Behind the Plate (The Boys of Baseball #2) - J. Sterling Page 0,50
kitchen, drinking a beer with Mac, Colin, and Dayton.
“There he is.” Mac gave a nod in my direction, and Cole swiveled in his chair to face me.
“Hey.” He stood up and walked over, patting my back with both fists.
I hadn’t realized how much I missed having him around until he was standing right in front of me.
“Hey, man. It’s good to see you,” I said.
“You too. Heard Coach kicked you out today. What happened?” he asked before sitting back down and reaching for his beer.
I eyeballed the rest of my roommates, who were waiting for me to answer. “I was late to weights.” I tried to play it off like it was no big deal, but we all knew that being late during the off-season was as unacceptable as being late during the regular season.
Cole gave me a knowing look. “Coach Jackson doesn’t fuck around, man.”
“Tell me about it,” I agreed, and he finished off his beer. “How’s ball?” I asked, dying to know how playing professional baseball was from his perspective. He was already doing the one thing we were still striving for.
“It’s good but hard.” He looked me dead in the eye. “It’s different than this was.”
“How so?” Dayton asked.
We were all practically foaming at the mouths for this information. Every one of us wanted the chance to play professional baseball, and Cole was currently doing it. He was living the dream.
“Every player is good at what they do. Don’t get me wrong; the guys here at Fullton are good, too, but it’s just different,” he started to explain, and we all seemed to lean closer toward him on instinct. “Everyone has the same goal. Every guy is getting paid to be there, and they all want to get to the next level. No one is there to stay in Single-A baseball for long, you know?”
I nodded my head and noticed that the guys were all doing the same. I’d had at least a million talks about this exact subject with my dad, but maybe things were different now. “What’s the biggest change that you’ve noticed from college to pro?”
Cole stayed quiet for a minute, clearly weighing his answer. “It’s twofold, I think. The hitting is one.”
“What do you mean? How?” Colin asked, and I knew it was because hitting was the one area he was constantly trying to improve. He struggled on and off at the plate.
“Pretty much every guy can hit. Home runs, I mean. It doesn’t matter if you can hit singles and doubles. As long as you rake in the homers consistently, you’re golden to coaches.”
Colin’s face dropped. He almost looked like he was about to cry. “That’s not even realistic.”
“I know. It’s not how I was taught to play either,” Cole agreed.
“A home run every now and then is nice, but a three fifty batting average with a high number of RBIs sounds better to me,” Mac said, and I knew that we were getting into the one thing that most players never thought about—the business aspect of baseball.
Thankfully, I had been well versed on the business side of the game because of my dad and uncle. “They don’t care about that right now. They haven’t for a few years. You can strike out ten times out of fifteen, but if those other five at bats are home runs, they’ll practically throw you a parade,” I said because it was true.
I’d been watching the game shift and bend and move since I started playing. It had basically evolved into a Home Run Derby of sorts, and it went against everything I’d ever thought about the sport.
“What’s the second thing?” Dayton asked. “You said there were two things. The hitting was first. What’s the second?”
“You’ll like this one.” Cole looked right at Dayton and grinned. “The pitching.”
“What about it?” Dayton turned serious.
“The pitchers are all fucking on point. They have control. Speed. Accuracy.”
Dayton nodded. “They should. Or else they shouldn’t be there.”
I laughed at the way Dayton had said it, but I completely understood what he was getting at. He was most likely going to be our Friday night starter this season, and you didn’t earn that honor by being a half-assed pitcher who couldn’t do his job well.
“You’re right,” Cole said. “But the big difference is, if they’re struggling at all on the mound, they get yanked. There’re just too many other pitchers waiting to take their place.”
“Damn,” Colin breathed out, and he still looked a little pale.