes-sir salute and swaggered off, the ump staring at him until he disappeared in the dugout.

Robbie was rattled by the home run. His wildness promptly returned and he walked the next two batters. The runners tagged and moved up on a fly ball to Yancy in center field. Robbie got the next batter on a bouncer back to the mound for the second out. But the next batter smacked another of Robbie’s “grandma fastballs” up the middle for a two-run single.

Now Robbie was seething at himself for letting the Yankees number nine hitter beat him. He pounded the ball in his glove and gritted his teeth as he looked in at the next batter. Throwing harder, he ran the count to 2 and 2 before the kid swung at a low fastball for strike three.

But the damage was done.

Yankees 3, Orioles 0.

This time Robbie walked off the mound with his head down.

“Okay, not bad, not bad!” his dad said, clapping. “Saw some encouraging signs! You’re getting there!”

Robbie was in no mood to listen to any of that. He slammed his glove against the dugout wall and took a seat at the end of the bench, his shoulders slumped.

When Marty sat down next to him, Robbie shot him a look.

“What?” Marty said. “Is this a bad time?”

“If you ever mention that legend stuff again,” Robbie said quietly, “I might have to kill you.”

Marty’s eyes widened. But for once, he said nothing.

Big Red was still breezing through the Orioles’ batting order in the top of the third inning. He was grunting—Uhhh!—after every pitch now. And the grunting was getting louder and louder, as if the kid was determined to show everyone how hard he was working.

“I hate grunters,” Willie said, looking out at Big Red. “He’s just showing off.”

“Why don’t you go tell him that?” Jordy said.

“Yeah,” Connor said. “Put him in an even better mood.”

That inning, Yancy had the first decent at-bat against the big kid, but his sharp line drive screamed right at the Yankees left fielder for the first out. Riley struck out on four pitches. Robbie was up next.

Seeing Robbie dig in, Big Red smirked again and started to say something. But the umpire stepped quickly from behind the plate, pointed a finger at him, and said simply, “Don’t.”

Robbie took the first two pitches, both low, seeing what the big guy had. Big Red threw hard, sure, but he wasn’t the fastest kid Robbie had ever faced. And his fastball didn’t move as much as Robbie expected it to, either.

I can hit this guy, he thought. Unless I’m just fooling myself. Unless I’m doing the baseball equivalent of whistling past the graveyard.

He took a called strike, then watched as Big Red’s next pitch sailed outside. On the next pitch, he was late swinging at a belt-high fastball, fouling it off to the right.

The count was 3 and 2. Robbie stepped out and took a deep breath. Don’t give in, don’t give in, he kept telling himself. And he didn’t. Instead, he fouled off the next pitch. And the next one. And the one after that, too.

“Way to hang!” his dad yelled. The rest of the Orioles were whooping, too, enthralled with the mini-drama that had suddenly developed between the big kid and their pitcher. There was also the sheer joy of seeing Big Red getting more and more frustrated, grunting louder and louder, his face turning redder and redder with each pitch.

Still, Robbie didn’t give in.

He fouled off another pitch, then another, then two more. Stomping around the mound after each pitch, Big Red looked like he wanted to scream. Instead, he bit down on his glove, setting off a gale of laughter in the Orioles dugout.

Please, guys, Robbie thought. The kid’s head is about to explode as it is. Don’t make it worse.

Finally, on the thirteenth pitch of the at-bat, Robbie hit a sharp one-hopper up the middle that the shortstop gloved on a nice play, firing on to first to end the inning.

Big Red pumped his fist and yelled like he had just struck out Alex Rodriguez with the bases loaded in the World Series. Still, Robbie was proud of himself. At least he’d hung in there and made the big guy work, big-time. At least he hadn’t swung at any junk. In some ways, it had been his best at-bat of the year.

When Mike relieved him in the fourth inning, the Orioles were still down, 3–0. But Robbie had to grudgingly admit it had been his best pitching outing of the season, too. Sure, the velocity hadn’t been there—his fastball wasn’t even close to what it used to be. But at least he had only walked two guys. He’d managed to keep his team in the game.

As the afternoon went on, he found his gloom lifting, especially when the Orioles staged a mini-rally in the sixth inning off the Yankees relief pitcher. Willie drew a leadoff walk, Jordy moved him over with a bouncer to first, and Connor delivered a run-scoring double to pull the Orioles to 3–1.

But that was how it ended: 3–1 Yankees, with Yancy making the final out on a long fly ball to center field. It was the Orioles’ tenth loss in a row. Yet somehow this one hurt less than the others, maybe because they knew they had just given a good team all it could handle.

After the two teams lined up to slap hands, Big Red went down the line slapping extra hard and muttering, “You suck, you suck” under his breath instead of “Good game, good game.”

When he reached Robbie, he stopped and smiled coldly. “Your coach got you out of there just in time,” he said. “My next at-bat might have torn your head off.”

“Oh, yeah?” Marty said, whirling around and getting in Big Red’s face. He jabbed a finger in Robbie’s direction. “Next time he faces you, you’ll be lucky if you see the ball.”

It was really kind of comical, Robbie thought, seeing that the top of Marty’s head barely came up to Big Red’s throat.

“Who’s this?” the big kid asked Robbie. “Your nerd bodyguard?”

Robbie started to answer. Just then, he caught a glimpse of something over Big Red’s shoulder. The sight made him freeze.

There was the one-armed boy, leaning against the fence, watching them intently. Only, this time he was wearing a hat.

The hat was on backward, but the orange band and black trim were a dead giveaway.

It was an Orioles hat.

“Uh, love to stay and chat,” Robbie said. “But I gotta go.”

He tossed his glove nonchalantly toward the dugout. Then he took off on a dead run for the one-armed boy.

This time, Robbie thought, he’s not getting away.