I've never hit a home run in my entire life. You'd think that with my body mass knocking a ball over the fence would come as natual as breathing but I just never could seem to master the art. I came really close once and it would not have merely been a home run, it would have been the home run about which Hollywood made movies.
Back in the day when our church used to have intramural sports, the bitterest rivals of Memorial Ward was Maplewood II. They were better than us at EVERYTHING, bastketball, volleyball, softball. They were always beating us but always by just a few points. In fact we actually won a few games but I think it was when half of their first string had food poisoning. I still remember standing there on the court feeling like my feet were encased in cement while one of the Cope brothers sailed like a gazelle over my head to the basket. The only thing we ever beat them in was scripture chase. We had spring-loaded quadruple combinations.
In almost every regional tournament, at the end of the day, the results would be Maplewood II bringing home the first place trophy with Memorial Ward coming in second.
And so one early spring morning in 1976, we took the field yet again in a regional softball tournament. There were several stakes competing and so it was to be an all day tournament, double round elimination. Our hopes were high because we had a ringer on our side. Lance Wade had come home from the military academy where he attended high school and would be playing on our side.
I never could figure out how parents could look at their tiny baby and just know that he was going to grow up with movie star good looks and give him a name to match but such was the case with Lance Wade. He was a dead ringer for our modern day Matthew McConaughey right down to the wavy blonde hair, ice-blue eyes, chiseled jaw and rippling physique.
Since he attended an all boy's military academy, Lance had no idea how good looking he was. When he came home on the weekends, Bret Bassett, Lance and I would often go to the movies and Lance often expressed astonishment, wondering what all the girls at the movies were staring at. They certainly weren't looking at the two flabby chunks of flesh next to him...I used to look at him and think, "With my brains and your looks, I could take over the world"
Lance must have been particularly valiant in the pre mortal life because Heavenly Father decided that being the best looking kid around wasn't enough for him...nope, he had to make him one of the most gifted athletes as well. With Lance on our side, we felt we finally had an even chance to beat Maplewood II and finally take home the first place trophy.
The day progressed and we easily vanquished all of the other teams. We even squeaked by Maplewood II. Since it was a double round elimination tournament, they were still in the fight though. We got beat once by a team from Beaumont and we went back into the mix as well.
At the end of the day, all other teams had been eliminated except Maplewood II and Memorial. We were to face our stake arch-rivals for the regional softball championship. The game lead changed every inning. We would be ahead and the Maplewood II would come up and they would lead, then we would come up to bat and go up by a point or two.
We went to extra innings see-sawing back and forth with the lead. At the bottom of the fourteenth inning, the score had Maplewood II up by one point. We had two outs on us. Lance, the tying run was on second and I was coming up to bat.
While I was never a power hitter, I was pretty good at spotting weak points in the defense and placing the ball where I wanted it to go. Usually that meant dinking it over the head of the shortstop into no man's land between the infield and the outfield.
Like Lance, I too am built somewhat like a movie star... I am over six feet tall but only have a 29 inch inseam which means when I run, I remind people of Yogi Bear. If I didn't get the ball out of the infield, I hadn't a prayer of making it to first base on those stubby legs of mine.
Maplewood II's left fielder was Kevin Butler, another one of God's favorites who was blessed with a rifle for a right arm. Twice already that night he had thrown me out from deep in right field with a frozen rope to first.
The setup could not be much more drammatic. Our bitterest rivals up ahead by a point, the tying run on second..two outs.... and me coming up. A base hit would easily put Lance at home and me on first. Bret Bassett was coming up behind me and he was good for an occasional home run. If I could just get on base, we would win the game, the championship, and never-ending glory.
I stepped up to the plate intending on hitting the ball over the second baseman but then something happened, when the ball left the pitcher's hand, it just seemed to float towards me in slow motion. It was the biggest, beefiest softball pitch ever thrown my way and I just knew that this was going to finally be the home run I had never hit.
I swung and watched the bat connect. The ball leapt off the bat and sailed towards the fences. I felt the vibration of that hit all the way down to the soles of my shoes and I knew we were about to win...and on my very first home run! Life could not be any sweeter. As I jogged towards first, I watched the path of the ball.
Kevin Butler had been used to my previous dinks and so when he saw me swing, he started running towards the infield so that he could scoop up my hit and send it sailing towards first as he had twice before. I grinned as I looked at the fear on Kevin's face when he realized that this ball was headed out of the park. He immediately went into a slide and popped up running in the opposite direction, chasing my ball to the left field fence.
By the time I got to first, Lance was already home. My ball was on it's downward descent and, just as I thought, it was going to clear the fence. Then halfway between first and second, my dreams of glory came crashing to earth.
In a last ditch effort, Kevin leapt up, his hip caught on the fence causing him to upend. As he summer-saulted over the fence with his feet up in the air and his head towards the ground, his left arm shot out and plucked my ball from out of the air. When he stood up again, he held up his glove with my ball still in it. It was the most amazing catch I had ever seen.
We had lost. Maplewood II won the regional tournament and I had STILL never hit a home run.
For years, even into my adult life, whenever I saw Kevin Butler at stake meetings, it would be through narrowed bitter eyes. To be fair, whenever he saw me, he would give me a big smile and hold up an immaginary softball in his hands.
Then one day I realized, that catch was one in a million. I had never seen anything like it, even in professional highlight films...and, in a wierd way, I was a part of it.
Call it delusional or dementia but I now realize that I was an integral part of the most amazing catch I ever witnessed. The last time I saw Kevin, he held up his immaginary ball and I came over to him and told him about my different perspective and how I was grateful to be a part of that wonderful catch.
His brow furrowed as he digested what I said and I could tell it took a bit of the shine off of the memory for him...That was sweet.
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