you’ll be facing their six-seven-eight hitters, so if you take a look at their heat maps…”
We spent the bottom of the first going through the strategy for the next few hitters, and how best Carter could use his repertoire of pitches. It felt kind of like teaching someone how to fly a plane once you were already in the air, but Carter was a professional and listened to my advice.
Suddenly there was a sound like a thunderclap. I looked up in time to see the baseball soaring through the air deep into the outfield. The center fielder slowed and gave up on the ball, and it cleared the fence by thirty feet.
The crowd went nuts. At the plate, Darryl tossed aside his bat and slowly jogged down to first base. The home run fireworks popped and sparkled above the stadium, filling the field with red and blue glow. The scoreboard flashed two runs.
Just like that, we had tied it up.
The team was hyped up when Darryl returned to the dugout. He had to high-five his way through a sea of players to reach the bench. He shared a few special handshakes with the shortstop and second baseman, then pumped his fist.
“Their ace doesn’t have shit! Every one of you better be teeing off on this triple-A motherfucker!” Darryl’s eyes glowed with emotion and his arms trembled. I had never seen him like this before.
Carter didn’t have his best outing. I couldn’t blame him after being thrown into the fire on short notice. But he scrambled his way through four innings and only gave up four runs. That kept us in the game and allowed us to take the lead in the eighth inning with a big rally. With a 6-4 lead, Cortez came into the ninth and closed it out for the win.
But the mood was subdued after the game. It was a pyrrhic victory. We may have won the game, but we had lost something far more important.
The team gathered up their gear and hurried back into the clubhouse. Everyone wanted to see how Rafael was doing. We found them in the physical training room. Rafael sat on the massage table with an ice sleeve over his arm. He smiled pitifully as I entered the room. Next to him, Theo and the head trainer were chatting.
“…normally run an MRI for this kind of thing, but I gave him a CT scan as well to get a full look at the soft tissue. With injuries like this it’s important to examine the surrounding…”
“Patrick,” Theo said impatiently. “What are the results?”
The trainer cleared his throat. “The scans are all negative. Rivera does not have a tear in his UCL.”
There was a collective sigh of relief among the coaches in the room. “Then what’s wrong with him? Is it muscular?” I asked.
“Although the scans do not show a tear, I believe it is still a UCL sprain. I’m afraid Rivera will be out of commission for a while.”
“How long is a while?” Rafael asked.
The trainer shrugged. “Could be a week. Could be a month. I would recommend sending you to a specialist for further examination.”
We all knew the implications of that. Even if Rafael was able to pitch a week from now, he certainly wouldn’t be at his best. He was more than likely done for the playoffs.
He stiffened on the table next to me, like he was trying to keep his emotions in check. I patted him on the back while the trainer explained some more information to Theo.
The rest of the team came into the physical training room and gave him words of encouragement. The shortstop joked that Rafael had four days to learn how to pitch with his left arm. Darryl gave him a bro-hug and left without saying anything.
When they were gone, I gave him a big hug. We held onto each other for a long time, both of us on the verge of tears.
32
Darryl
It was the first victory of my life where I felt like shit after. The mood back at home was funereal. The only thing missing was the casket.
“What happened?” Natalie asked. She and Rafael were sitting on the edge of the pool with their feet in the water, while I was stretched out on one of the pool chairs.
“I reached back for a little extra oomph against Stanton.”
Natalie sighed like she disapproved. “We worked on your over-throwing back in May. Smooth is fast. Remember?”
“I know,” he said gloomily.
“At least it’s not torn,” I called