The first chapter disclaimers still apply. Please donate to Nifty, and please be safe always.
This chapter has a lot of baseball. It also has some of the non- baseball fun on the summer team's only overnight trip.
Feedback is always appreciated. Douglas. thehakaanen@hotmail.com
CHAPTER 8 TOURNAMENTS
<Friday, June 27, Olympia Baseball Complex>
[ERIC]
While playing in our league was important, playing in tournaments was the most fun part of being on a summer baseball team. I mean a travel team should be traveling, right? We managed to raise enough money for two tournaments. The first one was in Olympia and was close to home, so all we needed to pay was the entry fee. The complex where it was being held was about an hour-and-a-half away by car.
The other tournament is the one that will cost us the big bucks. That was why we had carwashes, garage sales, recycling, the fence advertising money, concession money, and extra money from sponsors. It was in Eugene, Oregon. We were going to rent two vans, which Coach Miller and Coach Sanders would be driving, to take us down to Oregon. Plus, we would be staying in a hotel and our meals would be paid for. We had a budget for how much we each spend to eat. The last expense was the entry fee.
We had enough money for this tournament with some left over in case we got into a postseason tournament. A team had to earn its way into those tournaments, and, after the league season we'd had, we thought we were good enough to be invited. The league paid a lot of the expenses for the postseason, and we had a special budget for the rest.
The Olympia tournament started Friday and we drew a Friday afternoon game. We were playing a team from Puyallup. They played good baseball there and their high school teams were always going to District and State tournaments. By State Tournaments, I mean the big Four-A schools, not the little A schools like us. We figured that meant their teams in our age group would be good, too.
We discussed what to call for the coin flip. We had elected Rich our captain, although Marty had become our leader as the season progressed.
"Tails never fails," Scott said.
Since we couldn't find a reason to disagree, Rich called tails at the home plate meeting. We were the team that was from the farthest away, so we got to call the flip. Tails didn't fail and Rich picked home team, giving us the hammer. Turns out we got so hammered we really didn't need the hammer.
We sure weren't wrong about them being good. They were bigger, older, more talented, and more experienced than we were. I was the starting pitcher for that game and it was a good experience for me. Which means it was supposedly proof that we learn and grow from our failures.
We did okay for the first four innings. I gave up a run off of a couple of hits and a walk in the top of the second inning. In the bottom of the inning, Rich singled and, after Marty struck out, Carl went yard. I thought Marty could hit the ball hard, but when Carl made solid contact he could hit the ball for what seemed like a mile or two. His home run gave us a 2-1 lead.
That lasted until the top of the fourth when I gave up a solo home run to their cleanup hitter. He was a big kid who I bet was six foot two or three. The only player we had over six foot was Marty, although Carl was creeping up on that magic number.
"Six feet tall and six inches long, that's what I'm going to be when school starts," Carl bragged a few days ago. He made it to six feet, but didn't hit six inches until after he started high school. Nobody said dicks and feet and bodies grew at the same rate.
Anyway, the score was tied at 2-2 going into the top of the fifth and we were feeling pretty good about how we were playing. That's when the lessons were taught. I was still throwing strikes, but suddenly they were hitting everything I threw up there. It took them awhile, but when they got me figured out they went right after me. And by hitting everything, I mean they were hitting everything hard.
By the time Coach Miller got me out and they finished beating up on me and Kraig, they'd scored ten runs in the inning. I think the term for how we felt is shell-shocked. The score was 12-2 and if we didn't score a run in the bottom of the fifth the game was over.
The good news is we scored a run to make it twelve-3 and forced the sixth inning to be played. The bad news is the Puyallup team scored two more runs in the sixth and held us in the bottom of the sixth and we still got 10 runned. We lost 14-3 in six innings.
Coach Miller said we didn't play bad baseball. We just ended up playing a team that was bigger, stronger, faster, and more experienced. He told us to learn from it, because next year that could be us. They gave us a good lesson on how a good team handles itself on and off the field.
Because we had been dumped into the losers' bracket we had to come back to play the next morning. That wouldn't be so bad, except for the fact that game time was 9 am. This is even worse than it sounds when you consider that we were told to meet at the middle school at 6:30. We found out we would be playing a team from Canada.
So, the bad news was the early morning meeting time plus the fact the Canadians were staying at a hotel in Olympia and would be able to sleep in later than us. The good news was that as sleepy as we all were, we actually played a decent game and came up with a win. Vince started and pitched five innings, giving up two runs and leaving with a 5-2 lead. Lars pitched two scoreless innings, giving up a harmless two out single in the sixth inning as we ended up with a 6-2 win.
That meant that we would be playing again at 1:00 in another loser out game. Marty was excited about this matchup. We would be playing a team from Bremerton and his friend Frank would be on that team. I was one of the few kids on our team who knew that Marty met Frank when he was in rehab back in January. They had kept in contact, but this was the first time they had met face-to-face since then.
Frank's team played on another field in the complex at 9:00, so we didn't know right away that we would be playing them. They won their game 9-7. It took twenty minutes longer than our game. As soon as they could, Marty and Frank got together and chatted. Later, I talked to Marty just before we started our warm-ups.
"Did you guys have a good talk?" I asked him.
"Yeah. He's a really cool guy. He's still sober like me. He wishes he had a boyfriend like me."
"You and Rich are boyfriends?"
"Not officially. Rich is still kinda going out with his girlfriend. Actually, we really haven't talked about it much. When we do talk about it, sometimes he says he is, then he isn't sure. Sometimes he says he'll break up with Trish, then he isn't sure. I guess him being my boyfriend is what is called wishful thinking. "
"Maybe you should just talk about it with the idea of deciding it."
"We will when the time is right. It isn't right yet. We get told not to get into any relationships in our first year of sobriety, but, well, it's a rule I wouldn't mind breaking. I just don't push it."
I wanted to say that at least he had somebody to think about having as a boyfriend. With Scott now going out with Tama, I was finding out that being a gay boy really wasn't all I thought it was a year ago. Unfortunately gay is what I was. I was beginning to think that when school started I should fake it and find a girl to ask out like Scott suggested. Then at least I would have somebody.
Marty and Frank both had good games. It was as if there was a competition between the two of them. Marty had two doubles and a single in four at bats and Frank ended up with three singles and a walk. But when it came down to the competition between our two teams, Frank's team won, beating us 7-5.
Hunter started and went the first three innings, followed by Lars and Jerome. Since we weren't allowed a pickup pitcher for this tournament, getting knocked into the losers' bracket had us quickly running out of pitchers. We had two league games coming up Tuesday and Wednesday and Coach was hoping to save Rodney and Scott for those games. We were now out of the tournament after suffering our second loss.
I was invited to Noah's house on Sunday. The twins came as well, and of course Bobby was there. We had a great time. The day was cool and cloudy, but that didn't stop us from spending most of the afternoon in the pool. We were joined by Shane and Nicky. Since the twins weren't on the list of boys who could skinny dip when Lisa was home, we had to wear swimsuits, which sucked. I was on the list, however, which was all part of a compromise with Noah's mom to allow at least some skinny dipping. Nobody could figure out why some of us were on the list and some weren't. We just lived with it. It's not like wearing swimming shorts was the end of the world.
Six of us spent the night in the cabana. Shane wasn't interested in hanging around with a bunch of naked boys, but Nicky was. The nine year old was getting a real taste for sexy stuff.
I hope we didn't disappoint him. I mean it's not like the six of us had a big orgy, but we did do some stuff. We were used to sexing with each other, which often meant just jerking ourselves off.
Kraig suggested truth or dare, but we didn't have many secrets from each other, and it was hard to dare each other to do stuff we hadn't already done. That didn't include Nicky, who hadn't done any anal sex, even though Noah had told him for almost a year he'd show him the ropes.
What we did was pair off by drawing slips of paper out of a hat. Each pair could do whatever they wanted with each other, and would sleep together. There were no restrictions, so it was possible the twins could be a pair and so could Bobby and Noah. We didn't care, we were just a bunch of horny twelve and thirteen year olds, plus a nine year old.
I ended up getting paired with Kraig, Kevin got Noah, and Bobby got Nicky. It was a pretty cool result since none of us was usually a pair. The idea wasn't to put on a show for each other, it was simply to get off together. Noah turned off the light even though it didn't really get dark until almost ten at this time of the year.
It turned out nobody fucked; we all ended up dry humping. That was probably the disappointing part for Nicky, since he was eager to find out more about the world of cornholing.
For me, it was nice to just make out with somebody. My sex had been my left hand since Scott and I broke up. Rubbing my hairless cock against Kraig's bigger teen cock felt just so totally good. I ended up shooting twice. Cuddling up with Kraig in our sleeping bags added a nice finishing touch to the evening.
On Monday we rode around on our bikes, shot some hoops at the park with Hunter, Lars, and Scott, and showed up on time for a four o'clock practice. It had been a good two days with my friends.
Rodney was the starter for our Tuesday game. It was the first of July and we were all getting pretty excited for the Fourth and all the stuff that went with it. However, when the game started we had our minds on baseball. Coach Miller had told us in practice that we needed to keep our minds on baseball until after our Wednesday game. We certainly did that on Tuesday as we beat Tumwater on their field with our first shutout. Rodney gave up only three hits, walked two, and struck out eight. We only made one error and picked up a 5-0 win.
Wednesday's game was a rematch with Shelton. Scott started and pitched his best game of the summer. He threw all seven innings and we won 8-2 on our field. Marty and Scott both hit home runs. We went into the long Fourth of July weekend with an 11-8 record and were 8-4 in league.
The Fourth ended up being a lot of fun, even if we did have to work some. The Falcons had volunteered to help with the setup for the town barbeque, so we had to be at the recreation center at nine. All of the players on the team were there except for Bobby, who went to Seattle with his brother, Tyler, and Mr. Robinson for the second straight year, and Lars, who had left right after the tournament last weekend for a week long trip with his family.
Noah and I chatted some about Bobby and his trip to Seattle.
"I bet Bobby will do some stuff with Tyler and Mr. Robinson in the hotel after the fireworks tonight," Noah said as we were setting out folding chairs.
"But Mr. Robinson is a teacher," I said. I know that sounded naïve, but I really couldn't imagine a teacher doing sex with a student—at least not then.
"His brother Tyler spends a lot of nights at Mr. Robinson's house. Don't tell me they don't do stuff. I am sure beyond sure that they do. Bobby went with them to Seattle last year, and he's spent a couple of night's at Mr. Robinson's house."
"So, did he say that they did stuff?" I asked.
"No. That's about the only thing Bobby won't talk about. And since he won't talk about it, I know they do stuff. If Bobby promised them he wouldn't tell anybody, then he won't tell anybody, not even me. That's the way he is."
"Yeah, I know Bobby. Nobody keeps a promise like he does."
"But I did tell him to ask them on this trip if he could tell me stuff."
I had to laugh at that. I mean here Bobby won't say anything about if he is having sex with his brother and his brother's teacher, but Noah is asking him to find out if he can tell about the stuff that isn't supposed to be happening. I guess what it all means is that Noah is telling Bobby to drop the hint that Noah knows what is going on between the two, so they might as well make it official.
Anyway, enough confusing stuff. Noah's family and mine ended up eating at the same table that afternoon. I went with Noah's family to Centralia to see that town's fireworks show. It wasn't as big as Seattle's or Tacoma's, but it was still pretty good.
We hung with the twins when we got to Centralia. They came with their parents, along with Korey and Chandler, who were off on their own somewhere.
"I think they were trying to find a place to get naked," Kevin said. "They got dared to take their clothes off by Mikey."
"Figures," I said. "I know I sure wasn't a horn dog like those two when I was ten. But they aren't going to find anything. The Fairgrounds is packed." The Fairgrounds is where the fireworks show and other things took place on the Fourth.
"That won't stop them," Kevin said. "I kinda wish I'd gone with them, just to see what kind of place they find."
The fireworks show was not a disappointment and we met with Korey and Chandler at the prearranged meeting spot after it was over.
"Did you do it?" Kraig asked.
"No. There wasn't any place to get naked. Now we both gotta suck Mikey off tomorrow."
"Aw, you poor, poor boys," Noah said. "That's going to be such a hardship."
"It is since we're going to have to do it outside. But it will be easier doing that than it was getting naked here."
The two of them and the twins took off to meet the twins' parents while Noah and I left to meet his. Finding everybody in the dark wouldn't be easy, but we had prearranged meeting places and it didn't take us long. I spent the night at Noah's house. We didn't fuck because Noah forgot to ask Bobby if it was okay.
"But won't he be doing it tonight?" I asked.
"I don't think they do that. Besides, we both know what Bobby is like. He's never asked me if he could fuck because he only fucks me. Although, doing his brother doesn't count, just like me doing Shane doesn't count."
But we did do a sixty-nine and enjoyed each other's cum, even if it wasn't all gooey and thick like with the older boys. We cuddled up naked in his bed and slept wrapped around each other like we were born to sleep that way.
I pitched our league game on Monday. I went five innings, Lars pitched one inning, and Rich pitched the last inning as we beat Kelso 6-4, making up for an earlier 4-3 loss. The Falcons were on a roll; we'd won four straight league games and were 8-4.
<Friday, July 11, Eugene Tournament>
Coach Miller and Mr. McCall had made out the schedule so that the Eugene tournament didn't have any league games close to it, either before or after. They couldn't do the same thing for the Olympia tournament, but we knew that working to win a trophy when we went to Oregon was an important goal. We would have all of our pitching available, plus we added Austin. Austin would be a bit of a question mark since in his league he pitched from 54 feet instead of the standard 60 feet 6 inches.
The team would be traveling as a group. Mr. McCall rented two large vans, which Coach Miller and Coach Sanders would be driving. Coach Ecklund also had his SUV, so we had plenty of room for everybody plus our equipment. We left Mayfield at nine in the morning on Friday. The trip would be a long one, taking about five hours.
We all stayed amused by talking, napping, playing video games, texting, and just looking out of the window. We stopped at a McDonald's in Portland for lunch, which made most of us want to take a nap.
We got to Eugene around two and checked into our motel. There would be four of us to a room, except for one room that would have a fifth boy sleeping on a pullout bed. We got to pick our own roommates, which we did at practice on Wednesday. Trust me when I say that was not an easy process. In fact, it was so hard to do that we decided we would change some of the roommates on Saturday night. We would be staying Saturday night even if we got eliminated from the tournament before then.
For the first night, I was going to be rooming with, Connor, Vince, and Rodney, who were all freshmen. When I objected at first, Connor pointed out that I was the chair for the Go to State team and so I shouldn't have a problem being with the older boys on the team. After all, everybody kept making a big deal about how mature I was.
"Yeah, but I'm littler than you guys are," I protested.
"It's not like we plan on beating you up, or anything like that," Connor said.
"Well, I was thinking of doing something where my being little counts," I pointing to my crotch.
Connor broke out laughing. "Um, we're not your eighth grade buddies. We're the freshman group, remember? It's not like we plan on having sex with you either."
"Although jerking off is not out of the question," Vince piped up.
"Speak for yourself," Rodney said. "What we need to do is find some hot chicks and invite them to the room. Now, THAT would be sex." Rodney was a total heterosexual horndog, and claimed to have fucked around twenty different girls of different ages since he was eleven.
But before we could worry about what we were going to do in the motel bedroom, we had to worry about our upcoming game. We were scheduled to play one of the Eugene teams at five-thirty. Scott was assigned to be our opening game pitcher. The Eugene team was very good, but we were finding out that we were a very good team, too. Scott pitched one of his best games of the summer as we won 3-2. He went all seven innings. He gave up five hits, walked only one, and struck out six. Believe me, Scott walking only one batter over a full game is almost headline news.
It was a tense game all the way. Carl started at catcher in place of Kevin. The tournament was a good place for him to gain some experience. He wasn't as good as Kevin, of course, but he didn't do badly. Scott obviously didn't have any problems throwing to him. Winning that first game was huge, because, as we found out in Olympia, there was nothing worse than being in the losers' bracket right from the start. A loss would put a team out of the tournament from that point on, and winning meant using up a lot of pitchers.
After the game we stopped for some late night snacks and then headed to the motel. We wouldn't be playing until one tomorrow, but were told that our wakeup call would be at eight to give us time to shower and to meet for breakfast at the IHOP next to the motel.
When we got back to our room, my three roommates and I got out of our uniforms and were quickly down to our underpants. "We have a choice here," Connor said. "We can turn on the TV and chill out, or we can jerk off and then chill out. I don't know about you guys, but I am pretty horny and I don't think nerf nuts (he pointed over to me) would appreciate my creaming up the sheets with a wet dream." Connor had volunteered to sleep with me, which left Vince and Rodney in the other bed. "You know what a wet dream is, right Eric?"
"I might still be in middle school, but I'm not clueless."
"Sounds good to me," Vince said, responding to Connor's suggestion. "I sleep better after a good jerk off."
"Ditto," Rodney chimed in. I couldn't help but be amazed about how horny fourteen year olds were. When I turned fourteen, I totally understood where they were coming from. My twelve year old horniness wasn't even in the same ballpark with those guys.
The three of them looked at me. "I'm good with it," I said.
"And no touching anybody else," Connor said. "This is about getting off, not about sex." I knew Connor was talking to me. He and the other two knew which way I leaned, and I hadn't even come out yet. My earlier relationship with Scott hadn't been a big secret. After Scott started going out with Tama, a casual observer might see that relationship as two horny boys with crushes on each other. That was the case with Scott, but it did not describe me.
The four of us quickly stripped off our underpants and were now naked, and hard. "Well, will you look at that," Vince said, pointing at me. I seemed to be the center of everyone's attention. "The boy ain't got no pubes." That wasn't a problem for Vince, who had a thick bush as well as ball hairs, not to mention a chunky, six inch boner that still had more growing to do. Vince was the only one in the room who was uncut. For me, it was sexy looking to see him working his skin around his red pecker head.
"Damn," Connor said. "you're starting eighth grade in a couple of months and you're still bald? Are you thirteen yet?"
"I will be in three weeks."
Connor violated his own no touch rule by reaching over and rubbing my pubic area. "Smooth as a baby's ass, so he don't shave it."
"How would you know how smooth a baby's ass is?" Vince asked mockingly. "Are you perving on little babies, now? Going weird on us now?"
"Stick it up your ass, Vince." Connor's hand stayed on my pubic area during the exchange, his knuckles rubbing my boner as he lightly massaged my smooth skin, giving me a couple of shivers. All of my sexual experience had been with boys my age or younger, except for Marty. The ninth grade group saw itself as straight and never got involved in our sexual hijinks, so I was surprised by Connor's lingering hand. I think he was , too, as he suddenly seemed to realize what he was doing and pulled his hand back.
We then quietly went to work on our own cocks. Rodney's looked to be a little over five inches, with a narrow row of pubic hair above it. The rest of his body was smooth. I didn't see any hair in his underarm region.
Connor's cock was not quite six inches. He had a decent nest of pubes, but no ball hairs. His pubic hair was thicker than Rodney's. All three of the ninth graders had precum leaking out of their cocks, which they enjoyed rubbing into their dicks as lube while they jerked off.
The three ninth graders pretended not to be paying attention to anybody else. Vince and Rodney sat up on one bed, their backs against the headboard, while Connor and I were in the same position on our bed. Our circle jerk quickly turned into an everybody-jack-off- quickly-and-see-who-could-cum-first-and-shoot-the-most session.
The freshmen started out talking about their latest female conquests, with Rodney having the most to say, of course. I got interested when Noah's sister's name, came up.
"I want to fuck Lisa so bad," Rodney said. "She is so fine." Connor and Vince admitted to a similar fantasy.
"You know that Jerome is pounding her pussy with his big cock," Vince said.
"He's been doing her for a long time," Rodney said, "the lucky asshole."
"Him and Shane both," Connor added. That comment surprised me. Not the part about Shane fucking his twin sister, that part I knew. What surprised me is that Connor knew it.
"That's what everybody says because they're all jealous," Rodney said. "No way Shane is porking his twin sister. None. Nada. Zero. Zilch."
"Maybe yes, maybe no." Connor said. The conversation died there as we concentrated on our own boners, and, at least for me, looking to see everybody else's jerk off technique, especially Vince with his uncut cock. Connor changed things a little by putting his hand back on my pubic area, barely grazing my cock.
"I like how smooth if feels," he whispered to me. He rubbed his hand lightly back and forth along my pubic area for maybe a minute, sending some shivers through me. As ge kept petting my smooth pubic area, the top of his hand kept rubbing lightly against my little boner while he took care of his own business at the same time. Connor was a person who kept being full of surprises.
Connor ended up shooting first with Vince maybe a minute behind him. I was impressed with Connor's distance; his first shot blasting straight up and landing in his hair. Vince shot a lot more than Connor, but it didn't go very far. It all puddled between his bellybutton and his cock. Connor pulled his hand away from me as soon as he started shooting.
I was next. My stuff wasn't very thick, but I shot it a decent distance, and I was proud of the five wads I spurted out.
"Hey, the little boy ain't firing blanks," Connor said. He once again surprised me by scooping up a wad that had landed on my belly and tasting it. "It's the real deal," he announced.
"Connor you're so gross. You should be hanging out with Marty," Vince said.
"If I can lick pussy I don't see no reason why I can't taste cum. I think it tastes better than pussy juice. One good reason to be gay, I guess."
Rodney let out a loud moan, lifted his butt slightly off the bed, and fired off five rounds of his own cum. "Jerking off is the second best feeling in the world," he said as he came down. "Only getting pussy can beat it."
"Even better than getting your dick sucked?" Connor asked.
"Like any girl knows how to suck a dick properly."
"I hear ya," Vince said. "But we all know how good some guys can be." Once again everybody looked at me.
"Don't look at me," I said. "I'm not gonna suck everybody off."
"Nobody asked you to," Connor said. He then gave me an evil grin. "But...maybe some day."
We all cleaned ourselves, with Rodney going the full shower route, and fell asleep. I woke up in the middle of the night with Connor wrapped around me. I liked it, and didn't bother to pull him off. I couldn't help but think that Connor had some feelings in him that weren't entirely straight.
<Saturday, July 12, Eugene tournament>
I pitched our Saturday game. We played a team from The Dalles, which was up the Columbia River. They were a good team, but once again we were on our game. I know I was on mine. It was my best game of the summer. Kevin and I thought almost like one throughout the game, and when it was over we had a 4-0 win. I went all the way and gave up only three hits and one walk. We made no errors, so our opponent only had four base runners the whole game and two of those were in the fifth inning when they got a double and walk. That was the only time they got a runner as far as second.
We would be playing the other undefeated team in the tournament at eight that evening in a game under the lights. Austin would be pitching for us and he was stoked. We all loved Austin, but we couldn't help but be worried about the fact he'd been pitching from a shorter distance all summer.
Turned out we had nothing to worry about. Austin had practiced from the longer distance as soon as he found out he would be pitching for us. He was a little shaky at the start, walking two of the first three batters he faced and giving up a run-scoring single, but after that he settled down and gave up only one more run, and that was in the fifth when he started getting tired.
Coach Miller brought Rich, our closer, in to pitch the last two innings. Rich gave up a single in the sixth and walked a batter in the seventh. He allowed no runs and we earned a fairly easy 7-2 win. We would be playing our next game at noon Sunday.
By the time we got to our rooms that night it was almost eleven. We decided not to play musical rooms like we'd planned. We were all tired and knew we'd have to be up by eight the next morning.
I knew that something sexual had happened in all four of our rooms last night. There was some jerking off and a little bit of cock sucking, with everybody participating in something.
But that was last night. After our evening game we were all too tired for doing sex and were happy to crash and be rested for Sunday's game.
<Sunday, July 13, Eugene tournament>
The tournament was a true double elimination, meaning everybody played until all the teams but one had two losses. The team that was left would be the tournament champion.
We ended up playing the second Eugene team, which beat The Dalles team in a morning game by an 8-6 score. The Eugene team and us were the only teams left that didn't have two losses. Eugene had one and we had none.
Lars started the noon game. The way it worked is if we won, then the Eugene team would have two losses and we would be the champions. If the Eugene team won, then we would have to play another game. We were hoping not to have to play the second game; we had a long ride back to Mayfield. The second game was called the "if" game, and would only be played "if" the Eugene team won.
Eugene pitched the pitcher everybody said was their best. Coach Miller didn't go with our best, which was Rodney. Instead he went with Lars, who was a decent pitcher, but far from our best. The Eugene pitcher was a big fifteen year old. He was about as old as a player could be in our program. He dominated us, while Lars, Hunter, and Rich pitched okay. In this case okay wasn't good enough and we ended up with a 6-1 loss. Now we each had one loss, and the winner of the second game, the "if" game, would be the champion.
Some of us had griped a bit about Coach Miller not pitching our best pitcher against their best pitcher in the first game. But we could now see why he did it. If Rodney goes against their ace, the game would have probably been a very close one and who knows who would have come out on top. Then the "if" game would have had two okay pitchers at the end of a tournament, so it probably would have ended up a close high scoring game, and again, who knew who would come out on top.
While there were no guarantees, Coach Miller decided Rodney had a better chance of winning if he didn't have to pitch against the Eugene ace. He took a gamble and it paid off. This time it was Rodney's turn to dominate, although the pitcher for Eugene ended up being a pretty decent junk ball pitcher whose slow stuff gave us fits.
Still, we managed to score four runs against him, while Rodney shook off a bad third inning, and we won the tournament by the score of 4-2. We had become a very good team as the summer progressed and this tournament was proof of that.
The play of the tournament was made by Bobby. He was playing right field and had a slicing line drive hit his way. He misread the drive and took a couple of steps in when he should have held his ground. But he quickly realized his mistake, and turned and started running back. I can remember when Bobby would have back-peddled on that kind of play, which is a big no-no for an outfielder. But this time, he turned and ran, diving for the ball, which landed in his glove while he was airborne. He crashed to the ground, holding on to the ball. He held his glove up in the air to show the ump he'd made the catch.
Jerome was playing center. He helped Bobby stand up, giving him a pat on the ass. Bobby tried hard not to grin, but he knew he'd made a fantastic catch. His uniform was grass stained, which made him happy. As far as Bobby was concerned, he hadn't been in the game unless his uniform was dirty.
After eating, we all piled into the vehicles and left Eugene a little after seven o'clock. We had a five hour trip home. In my van we talked excitedly about how great the tournament was, about how much we'd improved.
Back home we had all but clinched a place in our league tournament, and we were thinking, even as young as we were, that we had a good chance of finishing in the top two and maybe going on to the Area Tournament for our program. We were all really feeling good about ourselves.
What we didn't know as we sped up Interstate 5 for home was that this was as good as we were going to feel in a long time. We were all about to learn that life has a way of grabbing you by the balls and squeezing. It would be a long time before we recaptured the mood of that weekend in Eugene.
Next: Bobby