“Hey! Quite convenient that you all happened to be in California this week, eh?”
I walked in the door of the In-N-Out and immediately spotted the group. Pete Grossman had been my best friend—and, well, my roommate—ever since my parents moved to Japan, back when I was still in elementary school. He was rather tall—six foot eight, he informed me—which made him quite recognizable. He was sitting just inside the door with three of our teammates back from middle school and high school: Jayson McDougal, Tim Cormier, and Tucker Davis. Simon Young, who had been a rival pitcher and a good friend off the field, was with them, as was an unfamiliar young kid who looked to be about fourteen years old.
Pete laughed. “Yeah, convenient, that’s what I’d call it,” he said. “Hey, I’m paying, so you better not complain,” I shot back. Pete sat back a little. “Yeah, you bet you’re paying. Five million a year,” he teased. I decided to change the subject. “So, Jayson, not rocking the ‘hawk anymore?” I asked, turning to a shorter (I mean, duh) guy with hair blacker than his solid black T-shirt. “Not right now,” he said, “USC wanted me to look a little more…presentable, for whatever reason. But I’m done with that now, so I might grow it out again.” Pete butted in. “Oh, by the way, this is Shane. You met him when we were down in Texas a few years ago with my cousins,” he said, “but it was very briefly, you may not remember him.” I denied that idea. “I remember him now.” I turned to Shane. “You were the kid with the weird head injury, right?” He looked up from his cell phone only to nod, then went back to tapping away at the screen. “Heh, sorry, he’s a busy guy, trying to finish up his degree and all.” “Degree? Isn’t he, like, fourteen?” Shane spoke up finally. “I’m actually nineteen,” he said, “same age as these guys. I’m trying to graduate in three years, and I just need one more class to finish up my English degree.”
“Anyways, why don’t we order? I’m getting kinda hungry,” I said. We got in line, behind a couple of couples (heh) and a scrawny-looking teenager. Suddenly, the kid turned around to face us. “You guys are, like, professional athletes, right?” he asked. “I’m actually the GM of a new Major League team,” I said, “and these guys might just be my first players. Why?” “Well,” the kid said, “I’m trying to be a Major Leaguer as well. I’m signed to play at a D-II school in Ohio next year, but my coaches and parents think I could get drafted in August.”
“About that…there’s not exactly going to be a draft this August, because of the whole league reformation thing,” I explained, “so if you want to go straight to the pros, your best bet would be to go play in a showcase around here. There’ll be a ton of scouts at those things from all the new teams.”
The kid arched his eyebrows. “What if I held, like, a private workout for one team?” he asked. “I guess you could go that route, but—wait a minute, I know where you’re going with this,” I said, “you’re trying to convince me to try you out, aren’t you?” The kid hung his head, turned around, and ordered a triple cheeseburger and a big order of fries. The kid went to sit at one of the little tables, and our group went to sit at one of those bigger circular-type tables after we ordered. I finished eating first and started talking to the others about how everything was going. Pete told me that he had been the starting first baseman in his junior year at UMass. “Hit .474 in conference play, with seven RBI and four runs,” he said proudly. I congratulated him and asked the others how they had been doing. Jayson had dropped out of college and gone off to play independent ball for a couple years and Tucker and Tim were trying to focus more on school at this point. Simon had joined the team at the D-III school he was going to. “But I barely played last year, only pitched four innings all season,” he said. Shane said he wasn’t playing in college either, but he had hit .541 in his senior year of high school down in Texas, and he had only quit so that he could graduate quickly and get back to playing.
As we talked, I noticed the kid straining to hear as much of our conversation as he could, but I continued to ignore him up until I was almost out the door. “My office is on the third floor next door, go on in,” I said to the guys, “I think I forgot something back there.” I walked back in and gave the table one last inspection. “Hmm, I guess I didn’t forget anything,” I said sarcastically. “Yep, there’s definitely nothing that I have forgotten.” I whirled around to face the kid. “Siiiiike!” I exclaimed as I invited him to come and join our meeting. He gladly accepted, threw away the scraps of his food—amazingly, he had polished off all of it—and followed me out the door and over into the five-story office building next door. We went up to the third floor, and when we got there, the others were already waiting for me in the office. Pete, ever the jokester, was sitting in my chair. “Oh yeah,” I said, “the office is a little, um, bare right now. I just got the job today, after all. By the way, I never got your name.” I said the last sentence looking at the kid. “Oh, sorry. My name’s Nick Bell,” he said. “Nice to meet you, Nick,” I said as I shook his hand. I tried to make small talk, but we ended up deciding to just go ahead and have a little workout on the back field.
I had Pete, Tim, Tucker, Shane, and Nick take a round of BP against each pitcher, then had them run through some simple baserunning and fielding drills. We decided to call it a day after that. “Swing back by any time Friday afternoon, I’ll be up in the office and we can talk money,” I told the seven of them. “Bring your agents, or consultants, or parents, or whoever, I’m giving you a few days so you can make arrangements.”
I said goodbye to all of them, and went back up to my office. I was quite tired, though, and I decided to go back home to my apartment. The apartment was well on the other side of town, near a mall and the ballpark that was, for the time being, the future home of the Fresno Flyers. I showered and changed into my pajamas—well, pajama pants and a white T-shirt—and nodded off, trying to think of something—anything—other than baseball.
_________________ Olive - she/they // NAPOLI FOR MVP // post count doesn't matter
yeah that log's dead too- i mean on hiatus (yes that one too) (seriously all of them now lol) (haha unless...?)
"All people are good for something. The important thing is finding what." - Tom
BrewersFuzz wrote: PEDs wrote: i think we banned him cause he was an idiot glad i never got banned for that
Second Member of the 10,000 Post Cult
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