Power Pros Forum

Dang what's with you killing people?

Oliver got up. Trying not to wake any of his brothers, he picked out an outfit and tiptoed down to the bathroom, where he put said outfit on. He then tiptoed down the stairs and into the kitchen, where he quickly scarfed down an orange and two Wild Berry frosted Pop-Tarts. He put his backpack on backwards, with the straps on his back and the actual backpack on his chest, opened the door, and started crabwalking to school.

But he had forgotten that his oldest brother, sixteen-year-old Percival, had started training to run a half-marathon. Percival was just coming back from his three-mile run when Oliver “stepped” onto the sidewalk, and he stopped the absent-minded seven-year-old in his tracks. Percival picked Oliver up and carried him back into the house, where he firmly scolded the young boy, who was wearing purple footy pajamas with a neon yellow life vest, a cowboy hat, and a pair of his brother Daniel’s boxer shorts—which were way too big on Oliver, given that Daniel was 15 and Oliver was only 7—tied on by a belt. “What the hell were you thinking?” his dad yelled at him when he found out what Oliver had tried to do. Oliver ran upstairs and into his room crying.

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“Jet fuel can’t melt dank memes!” an excited Alan Mao shouted as he dashed across the playground after school. As soon as he got home, he went up to his room and started studying…studying jokes and memes, of course, but his parents didn’t need to know that.

When he woke up the next morning, he was ready to go shopping. His sister, Ayla, usually enjoyed the weekend trips to the mall more than he did, but this would not be the case on this particular Saturday morning. Their parents pretty much just tagged along to pay for everything, but to the surprise of both kids, they didn’t push back when Ayla said she wanted to go into Hot Topic. Alan initially didn’t want to go in, but once he saw the clearance rack, he couldn’t resist. He couldn’t believe his eyes when he saw the gray Grumpy Cat T-shirt he had wanted for his birthday—and in his size, too. Quite a bargain it was as well, as the store needed to sell it off to make room for other inventory, and was discounting it down to only $1.29—quite a reasonable price, Alan thought as he fished in the pocket of his khaki shorts for two crisp dollar bills, his entire allowance for the week. He ended up buying a small bottle of sour spray, bringing the total to exactly two dollars.

He consumed the entire bottle within a minute of getting in the car to go back home.

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“What did you just say, young man?”

Sydney Sydence was not happy. Business had been slow all week at the pub, and she had just been trying to take her mind off of things. Her husband had decided to work late, so he was still downtown at the pub. She had given her seven-year-old son Coen permission to have a friend over that night for a sleepover and to play the next day, and Coen had taken advantage, inviting his baseball teammate and elementary-school classmate Andrew White over to their house after school. But Andrew had said that he couldn’t make it until after dinner, and Coen was in his room playing an old video game—MLB Power Pros 2008—while he waited for his friend to show up. His favorite part of the game was “Success Mode”, a story-based create-a-player mode, and he had been trying to create a realistic version of his favorite MLB player, Tampa Bay ace Chris Archer. But he had played poorly in his five Double-A league games and failed to rack up enough “scout points” to advance. The game had just shown Coen its “Game Over” cutscene for the fourth time in a row, and the boy had let out his frustration by uttering a phrase he had heard his friends say before: “What’s a truck?”

The phrase, of course, sounded like something different entirely, and Mrs. Sydence did not believe her son when he explained this to her. Coen soon found himself sucking on a fresh bar of soap, and when Andrew showed up at the door with a backpack slung over his right shoulder, Coen was told to answer the door with the soap still in his mouth.

Would Andrew please message me with his reaction to this…unique situation? ty

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This would sound really disturbing out of context

Mrs. Sydence took the soap out of Coen’s mouth at last, and the two boys headed up the stairs to Coen’s room. Andrew set down his backpack. “What did you say?” he asked knowingly. Coen, in a hushed voice, confessed what he had said, and Andrew laughed. “That’s nothing,” he said. “My sister Jenny swears all the time, and I don’t think she’s even gotten a slap on the wrist,” he said with another chuckle. “Yeah, well, my parents aren’t in the best mood,” Coen explained, “they’re pretty cool unless business is bad…and let’s just say that business is pretty bad right now,” Coen continued with an emphasis on pretty bad.

As soon as the boys had gotten settled in and Coen had taught Andrew the basics of Power Pros, Mr. Sydence came home. Slamming the door behind him, he immediately went into the kitchen and opened the fridge. “Want anything?” he asked his wife of eleven years, who was now back in her seat on the couch in the living room, knitting Coen a new sweater. “Surprise me,” she said, and Mr. Sydence grabbed two Guinness beer bottles and made his way into the living room, where he switched on the TV.

Coen and Andrew then started an exhibition game, Coen’s Rays against Andrew’s Tigers, and despite the latter being a total novice to the game, he pulled out a 5-2 victory on a walk-off grand slam by James McCann, Detroit’s young catching phenom. Coen reached up to the top bunk of his bed, grabbed his favorite Rays snapback, and pulled it low over his bangs. “I want a rematch,” he said confidently.

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“Coen Sydence? I think not,” Alan Mao giggled as he made his list of classmates to invite to his upcoming eighth birthday party.

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The next day, April 15th, marked the seventh birthdays of two Sandy Eggo second-graders.

“Happy birthday, dear Conner-and-Caroline, happy birthday to youuuuuu!” the kids sang. Conner blew out the candle on his chocolate-frosted cupcake and made a wish. Caroline did the same, though her cupcake was strawberry-frosted. Caroline turned to Conner. “So, what did you wish for?” she whispered. “I can’t tell you,” Conner teased, “but I can tell you to tell your mom that I said thanks.”

Mrs. Howell, a nurse, had baked a cupcake for every second-grade student at the elementary school—forty-four in total—after a marathon shift the night before, and she was still asleep when Caroline got off the yellow school bus at 3:34 that afternoon. Caroline tried to sneak her way up to her room so as not to wake her mom, and it worked; she immediately put in earbuds and started watching a movie on her iPad mini.

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Three and a half years passed. Going into the sixteenth and final game of the regular season, the Sunflowers and the Nukes were both 12-3. The winner of their game would get to go to the Little League World Series.

LLWS??? Sweet.

Keep it going MattRoth.

Wow where did the time go?

July 12, 2020

Capistrano Park — Baseball Field — Visiting Dugout

Here’s the lineup.

*pitter-patter*

Oceanside Sunflowers
COACH: Dan Rommel

1: Reed Pollack, 2B
2: Freddy Guerrero, P
3: Matty Cooper, CF
4: Keith Braun, 1B
5: Jackson Robertson, C
6: Katie Lawrence, SS
7: Robert Tomlinson, LF
8: Alan Mao, RF
9: Josh Barnett, 3B
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Trevor Braun, INF
Mitchell Hanifin, INF
Tai Thomas, OF
Drew Nichols, C
Kevin Vincent, P
Morgan Cobb, OF
Carson Eaves, P/INF

Home Dugout

Here’s the lineup.

*pitter-patter*

Oceanside Nukes
COACH: Kevin Miller

1: Lucy Henderson, SS
2: Jackleton Scheffley, 1B
3: Conner Holland, LF
4: Pablo Sanchez, 2B
5: Daniel Hughes, C
6: Andrew White, RF
7: Timmy Turner, P
8: Oliver Hawthorne, CF
9: Ford Smalley, 3B
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Harley Aston, P
Davis Freeman, INF
Zander Freeman, INF
Coen Sydence, P
Taylor Clarkson, OF
William Young, C
Brett Dawson, UTIL
Jackson Hughes, P/OF

Home Plate

“…and those are the ground rules.”

“Alright, exchange lineups,” barked the young umpire. The two coaches complied.

Dan Rommel’s eyes lit up when he saw the “bench” portion of the Nukes’ lineup card. “I can’t believe it,” he muttered to himself as he walked back to the dugout. “They’re really benching their three best players?”

A scrawny, sandy-haired boy came trotting up to him. “Good morning, Reed. Just the boy I was looking for,” said the coach. Reed quietly said hello. “Lemme guess,” he said, “right bench?” Coach Rommel shook his head. “Left bench?” Another shake of the head. “Uh…middle bench?” Coach Rommel replied verbally this time. “How about second base,” he said, “and batting leadoff?”

Suddenly, Reed became light-headed and fainted.

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Seattle

Play-by-Play

Top 1st: Pollack grounded out to second. Guerrero flied out to right. Cooper singled to center. Braun struck out swinging. 0-0
Bot 1st: Henderson struck out swinging. Scheffley popped out to first. Holland tripled to deep left. Sanchez lined out to right. 0-0
Top 2nd: Robertson popped out to catcher. Lawrence reached on throwing error by second baseman Sanchez. Tomlinson singled to left, Lawrence to second.

Top of the Second

Alan Mao strode to the plate with his trusty Easton composite bat in hand. He stepped into the right-handed batter’s box and took his usual four practice swings, then tapped the end of the bat on the plate twice and got into his stance. With runners on first and second and one out, Alan knew what was coming as he looked down the line to get the sign. Right-hander Timmy Turner came set and threw a looping breaking ball that looked like it was over the outside edge of the plate.

What do you do, Alan?

A. Try to lay down a sacrifice bunt
B. Try to go the other way
C. Lay off the pitch
D. Scream “ayy lmao”, hit a home run, and run the bases backwards

The only option I see is D.

alas, it wasn't to be, sadly...

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Top of the Second

Alan sized up the slow curveball, paused, then tried to drive it the other way. He made contact, but the result was a inning-ending, 4-6-3 double play.

Australian-born catcher Daniel Hughes led off the bottom of the second with a flyout to the warning track in left; Andrew and Timmy both grounded back to the pitcher, and the inning was over.

In the top of the third, Josh Barnett led off with a long fly into the stands down the first-base line, followed by a similar foul down the third-base line, followed by a high pop fly straight down the middle that was easily caught by Oliver Hawthorne out in center. Leadoff man Reed Pollack came up to bat, and Timmy thought long and hard ( ) about how to approach him.

How do you approach the at-bat, Timmy?

A. Pitch to contact, dare him to hit the ball
B. Pitch around him, nibble at the edges
C. Drill him with a fastball
D. Just keep making pickoff moves to first even though there’s no one on

[Timmy did not respond in time so I chose for him]

Top of the Third

Timmy sized up the diminutive boy standing in the right-handed batter’s box. I bet he won’t hit my offspeed stuff…he thought as he wound up and lobbed in a slow palmball-esque changeup for a strike. His next pitch was a knuckleball, and the 0-2 delivery was another one, this one a high, hanging pitch that Reed yanked down the third-base line and into left field. Conner Holland took off from left-center and pushed off of the grass about a foot away from the foul line, putting his body into a fully extended position in order to try and catch the hard, sinking liner.

A loud cheer went up from nearly everyone in the ballpark as Conner held up his glove with the ball safely in its pocket. Even Reed, who had taken a wide turn around first and started digging for second, stopped to clap briefly before returning to the visitors’ dugout. Freddy Guerrero, the opposing pitcher, fanned on three pitches—all of them four-seam fastballs—to end the inning.

Freddy popped one last fastball into Jackson’s catching mitt, then walked off to the side of the mound as the catcher got up out of his crouch and fired down to second base. Reed tossed the ball to Katie, who tossed it to Josh, who lobbed it back to the Cuban-American right-hander. Center fielder Oliver Hawthorne stepped into the box, tapped his green Louisville Slugger bat on the plate four times, took a single practice swing, and got into his slightly open stance. Freddy came set, wound up, and released the ball. Fastball, Oliver thought as he went into his load. But he didn’t get a chance to swing at the pitch before it hit him smack in the left thigh. The next batter was little Ford Smalley. His surname was just a coincidence, but the boy was at least a foot shorter than the pitcher he was facing. He was a little scared of the ball, but was a terrific bunter and a great fielder, and he was being asked to do one of those things during this trip to the plate—and it certainly wasn’t fielding. He laid down a perfect bunt, sacrificing himself to advance Oliver to second and bringing up leadoff batter Lucy Henderson, who had struck out in her first at-bat. Changeup, she identified the pitch as it came in, right down the middle.

What do you do, Katie?

A. Swing
B. Take? I don’t know why you would do this but it’s an option, I suppose
C. uh, bunt, I suppose?
D. Catch the ball, flip off the pitcher, and throw the ball into the outfield

swing, just do it

uh so I messed up last update, Lucy and Katie are different people on different teams, oops.

Bottom of the Third

Lucy locked in on the pitch and smoked it to right-center for a base hit. Matty Cooper charged over from center field to cut off the ball, but he played it smart and threw it in to second, allowing the run to score but keeping the batter at first. Jackleton Scheffley followed and popped out to second base, and Conner Holland grounded to short to end the inning.

A new pitcher came in for the Nukes for the fourth inning. Jackson Hughes, a right-hander, was usually the last resort for the team pitching-wise, but they really needed him to eat some innings, as Timmy had complained of pain in his shoulder after the third inning. “It hurts really bad,” he whined, and Coach Miller decided to give him the rest of the day off. Jackson’s brother, Daniel, was catching, which helped the younger boy calm down a little on the mound. But after three straight singles to start the inning, Jackson’s nerves came back, and he let a fastball slip down the middle. It was promptly crushed by Katie Lawrence, well over the right-field fence. Daniel came out to the mound and talked to Jackson, and it worked, as the boy calmed down and retired nine straight. Unfortunately, the Nukes couldn’t manage more than a couple of baserunners over the next three innings, and it was on to the seventh, with another new pitcher entering for the Nukes, this one a left-hander, the Irish kid, Coen Sydence. Robert and Alan both grounded out to third base, and Mitchell Hanifin struck out pinch-hitting to end the inning.

Coach Miller nodded to Harley Aston at the far end of the dugout. “Go get warmed up,” he ordered, and Harley went out to the bullpen with backup catcher William Young. With lefty Kevin Vincent back on the mound for a third inning, and Mitchell now at third, Andrew White stepped into the box for a third time. He was 0 for 2, though he had reached on an error—coincidentally, on Josh, who was no longer in the game—in the fourth inning. Kevin was a soft-tosser, one of those “crafty lefty” types, and he baffled Andrew by throwing a curveball, a splitter, a circle changeup, and then another curveball. Fortunately for the batter, none of those pitches were in the strike zone, and Andrew cast his bat aside and jogged down to first, where he was replaced by speedy Davis Freeman, whose brother Zander also entered the game, pinch-hitting for the pitcher Coen. Zander hit a hard grounder to shortstop Katie Lawrence’s right on the first pitch.

What do you do, Katie? (this time, fo’ rizzle)

A. Try to backhand the ball and make a play
B. Just block the ball so Davis doesn’t get any further than second
C. Pretend you’re a CPU player in Power Pros and go cover the base
D. Chase after that butterfly in right field

Bottom of the 7th

Katie lunged to her right, trying to snare the ball with a backhand. Davis was far too fast to throw out at second, but she had a shot at getting the out at first if she could make the exchange quickly. Katie pulled the ball out of her glove and fired across to Keith Braun, who let the ball smack into the pocket of his glove for the out. Ford Smalley dropped down his third sacrifice bunt of the day, and it was a runner on third with two outs for pinch-hitter Taylor Clarkson, who knocked a base hit over Reed’s head at second to score the run. Jackleton and Conner walked, and Coach Rommel pulled Kevin and replaced him on the mound with Carson Eaves, a righty with a deceptive sidearm delivery.

Pablo Sanchez watched from the on-deck circle as Carson threw his warm-up pitches. “Aquí vamos,” he whispered as he dug in, took a couple of practice swings, and prepared to face the new pitcher. All he needed was a long, bases-clearing double to score three runs and win the game. Carson’s first pitch was a hard, tumbling splitter at the knees for strike one. His second pitch was a fastball on the black for strike two, but he missed with a pair of sliders before winding up and delivering another splitter.

Pablo, ¿Que haces?

A. Try to foul it off and hope for a fastball
B. Swing with power, trying for a long extra-base hit, but with a high chance of a whiff
C. Just go for a base hit
D. Take it for a called strike three, ending the game and costing you and your team a chance of going to the LLWS

Pick D.! Pick D.!

Oh boy! I can read the rpg AND learn Spanish! Goody!

alas, it wasn't to be... At least you tried. I'll give you a gold star for that

very educational, this RPG

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Bottom of the 7th

Pablo went with the pitch, pulling it into left field for a base hit. Taylor scored with ease, but Robert Tomlinson moved quickly to throw the ball back in, and Jackleton was stuck at third. Daniel Hughes was up next, again with the bases loaded and two outs. Soon, the count was 3-0, and Jackson came out to the mound to calm Carson down. It didn’t work, as he walked in the run, but a visit from Coach Rommel calmed him down and he finally got the third out, inducing a weak roller to second by Davis Freeman—who had come in earlier that inning as a pinch-runner—to end the inning.

A lengthy series of switches took Jackleton out of the game and put Harley in to pitch. In addition, William Young came in to catch, leaving only Brett Dawson—a blonde-haired boy who could play all nine positions if needed—available off the bench. Meanwhile, the Sunflowers still had three players available, and Coach Rommel was unsure if he would use them. Reed Pollack led off the inning by striking out, and Carson Eaves grounded to third, but Matty Cooper hit a long triple to center field, bringing Keith Braun up. Coach Miller signaled to the catcher William, who relayed the sign to Harley on the mound, stood up, and extended his gloved left hand. Harley issued the intentional walk, bringing up Jackson Robertson, who was 1 for 3. Coach Miller came out to the mound to discuss the situation with Harley.

Who do you want to face?

A. Jackson Robertson — 1 for 3, run
B. Katie Lawrence — 1 for 3, grand slam, reached on an error
C. Robert Tomlinson — 1 for 3; this is the safest option, but will allow a run to score
D. No one; take yourself out of the game and make Brett come in to pitch