Chapter VII: At the Batting Net

The baseball candidates started indoor practice on the following Monday. It was dry work at first. Anson Lord, called “Pop” by his intimates, had theories of his own on the subject of preliminary preparations, and, as captain of the nine, he was in position to carry them out. Lord was, of course, a first class fellow, eighteen years of age and a crack first baseman. In appearance he was big and broad-shouldered, with a rather serious countenance lightened by kindly gray eyes and a contagious smile. That he was immensely popular goes without saying since he was First Class President, an honor that almost invariably went to a crew man at North Bank. Indeed, Lord and Loring Browne, who captained and rowed Number Two in the boat, had fought a close fight for the presidency in the fall. Pop’s preliminary training methods included tiresome exercises with dumb-bells and Indian clubs and even chest weights, and there was much grumbling among the new candidates. The older ones knew Pop too well to demur. Besides, it was always, somehow, a pleasure to please Anson Lord!

Jerry performed uncomplainingly and unfalteringly at stunts quite novel to him, although, until Tom explained, he couldn’t see the connection between swinging a pair of Indian clubs and playing baseball! Perhaps Tom’s explanation was a trifle vague, but Jerry was satisfied with it. “The idea is to limber up your muscles, Jerry,” said Tom. “Develop ’em, too. Lots of those fellows who are trying for the nine couldn’t whip a ball from first to third to-day without getting a crick in their arms, let alone throwing from deep center to second! All that dumb-bell stuff is to develop the wrist and forearm muscles, because, Jerry, you’ve just got to be supple there if you’re going to play the game right. It is tiresome, but it’s good for you, son.”

“Oh, I ain’t complaining none,” said Jerry cheerfully. “I was just pondering.”

“Well,” Tom laughed, “ponder all you like, Jerry, but keep up the good work. I want to see you make the second nine, anyway, son. You can do it, too.”

“Reckon I’d a heap rather make the regular team,” answered Jerry, “and I’m agoing to if nothing don’t bust!”

The first day of March found the candidates outdoors at last. The frost was out of the ground and a series of warm, sunshiny days with aiding breezes had dried the field and made it firm underfoot. Mr. Keegan arrived on the fifth of the month, a small, slight man, well under thirty, with movements like a steel trap and a sharp, decisive voice. But he was good-tempered and could laugh as well as frown, and the school liked him well enough to go to the little station in a body to give him welcome. Although Cicero was on hand with his stylish black mules and the “hack,” Joe Keegan elected to walk, and so with Rodney Keller――familiarly known as “Tub,” football center and baseball catcher――carrying his suit case, and Captain Lord and most of the other diamond warriors close about him, Coach Keegan made a fairly impressive return to the scene of his duties. There was some cheering and singing by the rank and file as the procession tramped along the sunlit road, and afterwards, from the steps of Ellicot, in which house the coach roomed while at the school, Mr. Keegan made a short speech which aroused his audience to such a pitch of enthusiasm that the few stay-at-homes came to their windows and, although unable to hear the address, cheered plaintively on every excuse. After that the baseball players hustled into their togs and were hard at work when the coach, transformed by a faded green sweater and a pair of old gray trousers, arrived at the field for his first glimpse of the season’s material.

Whether he liked what he saw wasn’t apparent, but certain it is that he wasted no time getting into action. The experienced players were weeded forth and sent to the batting net and the green candidates lined up before him in a half circle. Coach Keegan looked them over deliberately and carefully during several moments of most respectful silence. Then he spoke crisply. “There’s one thing I’m going to have this spring, fellows,” he began, “and that’s instant obedience. When I say ‘Jump!’ you jump! I’ll forgive any of you for stupidity or rotten playing, but the fellow who doesn’t do as he’s told, _and do it quick_, is going to get into a mess of trouble! I guess I’ve made myself plain, haven’t I? All right. Now, the next thing. We’re going in for speed this year. We’re going to have the fastest team that’s playing ball below Mason and Dixon’s Line, fellows. Maybe we aren’t going to play as fine an article as some other teams, maybe we’re going to be punk, but, good or punk, we’re going to be _fast_! And the next two or three weeks are going to be devoted very largely to learning speed. If any of you fellows object to moving in a hurry, this is a good time to say so gracefully and get out. All right. Let’s get busy!”

When the scant hour of practice was over that afternoon every one knew that the coach had come!

A fortnight of vigorous preliminary work followed, the candidates practicing every week-day afternoon save Saturday from three-thirty to five. About forty fellows reported that first afternoon and of the number thirty-two were still in training a fortnight later, and of the thirty-two was Jerry Benson. Jerry was learning rather slowly. Teaching speed to him was, it seemed at first, a hopeless task. Jerry was deliberative of thought and speech and action. Having once started, he could travel fast, but he couldn’t shoot away from a mark, as some of the fellows could, like a sprinter at the sound of the pistol. Many times Coach Keegan got after him hard in words of one syllable, and at such times Jerry, blinking his blue eyes, took the reprimand in good-natured silence and looked so evidently anxious to please that the coach’s scolding usually ended in a tolerant “Oh, well, see if you can’t get some snap in it, boy!”

Mr. Keegan’s remarks on the occasion of his first sight of Jerry at batting practice were not at all what Tom had expected and predicted. Jerry had taken his turn at the net a number of times before it happened that the coach was present. Batting practice for the new candidates was under the direction of Rodney Keller, and the coach’s supervision was more or less superficial. But one afternoon Mr. Keegan came to the net at the moment that Jerry stepped out of his place in the line of waiting batters, picked up a bat and faced Thacher, one of the second-string pitchers. Although Tub Keller had conscientiously tried to mold Jerry to the established form of batting, he had not, in view of the results Jerry was getting, insisted overmuch, and Jerry’s style had been modified but little; in fact, when he got thoroughly interested and quite forgot his instructions, he stood back, spread his legs widely and caressed his shoulder blades with his bat just as he had always done.

To-day, in spite of Tub’s matter-of-course “Feet together, Jerry!” Jerry spread himself as usual and faced Thacher intently, while the waiting line smiled or chuckled as they observed the coach’s frown of disapproval. Perhaps had Jerry known that Mr. Keegan was looking on he would have conformed more closely to the style approved of the coach, but he didn’t. Thacher was pitching straight balls, with an occasional change of pace for the more adept batters, and his first delivery to Jerry was a fast one that cut the outer corner of the plate. Jerry started to offer at it, changed his mind and watched it go by speculatively. He had suspected a break and had been fooled.

“Strike!” droned Tub, as the ball settled into his mitt. Mr. Keegan opened his mouth and took a step forward, and then, like Jerry, changed his mind and waited. Thacher grinned and winked, for he and Jerry were getting to be friendly antagonists at the net. Jerry answered the smile untroubledly and Thacher wound up again. This time it was a slow one that floated across knee-high, or would have had Jerry not swung and caught it fairly near the end of his bat. The ball sailed off in a long, low fly to deep center.

“A peach, Jerry!” said Tub. “Good for three bags, easy.”

Thacher grinned as he picked up another ball and Jerry dropped the bat and started to take his place at the tail end of the line. But Mr. Keegan stopped him.

“Hold on, Benson! Try another one,” he said.

Jerry picked up the bat again and, in deference to the coach’s presence, placed his feet fairly close together, trying to remember all the instructions that had been given him by Tub. Thacher, seeking revenge, let loose with a high ball that looked very much like a strike to the batsman. Perhaps Jerry’s judgment was slightly disturbed by the knowledge that the coach was watching. At all events, the ball played a sorry trick and Tub had to step well to the right to get it. And Jerry swung hard and, having his feet close together, spun around like a top and landed at Tub’s feet, to the amusement of the audience, including, you may be certain, Thacher. Jerry smiled a trifle sheepishly as he unscrambled himself from Tub, the ball and the bat.

“Wait a minute,” said Mr. Keegan again. “Why did you change your position that time, Benson?”

Jerry couldn’t find an answer for a long moment. Then he said: “Tub says to put your feet together.”

“Does, eh? Well, does he tell you to hold your bat behind your back and swing like a hammer-thrower? How do you expect to hit anything that way? Don’t you know that you can’t swing your arms and your body half around the compass and keep your feet together? Now you hit the next one the way you’ve been hitting. Stand your own way, boy. Give him another, Thacher.”

Jerry felt somewhat embarrassed by so much attention, but permission to face the pitcher in his own style brought a return of confidence, and when Thacher hurled the next delivery, a fast ball right in the groove, he put every ounce into the swing and sent that sphere on the journey of its young life! Far into left field it sped, well behind the nearest fielder! The audience said “Wow!” and “Some swipe!” and Thacher threw up his arms in token of surrender. As Jerry walked off, after an inquiring look at Mr. Keegan and a nod of dismissal, the coach turned to Tub.

“How often does he do that?” he asked the catcher.

“About twice out of three times, sir. There doesn’t seem to be much use trying to get him to stand right. When he does he misses ’em about every time.”

“I guess you’d better let him hit them the way he wants to,” replied the coach. “What was Thacher feeding him? Straight ones?”

“Yes, sir, mostly. Jerry gets fooled on the hooks.”

“Well, see that he gets hooks until they don’t fool him. No use wasting time feeding him straight balls. The boy’s a batter, and he ought to be taught to take everything that comes. Give him the third degree, Keller, every time he comes up. Make him hit the hard ones. That’s the only way to bring him along.”

So it was that the next time Jerry faced Thacher the latter got his instructions to fool the batsman to the top of his bent, and those of the squad who secretly envied Jerry his ability to “lace ’em” laughed gleefully to see him swing helplessly around while a fast drop or a wide hook smacked into Tub’s glove. But that was just at first and there came a time when Thacher again metaphorically if not visually threw up his hands in token of submission. But that was much later, and before it came other things of moment happened.