Top of the lineup



Me at a batting cage, allegedly perfecting my batting skills.

 Well, I made it. I made it into the top of the lineup on my softball team tonight. Coach Dave put me at batter #3. That has never, never happened. I'm usually near the bottom of the lineup in position 8, 9, or 10. For those unfamiliar with baseball or softball, the batting order is usually dominated in the first 3 positions by solid, dependable base-hit players that can get on base. Then, the "clean-up" hitter is put in position 4 to hit the ball well into the outfield, giving the runners on base time to score. So by putting me in the 3rd position, my coach was viewing me as a pretty good bet for getting a hit. I did not disappoint during my first time at bat. I poked it through the infield between the first and second basemen. I made almost the same exact hit my second time up to bat, but this time the second baseman got the ball. I struck out during my third time at bat, and then for my fourth time up I hit a infield bounce to the shortstop. You know, I nearly made it to first base on that hit. I can sprint faster than anyone I know, and I nearly beat the throw to first. I know "nearly" doesn't count, but I think I heard the people in the stands gasp at how fast I could get to first.

We ended the game with a 5-5 tie. It's odd to end with a tie, but the score didn't matter because the other team forfeited. They didn't have enough players at the official starting time, so that meant my team automatically won. We have a big team and we had to travel to a different town to get there, so we didn't want to just leave when it was determined that the game would be forfeit. So we sent a few of our players over to the other team and we played the game anyway. Obviously it was fun to play a game you knew you had already won. We laughed at each other when we made mistakes; if the game really mattered, we'd have taken it more seriously.