Rivals (2010) (17 page)

WHEN JOSH’S PARENTS ASKED
them about the party, they told half the truth and nothing but half the truth. They’d all decided on the shuttle bus back to the camp that mentioning the shotgun blasts would create more trouble than any of them wanted. Still, even without certain details, they were able to tell a convincing enough tale about the video, the money, and Mickey Mullen’s accusation of Myron onstage so that Josh’s parents were nearly as certain as they were that Mickey Mullen himself had tried to fix the game.

“Incredible,” Josh’s dad said, shaking his head, his mouth agog in disbelief. “Why didn’t you tell me about all this sooner, Josh?”

Josh shifted uncomfortably in the little wooden chair that sat facing the musty couch in the cabin’s
small living room. He looked down at his feet and shrugged.

“There must have been a reason,” his dad said, his voice rumbling in a way that let Josh know he had better give a good answer.

“Well,” Josh said. “Right from the start, that Myron said he’d ruin you, Dad. He talked about how Mickey Mullen had the media eating out of his hand and said that if I opened my mouth, they’d get them to do a big story on you and make you look really bad.”

Josh’s dad shook his head. “I don’t care how the media makes me out, Josh.”

Josh kept his head down. Quietly he said, “They were going to talk about how you never made it, Dad. They said bad things. I know all that bothers you.”

Josh glanced up to see his dad give his mom a weak smile and take her hand in his own giant paw.

“Your dad played thirteen years as a pro,” his mom said softly. “Yeah, he never made it to the big leagues, but there’re some guys in the big leagues who only play a year or two, and how do you think they feel? They wish they had more. People talk about athletes who are winners? Someone who does his best, goes as far as he can, and isn’t ashamed or frightened of the things he
didn’t
do? That’s a winner.”

Josh looked up. This time he nodded.

“And,” Benji said somberly from his rocking chair in the corner of the room, “it’s all about scoring, because the team who scores the most points
always
wins.”

“Oh brother,” Josh said.

“Don’t forget what your mom said when you’re playing tomorrow, Josh,” his dad said, ignoring Benji. “You play your best. Enjoy being there. It’s a huge accomplishment just to get to Cooperstown—think of what you had to go through with your eye, that surgery—and we have a great team. If we lose, then that’s what was meant to be. Just do your best.”

His mom and dad traded looks. Then his dad patted his mom on the leg. “Come on, Laura, let’s go take a walk. Josh can listen for the baby if she gets up, right, Josh?”

“Sure,” he said, “you guys go.”

Josh watched them leave, clasping hands as they walked down the porch steps and out under the starry sky.

“How about a couple sodas?” Benji asked. “Hey, why the gloomy face?”

“Just thinking about what he said,” Josh said.

“Yeah,” Benji said, “your dad’s a sharp cookie. Whatever’s meant to be, right? We just let it happen and enjoy the whole thing. I love that.”

“No,” Josh said, “he’s not right. Not about that. We can’t just let it happen, Benji. We’ve
got
to win this thing tomorrow, and I’m not talking about winning it for us. I can’t let Mickey Mullen think that he gets whatever he wants, like he’s acting in some movie and we’re all just a bunch of extras. We’ve
got
to win this thing.

“We’ve got to win it for my dad.”

THE CHAMPIONSHIP GAME TOOK
place on the main field in the center of Dream Park. The Titans’ bus dropped them off outside a battered green door in the side of the cinder-block field house where they were allowing the semifinalists to change and prepare. The locker room smelled like damp socks and dried mud. Josh examined his face in the mottled mirror and traced the scar beneath his eye as he pondered his mother’s words from the night before.

“You ready?” Benji asked, patting him on the back.

Josh washed his hands and nodded without speaking.

Josh’s dad called them together, speaking in his soft rumbling-thunder voice.

“Okay,” he said, looking around at each of them,
“everyone knows by now that the Mick tried to buy off the umpire—or we think he did, anyway—but that’s over. Don’t lose your focus. The Mullen kid is still going to be the best pitcher we’ve seen. He throws more heat than anyone, but he’s not perfect and I know a way we can beat him.”

Josh shifted and looked around. The rest of the team stared at his father as if they were in a trance. He could tell they all believed in his dad, and Josh did too.

“He throws heat, but he’s a little on the wild side,” his dad said. “That’s how we beat him, with our brains. We make him throw more pitches than he wants. First of all, he’s pitched two entire games already this week, which is a lot. Second, the games he’s pitched, the ump was giving him one heck of a big strike zone. After everything that’s happened and everyone talking, that won’t happen with the ump we’ll get today.

“So, we wear him out. We make him throw eight to ten pitches for every batter. Don’t worry about hitting it early on, just guard the plate. Get a piece of the ball—a foul is going to be like gold for us. It might not seem like it, but by the end, we’ll have him worn out, and if I know Mickey Mullen, the dad, he’s not going to pull his kid out, even if he’s struggling. Trust me, guys. Hang in, protect the plate, and we’ll get them in the end.”

After a crisp cheer led by Josh’s dad, they burst out of the locker room and took the field. Wind snapped at the pennants atop the stadium’s flagpoles, and sunshine
spilled down through a high haze of fish scale clouds. A hint of popcorn and cotton candy floated on the breeze along with the buzz of the growing crowd in the stands. The sight of TV cameras up in the top row of the bleachers and behind home plate made Josh’s stomach roll. Jaden, her dad, and Josh’s mom sat right behind the Titans dugout, and they all offered him a thumbs-up. Josh refused to look at Mickey Mullen or Mickey Jr. Instead, he lost himself in the pregame ritual of their pepper drill and warm-up swings.

With his hat over his heart, Josh felt a thrill as he heard “The Star-Spangled Banner.” When the music ended, he pulled his cap on tight and turned to Benji. “This is it. Can you believe it? Everything we went through, and now we’re really here.”

“And they’re here too,” Benji said, pointing up to a section in the crowd where more than a dozen college coaches sat clustered together to scout the talent.

“Let’s do it, Benji,” Josh said, holding out a fist for Benji to bump. “We got an even field. No cheating. No tricks. Just baseball.”

The mayor of Cooperstown stepped out to the pitcher’s mound and announced the beginning of the first-ever Hall of Fame national championship game. The crowd cheered and the Titans did too as they dashed out onto the field. Josh planted his heels on the lip of grass between second and third, then rocked forward with his toes in the dirt, bent over and ready for anything.

Anything was what he got. The Comets could hit, and they kept the Titans busy in the field. Even with stellar defense that included two double plays through five and a half innings, the Titans found themselves down 5–3 going into the bottom of the final inning. Mickey Jr. had given up just four hits: a single to Esch and a home run to Josh in the first, along with a double by Josh in the third that sent a runner in to score before Mickey Jr. closed out the inning. The only bright side going into their last at bat was that the Titans were at the top of their order.

Josh’s dad called the team together. Jaden had moved into the dugout with her pen and pad, and she took notes as Josh’s father spoke.

“Okay, this is it,” he said, kneeling down in front of them as they clustered together in the dugout. “This is right where we said we’d be. We can do it, but you’ve got to believe. Don’t let Mullen intimidate you. He’s not the same pitcher he was in the first inning. Trust me, his arm is going. He’s worn out. I know he’s only given up four hits, but even when we’ve struck out, we made him throw more pitches than is good for him. You did your job up until now—now we finish this thing. First three guys get on base. Josh, you clean it up. Okay, bring it in. ‘Believe’ on three. One, two, three—”

“BELIEVE!”

ESCH WAS THEIR LEADOFF
batter, and the first two pitches Mickey Jr. threw had so much heat that Esch could only blink as they burned right by him down the middle. Esch stepped back out of the box with an 0–2 count and looked over at Josh’s dad. His dad held up a clenched fist and nodded for him to hang in. Esch took a deep breath and stepped up. The next two pitches went wild. When the third pitch went just high and inside, Mickey Mullen shot out of the Comets dugout screaming at the umpire when he called it a ball.

The umpire was a huge man with a thick bull neck. The rumor around the park was that he was a college umpire the tournament had brought up from New York City. The ump held up his meaty hands as he warned Mickey Mullen that another tirade would be his last.

Esch stepped back into the box. The 3–2 pitch came, right down the middle. Esch swung over it but managed to nick it just enough so that it dribbled down the third-base line. The catcher threw off his mask and scrambled for it.

Esch took off like a shot and made it safely just as the catcher’s throw made it to first.

“Good thing they don’t own the ump,” Jaden muttered to Josh after the cheering in their dugout subsided.

The next Titans batter went down but it took Mickey Jr. eleven pitches to do it, and Josh could see that his dad was right. The balls didn’t have the heat they had before—far from it. The batter before Josh got up and hit a single over the shortstop’s head, putting two on base with just one out.

Josh cheered from the batter’s circle, then puffed out his cheeks and blew a gust of air. Jaden and Benji both gave him a thumbs-up. His dad stepped out of the dugout to slap him on the back and tell him to swing big. Josh nodded, then walked up to the plate and planted his feet in the batter’s box.

That’s when Mickey Mullen, the dad, jogged out to the mound.

THE FATHER AND SON
talked back and forth at the bottom of the mound. Mickey’s cheeks seemed to pinch at his eyes as he spat out a tirade of angry words at his son that Josh couldn’t quite make out. Mickey Jr. didn’t slouch—he stood tall and looked evenly at his famous father and shook his head no. Mickey Mullen’s face went red and Josh heard the words, “You’ll walk him if I tell you to walk him or you’ll walk home to California.”

The father turned and stomped back to the dugout. Mickey Jr. climbed the mound.

Josh stared out at Mickey Jr. and saw something that surprised him.

Mickey Jr. held his head high with defiance.

Josh set his feet, gritted his teeth, and cranked back his bat, ready for the pitch.

Mickey Jr. wound up, and when the ball left his hand, Josh knew it was a changeup. He read it perfectly, right down the middle, and swung with everything he had.

It was too much. Josh pulled the ball well outside the third-base line. It cleared the fence by a mile but was obviously foul.

“No,” Mickey Mullen screamed from the dugout. “Don’t you do it!”

The umpire tossed out a fresh ball. Mickey Jr. adjusted it in his glove and bit his lip. Glaring down at Josh, he wound up and threw another pitch down the middle with all the heat he could muster.

It was a fastball that wasn’t so fast.

Josh got all of it and the ball took off, clearing the fence by more than a hundred feet. The crowd exploded, and as Josh circled the bases he couldn’t help noticing Mickey Jr.’s chin hit his chest, and he couldn’t help feeling bad for the opposing pitcher, knowing his famous father would be enraged with him for going against his wishes and failing.

To his credit, Mickey Mullen shook his head, clapped his hands at his son, and shouted for him to forget about it. The father shouted that if Mickey Jr. put down two more batters, the inning would be over—they could take it into extra innings and win it anyway.

Mickey Jr. took heart. He put the next Titans batter down with just four pitches, the last one a fastball that showed some life. All eyes in the stadium went to the
Titans batter’s circle, where Benji stood with his jaw hanging slack.

Josh put a hand on Benji’s arm, and his dad put his hand on the other. Benji trembled and gulped like a fish in the bottom of a boat.

“Hey,” Josh said, “Batman and Robin. Heavy Hitter, right? That’s you. You can do this.”

“Benji,” Josh’s dad said, leaning over so he was eye level with Josh’s best friend, “I know why you call yourself a heavy hitter all the time. I know you don’t really believe that about yourself, but that’s okay, because every good ballplayer grows up. They take the step between being a kid and a young man. It happens. Sometimes it happens when no one’s looking. For you, it’s gonna happen right here, right now, with all these people watching and with thousands of others checking you out on TV.”

“Don’t you mean millions?” Benji asked with a weak smile.

“It’s ESPN Four,” Josh’s dad said, grinning, “don’t get that excited. This is it, though. Trust me, Benji. His arm is worn down and you’re putting this out of the park.”

“Good luck, buddy,” Josh said.

Benji staggered toward the plate, muttering to himself.

“What’s he saying?” Josh’s dad asked him.

“He’s saying ‘heavy hitter,’ Dad,” Josh said, then he crossed his fingers for luck.

Benji dusted off his hands and spit into his glove. He held up one hand and stepped into the batter’s box. The first pitch came fast and inside. Benji swung for the fences and fouled it off the handle of his bat.

“You’re making contact!” Josh’s dad shouted.

“Get him, Benji!” Jaden shouted.

Josh bit his lip.

The next pitch came fast down the middle. Benji swung so hard he spun himself into the dirt. The ball smacked the catcher’s mitt and the catcher tossed it back to Mickey Jr., who fought back a smile.

“Oh brother,” Jaden said, moaning to Josh and clenching his arm in her grip, “an 0–2 count.”

“Believe,” Josh said in a whisper.

Mickey Jr. looked at his dad, who signaled something. Then he took a deep breath, wound up, and threw a fastball too high to be a strike.

Benji reared back and swung.