Ez and Forest, our first baseman deep in conversation over superstitions.
“No, wasn’t it a snake?” Forest’s eyes drop to the rattlesnake’s tail in his hand. Knowing Forest, I’m pretty sure he obtained that himself, and the snake is somewhere in here. Wouldn’t be the first time. He once brought a scorpion in and left it in Ez’s locker.
When I lean forward, the ice pack on my shoulder falls off. “I think you guys missed big chunks of that movie. It was a chicken.” I’ve seen the movie enough to know every detail.
“Right, yes, it was.” Ez points at me, smiling as he adjusts his shin guards. “He’s right. It was a chicken.” He lifts his head. “Who’s got a chicken? I need to bite its head off.”
No one answers him. At least not with where a chicken is at. It’s ten minutes before game time, and we’re not in the mood to get amped up. That’s the difference between any other locker room before a game and the ones of baseball players. We play worse if we’re amped up.
And, if you haven’t guessed it yet, baseball players are highly superstitious. Don’t believe me? You don’t know anything about baseball players then.
Playing on Friday the thirteenth? Not great. Triskaidekaphobia. Don’t ask me how to pronounce that one, but from what Ez tells me during warm-ups, it’s the fear of the number thirteen. And he has it. Which explains his I-don’t-trust-you attitude toward our left fielder.
Superstitions are a part of baseball. Kissing a rosary before a bat, fixing gloves and hats before a pitch, hitting home plate… all things ballplayers do to avoid any amount of bad luck. And then there’s the general ones. Leave the pitcher alone on game day. Don’t step on the chalk line. Never mention a no-hitter.
AS WE OPEN our three-game set against Long Beach, we’re all on edge. The weather cleared up and allowed us to get the game in but we’re struggling at the plate.
I’m pitching a good game. It’s the thirty-second pitch of the game. Fourth inning. One out. A strike count 1-2, but that’s when I’m shaken, mentally.
Throw a strike. Keep it in the park. Don’t think about who’s up.
Though I need my mind to be on the game, it’s not. It’s on the one in the stands, two rows back watching me with intention. It’s Brie Beckett, my ex-girlfriend. Why we broke up isn’t all that complicated, but has everything to do with maturity and the demands of a college baseball player, hell, college athlete.
Unfortunately for me, the moment Brie shows up, I’m a mess out there, my breath leaving me in gasps. I loved her. God, did I fucking love that girl. Probably the only girl I ever loved in a string of relationships I can’t quite pinpoint their failure.
Behind the plate, Ez puts two fingers down. A cutter. Leaning to his right, he distances himself from the right-handed batter. I nod my approval, set over the rubber, and drift my eyes to first base, then narrow in on Ez’s mitt.
If I had to guess, Ez is smiling under the mask. He knows who’s up and my feeling about it. I’d love to let a pitch go right at his fucking nose, but that’d mess up my stats and not something I want to do.
I don’t want to throw a fastball to a right-handed batter on the inside. If I do, it’ll cross over the plate and the bat barrel. If I want to deliver him a fastball, I’ll let my wrist turn ever so slightly, and my fingers will fall to the left side of the ball and change the rotation of the ball, its path, and will hit a few inches on the inside toward the batter. It gets me strikes, usually, but like I said, I don’t want to throw that pitch to this particular batter.
The reason why Brie showed up today didn’t have anything to do with me. It has to do with the guy holding the bat and his grudge against me. The only pitcher to ever strike him out. Happened last season, game two of the three-game series against them, and I’ll never let him forget it.
But it goes back even further than that if you want to get technical about it because that guy, we were best friends growing up. And now my girlfriend of the last three years is blowing him.
Funny how betrayal works. Baylor Wright knows a thing or two about it. We