Lock Your Doors, Bolt Your Windows - It's Softball Time

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I swear this isn’t another blog strictly about animals … but can we talk about animals for a second? Have you noticed them acting in a peculiar fashion lately? I’m talking about geese flying south despite the heat? Cats incessantly scratching at their right ear? Dogs leaving their place at your side only to turn up hours later, whimpering softly to themselves in a dark and empty room? Squirrels putting on tiny fedoras, gathering their possessions into a bindle and thumbing it out of town?

                Of course you have. I feel silly even asking. Well, all of these ominous signs can only mean one thing – I’ve returned to softball. See? And you were worried this was going to be about animals. Nope, it’s about softball. 

            Me, the world’s worst softball player, the person who managed to injure himself in an adult league softball pick-up game so badly that it required surgery. The person who once played an entire season of baseball and only got on base twice, once via getting hit by a pitch and once via walk.

Yup, nothing left to do now but board up your windows, check that you’ve got spare batteries for all of your radios and flashlights, put on a pot of coffee and wait out the reminder of the season. Luckily for the Southeastern Pennsylvania region, the season is already halfway over. I missed the first part recovering from the surgery I got as a result of my previous softball odyssey.

My first game was actually not this past Monday but the one before it. My write up of that – and my warning to all of civilization – was preempted by my need to review “Terminator: Genisys.” So, sorry about that. Here’s what went down in handy bulleted form. To get yourself into the proper frame of mind while reading this, it is important to picture all of what follows in the Chiller text style.

We’re Talking About Playoffs: The Actual End of the Whole Mess

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The playoffs began and ended for my team last night. By virtue of our less than impressive regular season, we’d been granted a one game playoff against another team who had a less than impressive regular season with the right to go into the actual playoffs and likely get smoked by a bunch of professional amateur athletes on the line.

                There was some concern as to whether or not we’d actually get the chance to play last night due to looming thunderstorms, but as 6:30 rolled around, we bravely took the field, ready to thumb our noses at Mother Nature and dare her to do sumptin’ about it. Well, that’s not exactly true. My team took to the field. I, on the other hand, took to the bench. That’s right, an astonishing five games into my return to softball, my team finally realized what many a gym teacher and little league coach had long since known: I was most valuable defending the dugout and offering words of encouragement to my teammates.

                For the first time all season we had an extra player, which meant the guys on the team would have to rotate, one person always sitting. Wisely, I was the first person chosen to sit and the team got off to a good start. I was also listed at 10^th in the batting order, right near the bottom, another smart strategy.

                Let’s talk about the offense first, because this is the part that’s least interesting. First at bat, I work a five pitch walk. This is shocking because I have honestly no clue what the strike zone looks like and since none of the pitches were over my head or in the dirt, they were all ones I’d usually swing at. My only explanation was that I was momentarily overcome by the magnitude of what I’d done so far that season at the plate and thinking of all those infield singles paralyzed me. Eventually I came around to score when one of my teammates hit a ball deep into the outfield. My next at bat, I ripped a grounder right at the third baseman or shortstop who couldn’t make a play on it, allowing me to safely reach first on what I’ll go ahead and call an infield single.

                And that was it. Two plate appearances, one official at bat. We had kind of a rough night at the plate and in the field last night as a team, so the game I believe wrapped early.

The End Of Softball (And No, I Didn't Play So Poorly They Canceled The Sport)

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Another softball game went in the books this week without me completely 100% embarrassing myself and, as far as I can tell, society has yet to crumble. Although to be honest, the fact that this Ebola thing has coincided with my rise as a below-average softball player has me a little concerned. Makes wonder what would happen if I ever hit, I don’t know, say a double.

                Last night’s game was the regular season finale and, considering I’m not currently slated to play in next week’s playoff game, it could be my last game of the season. Or, potentially, my last game ever, depending on whether or not the team makes the tactical mistake of allowing everyone in the company to play again.

The potential finality of the game was something I hadn’t considered until literally just a few minutes ago. Had I known, you can rest assured I would have put a tremendous amount of pressure on myself, failed to even come close to meeting my own expectations, and spent most of the game caught in a tidal wave of nostalgia over events both great and small. “This may be my last ever at-bat.” “This could be my last ever time taking the field.” “This could be the last time I ever sit on this exact bench.”

                Instead, I went out there last night and did pretty much what I’ve done for most of this season: Be perfectly mediocre. Sure, last week’s game was a bit worse than mediocre, the week before was a little better, but when you take the whole thing into consideration, I’m hovering around the middle.

Hits and Catches: The Part of the Sports Movie Where Things are Going Too Good

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                When I decided to write about my return to softball, I thought to myself: “Here’s a way to embarrass yourself on the Internet that you haven’t explored before.” I mean, I’ve already gone into great and disturbing detail about the inner workings of my mind and my shortcomings as a human being on this very blog.

                 But my shortcomings as an athlete? That promised to be a hot take.

                Then, during my first two weeks back, a strange and completely unexpected thing happened: I turned out to be a GOD at softball. No I didn’t. Of course not. No, what I turned out to be was a slightly mediocre slap hitter with zero power, good speed on the base paths but little to no ability to actually control said speed, and a warm body willing to stand in right field for innings on end without getting bored and wandering off.

                Basically, I was like Juan Pierre in a blindfold.

                By no means was I the total package, but by god mediocre is several million times better than what I thought was going to happen. Even though my company’s team has a long history of losing, I still expected my performance on the field to be such an affront to basic human decency that I’d be lucky to only be fired for it and not taken out into the back parking lot, flogged repeatedly and then fired.  

                I returned on Tuesday night for my third game. My team was also there, so already we were ahead of last week. Shockingly enough, my first at bat ended with the ball not leaving the infield, but with me standing proud on first base. Infield single. I went first-to-third on a long single to the outfield and there I was. Standing on third, a stone’s throw from home plate and my first official run of the season (third overall counting scrimmages).

                A co-worker steps up to the plate. Makes solid contact. The infielder won’t catch it, but he will have a play, likely at first. The third base coach says go. I stand there. He says go again. I stand there. He says go a third time and I do the only sensible thing a person can do in that situation: I stand there. The guy gets thrown out at first. He jogs by and gives me the “What the hell?” look. I continue standing.

                I have a long history of ignoring what base coaches tell me to do, but I also think my injuries from the week before came into play. I’d have to run really, really fast to get home safely and I wanted zero part in a high-speed play at the plate.

                But it was totally fine, I got to jog home on the next play when someone else got a hit.

                I also had another hit later in the game and, unlike all of my other hits, it was a doozy. It was still a single, but not only did the ball make it out of the infield, it did so in the air, dropping right in front of the left fielder. I also popped out later to end a potential rally, but let’s not talk about that. Let’s focus on the singles.

                An even bigger accomplishment then getting a ball to leave the infield occurred later in the game. It actually occurred twice. On the defensive side of things. As I’ve already mentioned, I’ve spent my time on defense gathering dust in right field, which is basically no man’s land due to the lack of lefties in the league and righties who can hit to the opposite field.

                On Tuesday, I was in my usual spot, fighting the urge to put my glove on my head and pick grass – two skills I perfected during my storied run through little league many years earlier. I heard contact and casually looked around to see whose problem it was. With a growing horror I realized the ball was heading for shallow right, out of reach of the infielders. It was my problem.

                I started running toward the spot where I thought it would land. I was moving more on fumes and instinct than anything else because all of my internal organs had pretty much stopped working so that all blood could be directed towards the panic center in my brain. The ball was close. It was a soft looper and it was coming down slowly, but surely. I reached up my glove and caught it! There were loud cheers! Marching bands were struck up! Fans flooded the field! Ecstasy! Jubilation!

                Then I dropped it.   

                Shame. Horror. Fear. Fans pelted tomatoes at me and threatened the lives of my cats. My supervisor assigned me bathroom-cleaning duty even though the bathrooms are shared among multiple companies are cleaned by paid janitors.

                Then I caught it again. Yay! The ball had fallen out of my glove, but I managed to catch it again before it hit the ground. I was so happy that I forgot to throw the ball back in to keep a base runner at first. He must have sensed my excitement or took pity on my because he went nowhere while my team shouted to send the ball back in.

                I actually caught I second looping fly later in the game. That one I over ran and had to jump a little to keep it from going over my head. That time, I got the ball back in the infield quickly. My defensive prowess had become old hat. We went on to lose the game pretty resoundingly, moving our record to 1-3 for the season.  

                In case you’re keeping score at home, and god knows I am, the evening’s doings have put my stat line for the season at: three games played, 4/10 for a .400 batting average, three runs scored, a big fat zero runs batted in, one strikeout (which in slow pitch softball is nearly unheard of), no errors and two caught balls.

I’m scheduled to play in one more game, not this Tuesday but the following one. Considering how well things have gone so far, there is a very real chance that all hell will break loose at that game just to even things out a bit. Seriously. People could die. Animals could be maimed. Empires could fall.

                Adult league softball at its finest.

Sporting Event Survival Guide: What's the deal with sports fans?

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I think there’s one thing we can all agree on: A live sporting event is just about the most frustrating thing you can spend money on that doesn’t require hand tools.

                Fun too, sure. But also that other f word.

                For one thing, there’s a 50/50 chance that you paid good money to watch your favorite team lose. In my case, it usually feels like those odds look more like 90/10 in favor of losing, but I’m sure everyone feels that way, expect for those awful people cursed with sunny dispositions that you run into on occasion.

                Beyond the whole losing thing, there’s also the part of going to a game where you’re forced to interact with other fans. You’re all there because you share a common love of sport, but in most cases that’s the only overlap in your Venn Diagrams.

                Other fans can be a giant pain.   

                My girlfriend and I made the trip to a live sporting even last week. Our team lost. Shocker. On the way home, she fell asleep in the car. Also, shocker.

While she was asleep, it gave me the chance to ponder fandom and in particular the ways people chose to pass the time when they’re locked in a stadium with 30,000 total strangers for a couple of hours.

                So now, in my best Jerry Seinfeld (“What is the deal with sports fans?”), here are the most common types of fans you’ll encounter in stadiums: