Written by Garret Mathews, veteran newspaper columnist, and author of several baseball books, including Swing Batta! (available at Amazon.com)
His name was Jack and he loved to watch kids play baseball.
Courtesy: slive.com
He was older than our fathers, but not as old as our grandfathers. He didn’t have children, so he adopted the players on my small town’s Little League teams.
Jack played no favorites. In his eyes, we were all superstars.
Every afternoon, he assumed the position — half-standing, half-leaning against the fence — behind the home team’s dugout. “How ya doing?” he said to the grown-ups. “Attaboy,” he said to the players.
You could strike out four times and be dropped to 9th in the batting order. You could boot every ground ball and be exiled to right field. It didn’t matter to Jack. “Attaboy,” he’d holler. “Keep after ‘em, kid.”
The Little League field can be a lonely place if you stink. Jack’s encouraging words raised our spirits and helped dry our eyes. The coach could threaten to trade us for a whole new team. Our dads could joke about fathering a bunch of losers.
It didn’t matter.
We knew we always had Jack.
He looked into our eyes while we talked as if the words actually mattered. We knew he’d never tattle to our parents or the coach.
Courtesy: northcentralpa.com
Folks in town whispered that Jack was slow, but we didn’t believe them. The man had a computer for a brain. He knew your team’s won-loss record. He knew the last time you got more than one hit in a game.
The League never had to provide extra seating for our games. Three rows of dusty bleachers were more than enough. Parental attendance was hit and miss. Attendance of grown-ups (those who didn’t have children on the field) was pretty much miss.
Except for Jack.
He must’ve had some kind of job, but he never talked about it. A job meant dealing with grown-ups and Jack preferred to be with children.
Adults thought he was crazy for going on and on and on about the HR that Harold McCall hit. He said the ball went over the road, landing in the service bay of Ratliff’s Transfer. That distance seemed to grow by 10’ at each retelling. But he had a captive audience. And we happily added to the legend.
Courtesy: uscdiglib.sumgsmug.com
Jack had a beat-up convertible that seemed to stretch from 3rd base to home plate. If your team won three games in a row the coach would buy milkshakes at the custard stand across town. Nobody wanted to go with him. You could sit in a station wagon any time. We piled in Jack’s ride instead.
I played a game with my ball cap, using it to gather air like a bulldozer scoops dirt.
I pretended to dump the contents under the seat and then reached up to get another supply.
The wind fluttered my shirt, bent my ears, and curled my hair.
“Attaboy,” Jack hollered.
At that moment, at least, everything was right with the world.
