The Prospect by Eliot Parker (epub ebook reader .txt) 📖

their rivals, the Charleston Alley Cats in Charleston in the game that would decide the association champion. This was the way the season was expected to conclude.
Shane Triplet would get the start for the Loggers. His final numbers were amazing, considering the pitcher missed over six weeks because of the suspension enforced by Commissioner Bud Morrison. But Shane posted a 12-3 record, with a 1.88 earned run average. He struck out 89 batters while only walking 13. Many players, coaches, and fans throughout the league believed those numbers were worthy of Shane being considered MVP of the league. However, nobody would find out until the league champion was crowned.
The bus ride to Charleston seemed unending. The bus rolled past the state capitol complex in Charleston, the late summer sun heightening the golden domed capital like jewels on a gold crown. The AT&T building, the Bank One Building and several other large structures were the largest any Logger player had ever seen in West Virginia, despite the fact the some of the players came from larger cities all over America
Descending across the 35th Street Bridge into the Charleston suburb known as Kanawha City highlighted several Charleston businesses and local landmarks. Risk’s Market and Murad’s restaurant dotted the landscape on both sides of the street. The street itself was a flurry of activity, with many people shuffling across the busy intersection, zipping in between lanes of traffic heading to Watt Powell Park, home of the Charleston Alley Cats.
As the bus approached Watt Powell Park, Walter encouraged his team to be professional, especially when speaking to the press as well as the fans from both teams. Furthermore, everything taking place before, during, and after the game was a reflection on them and on Sheaville as well.
Over 1,500 Loggers fans were expected to make the commute from the small lumber town to the capital city of West Virginia. Upon entrance to Watt Powell Park, the parking lot was awash in a mixed sea of blues, grays, reds, and blacks, dividing the constituency of fans.
Shane hobbled of the bus, although he quickly regained a confident, businesslike strut that carried him across the skinny parking lot near the fenced gate designated as the players’ entrance. Not more than four steps into his walking stride, Shane was approached by the Charleston Alley Cats Radio Network play-by-play man Jim Thomas. The announcer had one objective and Shane knew it: what is the internal resolve of Shane Triplet, considering this game was going to be his first championship game as a pitcher.
“So, Shane, how does it feel to pitch in such a large game after such a tumultuous season?” Thomas asked scribbling pen marks onto a mangled notepad splotched with stains.
Shane nonchalantly shrugged off the question. “Pitching in this game is like pitching in any other game. The only difference is there is no next game.”
Thomas seized on the opportunity to ask another question as the pitcher lengthened his steps.
“This is a big game for you also because you are going to be a father soon? Is your wife here to support you in the game?”
Shane stopped walking and looked first at Thomas, then at his notepad. “She is not my wife and my personal life is not open for your interpretation. This interview is over.”
Shane disappeared behind the checkered metal gate leading onto the Watt Powell Park before Jim Thomas could manage to ask another question.
For Shane, the moment was frustrating and invigorating. He now understood what it must have been like to be Pete Rose, Chris Sabo, Rob Dibble, and many other Cincinnati Reds players prior to the 1990 World Series. They must have been besieged with questions Shane thought. The boldness of JimThomas just emboldened Shane to immediately race out onto the pitchers mound and begin striking out Alley Cats hitters.
Walter Mann gave a curt, but magisterial speech to the Sheaville Loggers before they took the field for the championship game. The manager, facing a disquieted group of youthful baseball players, was not overzealous in his approach to the speech.
“Boys, this ain’t the end of our baseball season. No sir.” Walter’s accent was as thick as southern molasses. “But it could be the beginning of something special. Remember this, there’s gonna be some scouts from major clubs here with us tonight, so you got a chance to make a good feeling with ‘em. Yet, I want you to play good, play smart, and whatever happens out there I want you to play like champs.”
The team rallied around the words of their manager and huddled close to the cramped locker room exit. The all began to chant Loggers, Loggers, Loggers over and over until they discharged from the room, resembling a cannon launching its cache into the open air.
As both players spilled onto the field, a mixture of cheers and jeers echoed from the crowd. Shane could always tell the cheers of the Loggers fans. They were unique; loud but not overcompensating cheers that featured screaming voices full of admiration and support, not pride and arrogance. However, pride and arrogance was the disposition of the Alley Cats fans, and Shane knew it-even if he could not prove it.
After the national anthem, Shane gathered with Biggie Rowan, Ryan Head, Chaz Martinez, Harry Deitzler, and Pat Sutton in order to strategize over the best way to handle the Charleston Alley Cats offense. Walter Mann joined in the meeting, which oddly resembled a group of men preparing to establish the rules of a card game on an idle Wednesday night.
“These guys can hit, they got speed, so you all infielders need to be on your toes for nine innings,” Walter reminded them. Walter’s eyes were clear and his dark pupils swollen with a blend of adrenaline and anticipation while his fingers twitched with a touch of nervousness. Even though Walter would never admit it, he was extremely nervous about the upcoming events.
“Now remember boys, there eight and nine fellas hit into plenty twin killings…so Ryan use and Chaz here be ready.”
Both Ryan and Chaz nodded in unison, in total agreement with the instructions provided by the manager.
Walter looked away from everyone else and concentrated on Shane. A lump filled his throat and his palms featured dime sized puddles of sweat. “Stick with fast balls and then follow with off-speed stuff. If they start hittin’ the fast one, then we will mix it up. Okay boys, let’s win a title.”
The teammates dispersed. Shane looked up into the early evening sky. It resembled a crushed rainbow; palates of color scattered across the Charleston skyline as the white florescent lights began to shine a ghostly white glow onto the diamond below. Gusts of stiff breeze blew wisps of blond hair into Shane’s field of vision, which he brushed away with the stroke of his hand. With little time to notice anything else, aside from Frank Miller and Phil Rodney taking their seats along the first base side of the ballpark, the umpire signaled to Shane that it was time for the game to begin.
The season for the Sheaville Loggers had arrived.

********************
The first pitch of the championship game was a Shane Triplet fastball that broke down and away from Alley Cats second baseman Juan Polanco. Then a slider was thrown that Polanco was unable to reach with a lower swing and extension of the wrists and arms. Finally, a knee buckling breaking ball froze the center fielder for the Charleston Alley Cats. In just three pitches, the first out of the game was recorded.
The Alley Cats fans were silenced. Their opening taunts and jokes about Shane’s problems with suspensions and his recent clashes with the West Virginia State Police provided plenty of fodder for the Charleston fans to muster up enough appropriate and sometimes inappropriate cheers to try and shatter the concentration of one of the most dominating pitchers in the Appalachian Baseball Association.
Yet Shane nixed any of those outbursts. Polanco’s strikeout brought the Sheaville fans to their feet and left the Alley Cats fans looking for their seats.
When second baseman Taylor Allen confidently crossed the chalk into the the batter’s box, he, like his teammate, faced the same arsenal of pitches that sliced the strike zone and Shane’s pinpoint control made the baseball change speeds and appear to change from a rather hittable approaching object into a aerial dancing marble.
Allen swung at every pitch and came up considerably short each time. The last pitch, a curveball on the outside corner broke away from the plate at the last possible second, sending Allen’s bat into the ground a cloud of dusts settling over the space between Biggie Rowan and the home plate umpire.
Billy Rose was the next Alley Cats batter. He was a rather short, squirmy hitter with a round face and then lips that tightly ripped across his face. His hands were rather large, but he looked more like a water boy than a minor league baseball hitter.
Shane, already perspiring, wiped the sweat from his brow with the shoulder sleeve of his ash gray jersey and looked around. The rest of the Loggers were pounding their fists into their gloves, meshing the leather into a softer, more manageable object that swallowed one hand and wrist. Chaz gave a slight wink, while Harry and Ryan managed to crack a slight grin.
Shane’s first pitch to Billy Rose was meant to be an overpowering fastball that would chart a path for the entire at bat. Instead, Billy received an early sign from Charleston manager Bob Beggs indicating the first pitch may be a fastball. Rose reacted accordingly, moving the bat in a clockwise motion forward with amazing speed and strength and slamming into the ball with brute force.
The sound of a bat hitting a fastball was very distinct. The sound resembled a firecracker explosion; one that caused every person at Watt Powell Park to hold their breath collectively with all eyes watching to see the baseball’s next move.
The ball kept moving and all right fielder Pat Sutton could do was watch as the baseball barely carried over the right field wall, decorated with advertisements, onto the train tracks slammed against the wall.
Walter Mann began pacing in the crowded, plainly furnished dugout with his hands folded behind his head, elbows jutting to the side. He drew his lips tightly against his face, watching as some of the bench players looked toward the fields featuring expressions that revealed uncertainty.
Biggie Rowan prepared to squat once again behind home plate and readjust the catcher’s mask on his face. He noticed Shane shouting and slamming his glove into the ground as Rose confidently trotted around third base amidst a roar of thunderous applause from the crowd.
Chaz raced behind Shane and patted him on the hip. “Don’t worry about it man, its just one run.”
Shane looked away. Chaz was never someone who could falsely exude reassurance or praise, so Shane did not even bother looking at him.
Instead, Shane went back to the patented fastball, once again dancing the baseball inside, outside, up and away from the strike zone, forcing third baseman Nefrio Dotel to helplessly swing and stare as the ball zipped into Biggie Rowan’s glove.
Only one hit and one run in the Alley Cats first, but it was a big run. Shane remembered Reds broadcaster Joe Nuxhall, the “ol’ lefthander,” talking about how psychologically important scoring the first run in a championship game was for a baseball team. Charleston managed to score first, although Shane made the two out of three hitters look overmatched at the plate; swinging at nothing and moving their necks around like the victims of whiplash.
Shane’s counterpart on the mound, pitcher Todd Wright, was a formidable opponent for Sheaville. Wright was 15-7 on the regular season, and was