The 823rd Hit

by Kurtis Scaletta

  WHO CAUGHT THE BIRTHDAY BALL?

  Teddy “the Bear” Larrabee just hit a homer—and on his birthday too! He really wants the lucky ball back, so Chad, the Pine City Porcupines’ batboy, heads into the stands to find it. Bad news: the old guy who caught the ball won’t give it up. Good news: he’s the uncle of a new kid in town who goes to Chad’s school. Now all Chad has to do is figure out what he can trade for the ball so he can keep “the Bear” happy—and slugging. To the baseball card collection!

  For Byron, our little champ

  —K.S.

  To Ethan and Abbie

  —E.W.

  PUBLISHER’S NOTE: This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Scaletta, Kurtis.

  The 823rd hit / by Kurtis Scaletta ; illustrated by Eric Wight.

  p. cm. — (A Topps league story ; bk. 4)

  Summary: To keep Teddy “the Bear” Larrabee happy and

  slugging, Chad the batboy has to figure out what a crabby

  fan would be willing to trade for Teddy’s lucky home run ball.

  ISBN 978-1-4197-0446-8 (hardcover : alk. paper)

  ISBN 978-1-4197-0445-1 (pbk. : alk. paper)

  [1. Baseball—Fiction. 2. Batboys—Fiction. 3. Baseball cards—

  Fiction.] I. Wight, Eric, 1974– ill. II. Title. III. Title: Eight

  hundred and twenty-third hit.

  PZ7.S27912Aap 2012

  [Fic]—dc23

  2012008321

  Copyright © 2012 The Topps Company, Inc.

  All rights reserved. Topps and Topps League Story are

  trademarks of The Topps Company, Inc.

  Book design by Chad W. Beckerman

  Published in 2012 by Amulet Books, an imprint of ABRAMS. All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, mechanical, electronic, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without written permission from the publisher. Amulet Books and Amulet Paperbacks are registered trademarks of Harry N. Abrams, Inc.

  Amulet Books are available at special discounts when purchased in quantity for premiums and promotions as well as fundraising or educational use. Special editions can also be created to specification. For details, contact specialmarkets@abramsbooks.com or the address below.

  115 West 18th Street

  New York, NY 10011

  www.abramsbooks.com

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  About the Author

  About the Artist

  or two weeks in August I did the worst thing ever. I did something I never thought I’d do: I rooted against my team, the Pine City Porcupines.

  This is what happened.

  When I got my job as a Pines’ batboy, Mom and Dad said I couldn’t work during the school year. They said I’d be out too late on school nights. They thought I would need the time to do homework.

  So I knew my days as a batboy were numbered when Mom started talking about clothes and school supplies and my new teacher.

  “Why can’t I work on weekends?” I asked at dinner.

  “We already agreed you wouldn’t work during the school year,” said Dad.

  That was true. But I only agreed so they would let me take the batboy job.

  “It’s just a few games,” I said. I took the Porcupines’ schedule out of my pocket and spread it on the table. I stabbed the month of September with my finger. “The regular season ends in two weeks. The Porcupines are on the road for one of those weeks. Then they’re in town for only one more weekend. After that, it’s just the playoffs.”

  “How many games are we talking about?” Mom asked.

  Now I knew I had a chance.

  “Two,” I said. “Three if you count Labor Day, and four if you count Friday. Plus the playoffs.”

  “Hmm. That sounds like a lot of games to me,” said Dad. “You could fall behind on your schoolwork and never catch up.”

  “Melissa Carvel was out of school for three weeks last year when she had the mumps,” I said. “She caught up.”

  “That girl didn’t have a choice,” he said. “We do.”

  Dad won that round.

  I went on to the next.

  “If you don’t want me to work on school nights, why do you make me walk the dog and unload the dishwasher?” I asked.

  “Those things don’t take you out of the house for hours,” said Dad.

  He was right. I knew it was a weak argument.

  I decided it was time to play my best card.

  “Dylan’s parents are letting him work on the weekends.”

  Dad sighed. “You can work on the weekends until the Porcupines are done,” he finally agreed. “But only under two conditions.”

  I felt a mixture of hope and dread. “What two conditions?”

  “First, once school starts, you have to do all of your homework before you go to the ballpark.”

  “Of course.” I wasn’t worried. We didn’t get that much homework at the beginning of the year.

  “Second, if you try to argue your way into working on a school night, the whole deal is off.”

  Dad was smart. I had been hoping to wheedle my way into working one school night. He saw this coming a mile off.

  “OK,” I said. “It’s a deal. I accept the two conditions. I won’t even ask to work on a school night.”

  “No matter what,” Dad said. “I’m serious, Chad.”

  “No matter what,” I said.

  • • •

  The Porcupines were going to be in the Prairie League playoffs, for sure. Each of the top four teams earned a spot in the playoffs. Even if the Porcupines lost the rest of their games, they’d be in at least fourth place.

  The Porcupines had never been in the playoffs since I could remember. Now that they were headed there, I would get to see the playoffs—and watch them from the dugout! I loved my job.

  A few days later, I took a closer look at the playoff schedule. What I read made me groan.

  In playoff tournaments, there’s a thing called “seeding.” The seeding determines who plays who, when, and where. When there are four teams, the best-ranked team plays the last-ranked team, and the second-best ranked team plays the second-to-last ranked team.

  The Porcupines were probably going to finish in either first or second place. The top two teams would have home-field advantage for the first round of the playoffs, which would be a five-game series. That was great news for the Porcupines—but bad news for me.

  The playoffs would be starting on a Wednesday night. That meant the Porcupines would play their home games on school nights, and then be out of town for the weekend! So the only way I could work a game during the playoffs would be if the Porcupines lost a bunch of games now and sank into third or fourth place. Then they would start the series on the road and play at home over the weekend.

  That would also give me a chance to see the Porcupines win the first series! They could win one of the first two away games, then come home to win the next two. I could be there for the celebration. That would be awesome beyond belief.

  I clenched my teeth. There was only one way for things to work out my way, and it meant betraying my favorite team.

>   I felt sick to my stomach doing it. I was the biggest Pines’ fan in Pine City. As a batboy, I was part of the team. That made it twice as wrong to root against the Porcupines. But I couldn’t help it.

  I cheered to myself when the Pines went on the road and lost five out of six games, including three in a row to the Swedenberg Swatters.

  I started to worry when the Porcupines came home and won three straight games against the Centralville Cougars. In the dugout I was all smiles and high fives and “Way to go!” and “First place, here we come!” I was glad the Pines were playing well. But I had my heart set on being there for some of the playoff games.

  Now it looked like the Porcupines were headed for second place. I was miserable. I would miss the playoff games. Even worse, I had betrayed my favorite team for nothing.

  Then the Rosedale Rogues came to Pine City.

  t was my turn to help the opposing team. I walked into the visitors’ locker room, and one of the Rogues asked me to relace his shoes. I was hunched over in the corner, and the players forgot I was there.

  “Glad this is the last series in this crummy stadium,” one of the Rogues said.

  “It’s the sorriest sight in the Prairie League,” another player agreed.

  “I don’t like the showers here,” said a third player. “The water’s not hot enough, and there’s no pressure.”

  What would they complain about next? That our grass wasn’t green enough? That our baseballs weren’t round enough?

  I finished lacing the shoes and plopped them on the bench. The Rogues still didn’t notice me. Not even the guy who owned the shoes.

  “The food is pretty boring here too,” he said.

  “I miss the catfish fingers and hush puppies back in Rosedale,” said another player. It was Damien Ricken. He had just been called up from Rookie League. Ricken was supposed to be a big-deal pitcher.

  By the time the game started, I didn’t care about seeding and school nights. I just wanted the Rosedale Rogues to lose. I wanted them to be sorry they ever came to Pine City. I rooted for the Pines with all my might. Unfortunately, the Rogues were on fire. They scored four runs in the first inning, before the Porcupines even came up to bat. Worse, Damien Ricken struck out the first three Porcupines batters and was back in the dugout before I knew it.

  “So that’s the competition?” he asked the Rogues’ catcher.

  “Yep,” the catcher answered with a grin.

  Damien noticed me watching.

  “Hey, kid. Where are the good places to eat around here?”

  “Um … I like the food here at the ballpark,” I said. I wanted to make that clear.

  “I don’t eat while I’m pitching. What about restaurants?”

  “The Pine City Café,” I said. I liked the pizza place better, but grown-ups always liked the Café.

  “Don’t get your hopes up,” the catcher said. “It’ll be closed by the time we get out of here.”

  “Figures,” said Damien. “This town is all pines and no city.”

  The guys on the bench cracked up.

  I was fuming, but I kept my cool. “The pizza place is open late,” I told him.

  • • •

  The Porcupines never caught up. They lost to the Rogues, 7–2.

  The next night wasn’t much better. It was my turn to work in the Porcupines’ dugout. They were losing, 6–1, by the fifth inning.

  “I’ll be glad when we’re done playing these Rogues,” said Mike Stammer, the Porcupines’ shortstop. He had just struck out for the second time that night. “I won’t miss them a bit.”

  “Me, neither,” said Tommy Harris. “The only thing I like about tonight’s pitcher is that he’s not Damien Ricken. Man, that Ricken guy has a good slider. I really hope we don’t have to face him again this season.”

  “You’d better hope we do see them again,” said Teddy Larrabee. Teddy was the first baseman. People call him Teddy “the Bear” Larrabee, because he’s big and kind of hairy. “You’d better hope we see Damien Ricken’s slider, too,” he added. “We’ll have to get past them to win the Prairie League championship.”

  “I was hoping we could sneak by when they weren’t looking,” said Wayne Zane.

  “That’s not what I meant,” said Teddy.

  “Just sayin’,” said Wayne. Wayne was the catcher, and he thought he was the team comedian. He grabbed his bat and went to the on-deck circle while Sammy Solaris, the designated hitter, went to the plate.

  Sammy got a base hit. The crowd cheered, but the Porcupines were still behind by five runs. Wayne strode to the plate. Meanwhile, Teddy headed for the on-deck circle. I had his bat ready.

  Wayne drew a walk. The crowd cheered louder. The Porcupines had a rally going!

  The Bear swung on the first pitch. The ball went high and deep, straight down the right field line. It hit the foul pole, bounced off it, and went into the stands. Now, if a ball hits the foul pole, it’s fair, even if the ball ends up in foul territory. That made Teddy’s hit a home run! The crowd clapped and stomped. The Pines were still down by two runs, but they were coming back!

  Sammy, Wayne, and Teddy circled the bases. We all met them at the dugout steps and traded high fives. Danny O’Brien went up to bat. Brian Daniels was on deck. I used to have trouble telling them apart. Now I could finally keep them straight.

  “Chad, can you go get that ball back?” Teddy asked. “It’s kind of a big one for me.”

  “What’s big about it?” Wayne Zane asked.

  I was wondering too. Teddy had hit home runs before, although not enough for this one to be a big number.

  “That was my eight hundred and twenty-third hit,” Teddy explained.

  “No, it wasn’t,” Wayne said. “Not unless you hit about seven hundred in Rookie League. And if you had done that, you’d be in the major leagues by now—and be a shoo-in for rookie of the year.”

  “I’m not just counting professional baseball hits,” Teddy explained. “I’m counting every hit.”

  “What, like high school baseball?” Sammy asked.

  “High school, junior high, Little League—all of it,” the Bear replied. “Every hit.”

  “Even T-ball?” Wayne asked.

  “Even T-ball,” said Teddy. “A hit is a hit.”

  “I have a follow-up question,” said Mike. “What’s the big deal about hit number eight hundred and twenty-three?”

  “Well,” said Teddy. “Today is August twenty-third. So … today is eight twenty-three. Get it?”

  “Yeah. That is kind of a coincidence,” Tommy said. He pronounced it “co-inky-dink.”

  “Also,” said Teddy, “today is my birthday.”

  “Hey! Happy birthday!” Tommy shook his hand. “Wow—you do need to get that ball back.”

  “See?” Teddy looked at me. “Find out who caught that ball. Tell ’em I’ll trade a new ball for it.”

  “Sure,” I said. “I’ll try.”

  walked around in the grandstand beyond first base. Somebody out here had Teddy’s lucky birthday baseball. But who?

  There was a man sitting in the third row who looked like he’d been punched in the eye. I slid in next to him.

  “Hi, I’m Chad the batboy,” I told him. “Did you see what happened to the home run ball that bounced off the foul pole?”

  “I reached for it and was sure I’d get it.” The man shook his head sadly. “But I wasn’t paying attention. Somebody stuck their elbow in my face.” He touched his eye and winced. “Is it turning black?”

  “More like purple and green,” I replied.

  “I didn’t see who got the ball,” the man said. “Ask him.” He pointed at a big, tall guy a few rows back. “He must have got it. He’s closer to the sky than everyone else.”

  “Thanks. Sorry about your eye.” I ran up the steps to the big, tall guy a few rows back.

  “Hi, I’m Chad the batboy. Did you see who got the home run ball that bounced off the foul pole?”

  “I was sure I ha
d it,” the big, tall guy said. His voice was low and booming. “It was almost in my hand. Then this little guy jumped up and snagged it away from me.”

  “That’s too bad,” I said. “Did you see who got it?”

  “That’s him over there.” The big, tall guy pointed one section over. “The one in the wool hat.”

  “Huh?” I only saw one person in a wool hat. He was a little old guy about the size of two peanuts stacked end on end.

  “That’s him, all right,” the big, tall guy said. “He’s little, but he’s tough.”

  “OK. Thanks.”

  I headed toward the man in the wool cap. I was wrong about him. He was the size of four stacked peanuts. Still, I couldn’t believe he had outjumped the big guy. He must have really wanted that baseball!

  “Hi, I’m Chad the batboy.” I offered him my hand. He just looked at it, so I took it back. “I heard you might have gotten the home run ball that bounced off the foul pole?”

  “It’s my ball,” the old man said. “I caught it fair and square.”

  “I know. I just wanted to ask—”

  “Don’t waste your breath!” he said. “Don’t think I’m giving it to you because you’re a kid. Go ahead and make big eyes and sniffle and cry. I’m keeping the ball.”

  “I’m not going to cry,” I said. “I work for the Pines. Teddy Larrabee, the player who hit the ball, wants it back.”

  “Then he shouldn’t have hit it so hard,” the old guy said.

  “We’re not asking you to just give it back,” I told him. “Teddy will trade you a new ball. He’ll even sign it for you.”

  “It’s not for trade.”

  “Please?” I said. “It would mean a lot to the Bear.”

  “It means a lot to me,” the old man said. “I’ve been wanting to catch a home run ball for sixty years. I’m not waiting another sixty years.”

  “Come on.” I explained how it was Teddy’s birthday ball and how he had been counting his hits since T-ball. I told the man about the coinkydink of number 823.

  “Nice story,” the old guy said. “But I’m still keeping the ball.”