Mr. Magoo Hangs In There

The close game I was expecting last night on the softball diamond turned into a 17-7 blowout, and we were on the 7 end of it. Rotator Cuff Boy didn't bother to show up, despite calling one of our other players yesterday morning to ask what time the game started, and one of our women was about 15-20 minutes late to the game, with no warning. So we got off to a dismal start.

We had some bright spots throughout the game, but for the most part, about half the team acted like they were demoralized or tired or didn't want to be there or something. Our batting was mostly terrible, and our fielding was no better. Very frustrating, since we should have been able to play a close game with this team.

You're on the edge of your seat wondering how Mr. Magoo did out in right-centerfield, aren't you? I knew you were.

Well, I didn't do all that badly, which was kind of a surprise given how long it's been since I've played out there. I chuckled ruefully to myself in the first inning as the other team sent three consecutive left-handed batters to the plate. I put myself in right-centerfield in an effort to minimize the number of fly balls that I had to judge and the number of throws I'd have to make with a bum elbow, since most batters are right-handed, and most righties pull the ball into left field. But wouldn't you know it, the other team had a whole bunch of left-handed batters, in addition to a couple of righties who routinely hit it out my way. I wound up being about as active as our left fielder last night.

I'm happy to report that I did not have to make any Runs of Shame to the wall to retrieve a fly ball that I misjudged. I made several catches, and my coworker, the left-centerfielder, was good about calling out when I was out of position, so I could adjust before disaster struck.

I wrote yesterday that it was going to work to my advantage that the sun was still up. That absolutely held true. However, the sun worked against me on one play. They hit a routine fly ball to centerfield, which was no problem...until the last second. There are trees lining the road behind home plate, and as the game progressed, the sun started to set behind those trees, casting shade over about half the outfield. The fly ball was just barely on the sunny side of the field, so as I left the shadows and moved under the ball, I suddenly got a direct view of the sun. I'm not entirely sure what happened next, since I was completely blinded, but the ball hit my glove and came out.

Fortunately, my face was there to stop it.

Since I could see nothing but white light, I had no idea where the ball was for the last ten feet or so of its flight. I was relying on luck that the ball might come down where I thought it would, and counting on my sense of touch to know when to close my glove. I was lucky...but too slow. The next thing I knew, I was on my butt, my sunglasses were all cockeyed on my face, and the ball was on the ground a few feet away. I scrambled for the ball and threw to the blurry blob that I think was our shortstop. I sat there in frustration for a few seconds and then became aware that a lot of people were asking me if I was okay. Apparently, it looked a lot worse than it really was. Chuck said that from his vantage point on the pitcher's mound, he thought I took the shot directly to my face. But the ball actually hit my glove first, thus losing a lot of momentum, and then my sunglasses absorbed a lot of the impact (and amazingly, they didn't break!). I didn't even realize that the ball had hit my skin. My main concern was that I could see nothing but white out of my left eye after staring directly into the sun.

I got up and returned to my spot in the outfield, but I didn't have any time to think about how I was going to compensate for having vision in only one eye. The very next pitch that Chuck threw was launched right back at me. It was short, so I had to run up on it. I wound up sliding under it and catching it cleanly. I'm really not sure how.

I came back to the dugout at the end of the inning to find a lot of people interested in my face. I still didn't feel any pain, but the Mrs. said it was red and starting to swell just under my left eye. A couple teammates predicted a shiner in my future. I was more concerned about still seeing a big white blob out of my left eye, and I had to bat.

Even after the game, when the adrenaline subsided, I never felt pain in my face. By the time I got out of the shower at home, there was no swelling or redness, and absolutely no pain. This morning, same deal.

As far as batting went, I had my typical 2-for-3 night. I hit a line drive so hard that I put a dent in my bat. It'll go in the books as a triple, thanks to very loose scoring in rec league softball, but it was probably really only a double. Chuck was on first base when I hit it, and I could hear their fielders shouting instructions to each other while the ball was in play, and I knew they were more concerned about getting Chuck out than they were about me. So while they tried unsuccessfully to keep him from scoring, I made it to third base easily. I'm bummed about my bat, though. I love that bat, and so does about half of our team and several players on the Mrs.'s team. I undercut the ball in my second at-bat and popped up to the second baseman, but my third at-bat was another solid shot into the outfield for a single, despite the white blob in my left eye.

So altogether, not a bad night for me individually, but a rough night for the team. It was real darn close to being a REALLY bad night for Olivia, though. One of our batters hit a towering foul ball that went into the grassy area where Olivia was running around. Olivia has not yet learned what it means when everyone screams "HEADS!!!" As she was running, the ball dropped less than six inches in front of her. She was startled by its arrival for about a nanosecond, but then kept on running around. Whew!

Two-for-three at the plate, including an RBI "triple", a run scored, no major gaffes out in right-centerfield, some decent catches out there, no significant injuries, and my daughter didn't get her skull caved in by a foul ball. I can live with that. Oh, and the elbow held up pretty well. On a couple of my throws to the infield that had to travel some distance, I got a little shot of pain as I released the ball, but for the most part, it wasn't bad. And I was pleasantly surprised to awaken this morning with absolutely no soreness in my elbow.

I'll miss next week's game, so Chuck will wear the coach's hat, and I won't have any softball stories to share. The game will be against the team that massacred us in the first week, though, so there probably wouldn't have been any stories to share, anyway.