Game Four: Paradise Preparatory (4)

Garret was back on the mound and was still pitching straight strikes. With a 0-2 count, their cleanup hitter, tapped a slow grounder my way. I greeted the ball, fielded it, and made a nice easy throw to Julian at first base for the first out.

The fifth batter in the lineup took two called strikes as well, then swung at the third. The grounder went straight to Noah, who had no troubles fielding it to Julian.

The sixth batter also took two called strikes. On the next pitch, he sent a grounder within Chris's reach. He snatched it up and made the throw to Julian for the final out. End of the second inning.

Garret and Jordan walked back together and I jogged with Noah. The whole inning seemed weird to me. Three groundouts? All at 0-2 counts? I glanced at the other teams dugout and saw them taking the field, preparing for the third inning. For a team that's down 5-0, they looked very relaxed. No signs of distress or worry could be seen.

"What's wrong?" Noah asked as we got back in the dugout.

I plopped down to sit. I took of my hat and scratched my head, unsure if I could put my feelings into words. "It's strange."

Noah lifted both eyebrows. "What? What is?"

"Their hitting." I put my hat back on.

Noah glanced at the other team on the field. "Oh. You mean how they all grounded out? With two strikes for each of them?"

I nodded, looking at him expecting him to know what was up.

Noah put on his helmet and got out his bat, then shrugged. "I don't know. Maybe it's their strategy? Like which infielder might be bad at fielding..? Don't worry about it for now. You did fine." He headed to the entrance of the dugout.

Don't worry? Zeke had said that about Jordan's batting. Was there a link?

To start off the third inning, Julian, Chris, and Noah would go up. Julian started with a strong single between the third baseman and shortstop. Then Chris followed up with a single of his own, between first and second. Now that I've been having weird thoughts all game, this started to seem strange too.

I watched Noah's at bat closely. With a 2-1 count, he sent a grounder right to the shortstop. I watched as the shortstop fielded it, nice and slow. But then there was a weird hesitation as he looked at second and third. Nevertheless, he tossed to the second baseman on second, who threw to the first baseman. They got the double play.

As Chris and Noah jogged back, I thought about what I saw. It's like they were moving in slow motion. No. It was like all their movements were calculated. Like they didn't want to get the outs. I frowned.

"Hey don't make that face. I thought I hit a good pitch." Noah sat beside me. "For a second, I thought I would beat out the double play, but, oh well."

I wanted to tell him that he only almost beat it out, was because of their delayed response, but that wouldn't be nice. And I wasn't totally sure anyways. Maybe that guy wasn't sure if he should throw to third instead.

I started getting a headache from overthinking this. I leaned back and tilted my head back, just looking at the ceiling of the dugout.

"Uh...you okay Jake?" Noah asked.

I gave him a thumbs up. I'm fine. Just confused. Confused about things I shouldn't worry about.

"Well you don't have time to relax right now. Jordan just struck out. Again." Noah sighed. I sat back up and watched as the teams started to switch. "It's weird that he would strike out twice."

I froze and glanced at Noah.

"I mean, this is the first time I'm officially playing with him in a game. But usually he does well at batting practice during the week." Noah continued. He stood up and stretched. "Okay. No slacking off. Let's go!" He ran onto the field to join the minute warmup.

I grabbed my glove and slowly followed. The bottom of the third would bring up Paradise Preparatory's batters seven, eight, and nine. I was on guard for something suspicious to happen again.

Garret kept up with the strike and got batter seven to fly out to left field. Nothing weird happened. But that's what I thought at the beginning of their offense each time so far. Batter eight would be the key. With a strike against him, he sent a long fly ball to Zeke in center field for our number two. My eyes narrowed at their last batter, who was also their pitcher. If he flew out to right field, then something wrong was really happening. I watched as Garret's first pitch to him was quickly sent to Sean in right field. End of the third. Still 5-0.

So they all hit fly balls this time. Maybe not with all the same counts, but it was too much to be a coincidence. Once in the dugout, I walked straight up to Zeke.

"Jake? What are you doing?" Noah asked from behind. "You need to get your bat and glove. You'll be coming up again this inning."

I ignored him and stopped in front of Zeke, who was standing next to Coach. I jerked my thumb to the field so he could understand what I want. And what I wanted, was answers.

Zeke sighed. "I told you not to worry. Just play like normal. Don't overthink. Get hits, get on base. Field properly, get outs."

A snort came from five feet away. Jordan was sitting there with his catcher gear still on. "You're too naive if you think that we can win against them with just that."

My jaw dropped. Noah gasped from beside me. Zeke and coach frowned, but neither of them had any disputes.