Baseball Was Everything
By Bill Williamson
When I was a kid, there was only one sport that really mattered, and that was Kid League Baseball. We could play from dawn to dusk and never get enough. The dirtier and later we returned home, the better. When I took my shower, the dirt would roll off in thin sheets, like I was encased in soil. It was the good earth, baseball earth, and you could only find at the neighborhood diamond. Walking home after a hard day there, the clay was worn as proof that you were a true-blue baseball player and pretty cool.
Saving enough pennies, nickels, and dimes to buy my Louisville Slugger with Mickey Mantle’s autograph branded into the barrel was a year-long challenge. Starting at the end of summer, the coins would slowly fill the mayonnaise jar my mom provided as a special bank. Dad cut a slot in the lid with his tin snips so I didn’t have to unscrew it to add coins. Running to the store for Mom, sweeping the sidewalks of elderly neighbors, and beautifying lawns with a reel-type monster mower provided the incremental capital I needed. Bonuses were dandelion demolition and fly swatting, which would fetch another dime or two along the way.
At the end of each week I would religiously count the mounting assets, keeping track on the lined green pages of my spiral notepad. I relived this ritual for the last four years of my career, and every spring my dad and I would make the blissful pilgrimage to Jamison’s Sports World to claim my prize. Upon returning home, Dad and I went to his workshop and broke out black cloth electrical tape to swathe the bat’s lower fifteen inches of lumber in rough, sticky, professional gripping authority. This would be my weapon of choice for the season. There would be no other. At twelve years old, I was determined to utilize it every day.
This particular season, however, found me a little short in the treasury. It was obvious that I wouldn’t be able to earn enough money to have the bat of my dreams this year. I went to my dad and told him of my plight.
“You know, Will, our family lives by the rule: If you don’t have enough money to buy it, you go without.”
That was what I expected to hear, and it nearly brought tears to my eyes. It was evident that Dad felt my pain, and he knew I was coming to him for a solution.
He looked me in the eye and said, “Do you really think you need a bat this year?”
Swallowing my pride, I responded that I guessed it wasn’t necessary, but I really did want to show up for the first practice with my own bat—it was a tradition to which I had become accustomed.
“I think we can still make that happen,” Dad replied, “but it’s going to be a little different this year.”
That being said, he asked me to follow him to the side of the shed next to the garage. He pointed to a large branch which had fallen the year before when the oak tree in our back yard was struck by lightning. It wasn’t the whole branch, just the fat part of it which was about the length of my dad’s leg and just as big around.
“There’s your new bat, Son!” he beamed.
“Oh, Man!” I thought to myself. “Does he really think I’m going to use that thing to hit a ball? I could hardly move it.” Frankly, at that moment, it seemed to me that my father had lost all of his marbles. How cool would I be, marching to the plate with a 60 pound dirty log?
“Let’s drag it in the workshop,” he said.
Both of us grabbed an end, moved into the workshop, and plopped it up on the workbench. Dad took a hand saw and removed all of the crud that had begun to grow on the log. He told me that wood had to “cure” and you couldn’t make anything worthwhile out of “green” wood. Since this was over a year old, it would be a perfect specimen to fashion into a perfect bat.
He placed the log on the table saw apron and, setting the blade high, began to strip away bark, bumps, and bugs. We ended up with a block about three feet long and six inches thick. Next, we went to the lathe and secured the block at both ends. Dad had let me experiment with smaller pieces of wood in the past, making little bowling pins, but I had no idea what was about to happen now. He took his woodturning tool set down from the wall and chose three tools to cut the wood down even further. He flipped the starter switch, the wood turned, and when he applied the turning tool, the chips created a virtual workshop blizzard. In a matter of hours, I could see my bat emerging from the raw chunk of timber that was just a log earlier in the day. Using one of my old bats as a pattern, Dad sighted down the barrel and matched the curves flawlessly. After producing what we felt to be the faultless slugger, it was my turn to soften the edges, smooth the barrel, and soothe my urge to release it from its shackles and employ it. Grabbing a strip of emery cloth, I put fabric to wood and inhaled the rich, heavy scent of Iowa Oak as the sawdust filled my young lungs.
Anxiously removing the bat from the jaws of the lathe after several days of tweaking, sanding, and shellacking, it was obvious my father and I had produced an object of wonder and pride. Now was the time to sheathe the lower portion in our traditional, heavy-duty ribbon of righteousness. Gazing in awe, I knew that this was the best bat I had ever owned.
Our coach, Kevin Sykora, had the misfortune of having all the bizarre afflictions of many people rolled into one, but most likely didn’t realize it. As I look back, he was probably fifteen years old at the time. His dad called him Junior, we called him Coach. He had a long butch haircut, noticeably bucked teeth, and dark brown freckles the size of raisins that covered as much of his body as we could see. There was always white, pasty goop in the corners of his mouth and he tugged uncontrollably at the nape of his neck when he got nervous. I think just talking to the team made him panicky, since his jerking was the malady I remember most vividly. When he spoke, there was an obvious lisp and spit flew all over the place. Actually, it wasn’t a full-blown lisp; it sounded more like he was talking through a mouth full of BBs. Front teeth the size of matchbook covers held back a portion of the spray, but sometimes we respectfully shielded our faces with our baseball gloves. As anxiety set in, he would rev his tongue to the point of inaudibility. Being true students of the sport, we listened patiently to his directions and nodded our heads at the points we thought might be vital. He had a very short fuse, and it’s a wonder we learned anything at all from him that season. Most of the time, trying to figure him out was simply a process of elimination; we would do what we thought Kevin said and then wait to see if he blew. When he really got steamed, he’d let out with his pet axiom, “Cheese and crackers, what the Sam Hell are you doing?!” We didn’t know who Sam Hell was, but he sure sounded mean.
Eddie “Chainsaw” Chadima was the fastest, most feared pitcher in town. At thirteen, his biceps were the size of canned hams, bolstered by him helping his dad cut down trees and carrying the wood to their dump truck. Chainsaw lived in the trailer court on top of the hill behind the baseball diamond. Big, mean, and rough, he rode his battered bike to games and jumped off while it was still rolling, always running it into a tree and leaving it lying on the ground. The rumor was that he threw the ball 100 miles per hour and the spitball was his trademark. His nickname, Chainsaw, wasn’t so much from his employment as much as from the way he blazed the baseball—so fast you couldn’t see it—consistently, and biting, like the teeth of the saws he brandished with his dad. They said he could only throw the same baseball four times because the stitching would come undone from the speed. During every game he would hit at least one kid he didn’t like when they were at the plate. My friend, Jimmy, got smacked one time and everyone thought his arm was broken in half. He wallowed in the dirt screaming in mortal pain, buzzing in circles like a one-winged June bug, but all that was produced was a big welt. If you were unfortunate enough to get a hit off of Chainsaw, they said he’d clout your arm so hard after the game you wouldn’t be able to lift a glass of Ovaltine© to your lips for a month. A homerun guaranteed that both of your legs would be busted at the knees and you would have to crawl home to mommy on your belly, bawling like a baby. I never witnessed anyone hitting a homerun off of Chainsaw’s pitches, so that might have just been a story. Coach always told us that the harder the pitch, the farther it would fly when you got hold of it. That was supposed to make us less apprehensive of killer pitchers.
As luck would have it, the final game of the season pitted us, The Westside Carpenters Union, against Chainsaw’s team, Sam’s Auto Salvage. This wasn’t any ordinary game, however. If our team won, we would garner the championship for our side of the river and play the winner from the other side at the Braves’ Municipal Stadium in front of thousands of cheering fans. Any hope of even making it through the game seemed a long shot as we watched Chainsaw’s ominous form commanding the pitcher’s mound inning after inning.
While the game progressed, we were getting pounded. The Carpenters limped into the bottom of the ninth inning down by three runs, 5-2. I was sixth in line to bat, and didn’t even give it a thought that I might actually make a trip to the plate. Tim Fields struck out, 1-2-3. Rodney Winger got a single, followed by Davey Jenkins also getting a single. By this time, Chainsaw was getting more than just a little agitated. Two men on base was not what he wanted now. Sweat poured into his eyes as he swore under his breath. Frank Tesar dug his shoes into the soft dirt next to home plate, gritting his teeth and waiting for the dreaded spitball to arrive. It arrived, all right, screaming into his ribs as he now knew he had become Chainsaw’s target for this game. He let out an ear-shattering scream that echoed off the brick post office walls two blocks away. We all rushed up to him, wondering if he was dying. Mama Tesar came running onto the field, shaking her fist at Chainsaw and firing off Czech curse words like a machine gun. Coach assessed the damage to be a bruised rib, brushed him off, and sent Ben Jackson in as his runner. The bases were loaded now and we sensed that Chainsaw was just prolonging the agony of our defeat. He, and we, knew that our weakest batter, Wencil Scrivens, was up next—a certain whiff. Wencil could hardly hold the bat, let alone swing it. His arms were weeds in the wind, and the bat was propped on his right shoulder. He didn’t even see the first two perfect strike pitches rocket past him, and swung at the next pitch three seconds after it had buried itself in the catcher’s mitt. There was an audible groan from the bleachers. That would be out number two. Chainsaw grinned devilishly, gaining pleasure from our ongoing pain.
Knowing this was the moment I had feared most in my kid league calling, I thought I was going to vomit in front of everyone. I shuffled to the plate in the bottom of the ninth inning, two batters were out, the bases were loaded, and we were down by three runs. We needed at least a triple to stay in the game and a homer to win the championship. Going into overtime was certain death, since our weakest batters would be coming up next. There was no way out. It was clear that I had to hit a homerun, something I had never done in my life. In fact, I would have stood a better chance of soaring off the roof of our house like Superman. My knees were Jell-O and my guts were churning. The biggest hit of my existence was the only thing that counted.
Coach was a bag of raw nerves, pacing, scratching, tugging, and mumbling to himself. Calling the pitch off, I ran over to him for direction. He said to let the first pitch go by so I could get my timing right. That was the joke of the day, since I couldn’t even see the ball as it broke the sound barrier. It actually sizzled on the journey past and cracked into the catcher’s mitt. Strike one. The catcher taunted something about me being “Queen of the Dorks.
Mom was yelling encouragement to me. “Come on, son, one hit is all you need!” I knew how utterly absurd it was for anyone to think that I’d be getting a hit today. Falling prey to Chainsaw Chadima was all that would happen. Nonetheless, I concentrated and let the second pitch pass—ball one. Ball two followed, the catcher was silent, and I managed to toss a weak smile at him. Swinging at the next pitch, nothing was hit but the heavy summer air. It was 2 and 2.
The crowd was silent, Mom was tense, and Coach mouthed, “Let it go!” I had to do what he said. Chainsaw spit into the dust as he wound up and commenced to send the Special Delivery to me. Gritting my teeth and holding my breath, I let it go.
“High and outside!” roared the ump. The famous 3-2 count was bestowed upon me and I could hardly stand up anymore. Looking Chainsaw in the eye, he returned the stare with a cocky smirk. His windup was terrifying as he let fly the most gut-wrenching “pull out all the stops” spitball of the century. I did what no savvy player ever does, something I had never done in my whole life at the plate, the thing a coach would swear at you for doing. When I observed the missile launch from his massive hand, I took a deep breath and closed my eyes! After imploring God and all of his saints to please let me hit the ball, a simple little triple to at least tie the score, I cranked the biggest swing of my life. With my eyes still closed, I heard the loudest crack of my young career and felt the worst jarring sting in my hands that I had ever experienced. My bat, my holy father and son creation, was split in two. The ever-elusive Sweet Spot sought by every player in the world had departed without me ever tapping into its resources. The hit was from somewhere else on the bat, but it was still a hit. Black tape was shredded and lying limp in the dirt at my feet. My teammates and Mom were screaming, “Run, run, run!”
To my utter amazement, as I bolted toward first base I watched the ball arc over the second baseman’s head, smack the ground, and continue racing through center field into the street. By the time the center fielder retrieved the ball and threw it to the second baseman, I was on my way to third base. “Go, go, go. Don’t stop now!” was all I could hear. The screams from the grandstand were garbled in my ears. I knew the three runners on base had already scored and we had tied the game, but that wasn’t good enough. Throwing caution to the wind, I shot toward the first homerun of my life. It felt like I was careening out of control, my legs ready to give way, my heart pounding—thumping like a bass drum throughout my body. Coach was leaping into an animated barnyard jig next to third base, screaming at me to go to home and waving me on. He had a death grip on his neck, and foaming spit was flying three feet in all directions. I glanced over my shoulder and spotted the second baseman heaving the ball to the catcher as I was six feet from home plate. The ball whizzed over my head, the catcher’s head, and the grandstand, landing smack in the middle of Old Man Simpson’s tulip garden. I pounced on home plate with both feet, the happiest kid in the world. Jake Elias and Tim Kubovec hoisted me onto their shoulders and the screaming team followed as they marched me around the bases.
Abruptly, I remembered what everyone said about getting a homerun off of Chainsaw Chadima. I thought I was going to throw up or wet my pants, or both. I was surrounded by my teammates when I saw him rapidly approaching the crowd, making a determined beeline for…me! He rushed over, delivered a thundering smack to the middle of my back, and said, “Nice hit, Kid!” He told me that was the only homerun he had given up for the season, and I deserved it—it won the Westside championship for our team. The best part was that I got to run home on both legs after my teammates lowered me off their shoulders. It was no problem drinking my Ovaltine©, either. I went without a shirt for the next week, conceitedly displaying the colossal red imprint of Chainsaw Chadima’s legendary pitching hand until it slowly faded into a proud mark of respect in my mind.
A week later, at the Braves’ Stadium, I proudly held my cap over my heart for the National Anthem. When it was finished, all of the players’ names were announced for both teams. My name came over the loudspeaker and it seemed like the crowd cheered just a little louder than they had for my teammates. Even though the announcer didn’t say it was my homerun that had gotten us there, my team knew. I knew, and was smiling inside and out as a special spot in the middle of my back radiated self-assurance for the night’s big game.
None of this would have had a chance of happening if it weren’t for my massive oak giant offering up one of his limbs for the most important event of my young life.