Raincharm’s Weblog

Yes, we were at a Mariner’s game tonight.
The Mariners won 7-0. A fast hitting start, singles, doubles, triples and home runs. Followed by a pitching gem.

But this isn’t about the Mariners. And it is not even about Carl. It is about me.

I have played a little softball in my time, but it was the slow-pitch variety. But I was never what I would call a good softball player. My at bats generally ended up with the ball in the infield between first and second. I got on base a bit, because I could run and a lot of the second basemen on the other team were also not so good. On defense I usually played catcher. It did not require as much depth perception, which I sorely lack, as outfield. It also keeps you involved in the game, which I like.

After college I played on company teams here and there. In Colorado I was usually playing with guys that would run in to cover home plate, leaving their base open. This resulted in some odd plays, but I was kind of OK with being shoved out of the way.

When I played with my current employer, a few years ago now, I continued with my catching duties. The difference with this team is that they expected I would actually be able to play the position. So in one of our first games there was going to be a play at the plate. Our shortstop, a true athlete, fired the ball home while the rather large male runner was closing the gap between third and home. Low and behold I caught the ball (man it hit the glove hard) and held it in front of me to tag the runner out (also a rather hard hit). But it worked, and I still remember the play.

Today, after 25 years of attending baseball games, watching others play BP and catch balls, I CAUGHT A BALL. Now I have gotten 2 or 3 other balls in BP, either thrown up by players, or bouncing in after hitting the seats. But this one was on the fly, from home plate, hit by the Oakland Athletics Travis Buck.

To set the stage, I was sitting in our seats, front row, right center field. The crowd was relatively small. Carl got three balls – one on the fly and two others thrown up. Earlier there had been an early teen hanging out, talking with Carl. He had at least two balls, both thrown up I think. He left and a man with his son showed up and started calling for balls. Two more boys showed up – and it was one of the boy’s 9th birthday. A player threw a ball to the birthday boy – nicely done. More than a few balls were flying our direction, and we got into a little dance. I would stand up and the boys would slide in whatever direction they thought would work best for their chances to catch or call, sliding in front of me several times. I joked with the lady behind me that my glove was strictly for defensive purposes – for protection. She said she expected me to protect her.

So Buck is up and hits a mighty wallop. I stand up, the kids slide in front of me. I am expecting them to catch the ball, and it is coming right at us. They both reach up, but at some point it registered that I am the tallest one there, and I don’t think they are going to catch it, so I stick up my mitt …

SMACK – just a little sting. I look in the mitt – and there it is – still. It didn’t pop out. I just started laughing and turned around to find Carl. He saw it all and was laughing too. The people around are saying great catch, and an Oakland pitcher is pretending to bow down to me. I don’t know that it was a great catch, more of a reaction.

Batting practice continued, and then ended. When the boys were getting ready to leave for their seats I gave them two of the balls that Carl had gotten earlier, so they each had a ball. The Dad told another person in our row that he really appreciated that – I hope they had a happy birthday game. [Carl does this kind of thing all the time, but I was the one at the seats with most of the balls today.]

It was fun, and many of the regulars stopped by. Of course they know this was a rare event. I have always had the fewest balls from batting practice in our family. But now, at least, I can say I caught one too.

This entry was posted on September 30, 2009 at 11:04 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.