This story is not about Native Americans, so if that’s what you expect you might as well not read it. What it is about is an erstwhile Little League baseball team named the Indians, and their trials and tribulations. If you read one of the previous Little League stories, you’ll know the league was blessed by my reappearance in a managerial role, much to the chagrin of the league President. Drinking a “cold one” after a game was not considered by him as something of a role model. What he didn’t realize was that I was only drinking it as a courtesy to the “offeree” ” He forced me to take it! I really don’t much like beer. And besides that, I wasn’t anywhere near the dugout, nor do I look anything like Walter Matthau. More like Yul Brynner!
Our season was divided into two halves, and to be champions you had to either win both halves or survive the onslaught of one playoff game, winner take all. There are only five teams in the majors, which is the 10 to 12 year old grouping. The Indians finished the first half at the bottom of the pile. We only had a couple of blowout games, but were close – one or two runs in most of our losses. But close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades. The daunting Red Sox had won the first half.
The kids’ attitude was still quite positive, and they were having fun whooping and hollering in the dugout like a bunch of wild Indians, which in fact they were. I wasn’t called Coach. I was Chief. Our team was the tribe, but at the strong suggestion of Blue-eyes, I drew the line on the squaw definitions. When we got together for practices or games, the normal greetings were the raising of the right hand and the guttural “How.” The dugout was the “wigwam.” Drinks like Gatorade were defined as “firewater.” The team was having fun, even if it wasn’t winning, and my attitude was “that was what it’s all about.” Don’t get this wrong! When they were in the game they were very serious and didn’t like to lose.
Since the rules would not allow bunting, I taught the troops or “clan,” as they preferred to be called, how to chop down on the ball, which had the same effect as a bunt. Tough play for an infielder, but very effective and totally legal. It would draw their infield in and then the troops could swing away. We had a signal for this. It was the “tomahawk chop.” Real subtle, right? Nobody’s gonna guess what that means! The chop began to pay off. We didn’t overdo it and used it mainly to move up runners, but the side benefits were probable throwing errors to first base. With a runner on third, it was like a squeeze play. Once the other team started throwing the ball around, we could go back to our strategy of “antelope” baseball.
Most of the other teams had adults acting as base coaches, but I decided to let the kids do it, especially my two-inning players. It worked out fine, because most of the time the kids running bases didn’t pay any attention to the base coach anyway. The tribe decided that they had have signs like they had seen on the TV games, which of course they dubbed ”Indian signs.” I mean after all, no self-respecting Indian would go anywhere without their signs.
So they would stand at the entrance to the “wigwam” and go through all these gyrations. There were a couple of problems with this. First, you couldn’t steal a base, so I was never sure what they were suggesting to the guy coaching first base. The other was that most of the signs they created were rather obscene. I had no idea what they meant, didn’t care and frankly, really didn’t want to know. Unfortunately, the signs could be seen by the opposition’s spectators and of course, someone reported it. I got yet another phone call from the league President telling me to cease and desist.
The Indians were prevailing. We were well into the second half and had only lost one game, and that was to the Red “Sods.” Our pitching had improved greatly and there were far fewer walks. We had lost two 12-year-olds, and I had to draft from the minors. It turned out the additions we got were very good pitchers and frankly, better all-round players than what I had lost. We only had two 12-year-olds left on the team, and one of them was a two-inning player, which was totally disproportionate to our competition, especially the Red Sox, who had eight 12-year-olds. The chop was an effective tool and was being imitated by some of the other teams, but their execution was not as good as ours. Part of the reason for this was that we focused on the lead runner, which for some reason the other teams neglected to do.
One interesting event that occurred is what I like to call the “double-double” play! Now you know that’s impossible in baseball, but it happened. We were leading in one game by about four or five runs when our starting pitching imploded and we could not get anybody out. The bases were loaded and the batter popped up right in front of the catcher. He caught the ball, threw to first base and the first baseman stepped on the bag because the runner had taken off and was now standing on second with another runner trying to get back to second and was tagged before he could get back. The runner at third was halfway between home and third base and had to tag up and he was tagged out. By this time we had kids running from one base to another, coaches out waving their arms and absolute chaos. At that point I thought the next thing that can happen is they’ll tag out the guy standing in the on deck circle. That’ll make it five outs!
The umpire was a young kid, and with all of this happening so fast, could not be expected to have seen, let alone interpret what the hell had just happened. Both teams were on the field and he was caught right in the middle. By this time it had dawned on me that we had just done the impossible, and made four outs in one inning. Naturally, it didn’t stand. We were given credit for a double play, and a runner was allowed to stay at third base. I pointed out that that meant one of their “runners had just disappeared off the face of the earth.” To no avail! Syllogistic logic has no place in baseball. We got the final out, and that was that. I did not argue about it because the kid umpire was clearly out of his depth. One of my gang wanted to know if we got credit for that fourth out in the next inning. Seemed like a good idea to me.
Another incident occurred, but fortunately did not involve in the Indians. Thank God! I just didn’t need another phone call from the President. In this instance, it was a case of “loaded bats” in a game that the Red Sox had lost. After the game, the Red Sox manager was picking up the gear, which was always the case, being the first item on our job description, and he picked up a bat which belonged to the opposition. As he was walking to the dugout, he saw what appeared to be black tape around the head of the bat, but was in fact a very thin lead weight used principally on golf clubs. He refused to surrender the bat to the other manager and went looking for league official.
The Red Sox manager insisted that the game be decreed a forfeit. He called me and wanted me to support his position, and I told him “no,” and that I personally doubt if the weighted bat had anything to do with their loss. My thoughts were that this was much ado about nothing. The way these kids swing, a little bit of weight wasn’t going to do a damn thing to improve their hitting. If anything, it was probably a disadvantage. The team that had beaten them had replaced the Indians at the bottom of the barrel. Next thing that happened – some of the parents got involved and actually got a lawyer to write a letter to the President of our league, which was a good thing because it would probably keep him busy, and keep him off my sad little butt.
As it turned out, the manager of the other team didn’t know anything about the lead weight, and this major felony had been perpetrated by one of the players. If the Red Sox’s parents had their way, the kid would’ve been sent to San Quentin. For the most part, Little League kids are great, but some of the parents can be a royal pain in the “tush.” I don’t know for sure, but I suspect Ms. Congeniality had something to do with this endeavor. If you don’t know who she is, then you’re not reading my other baseball stories, which indicates you have superior intelligence and more important things to do. But I digress!
The season was winding down and we were in a dead heat with the Red Sox. We had one more game to play, and if we won it, we would force a playoff for the second half – and if we won that, then we would have to play another “winner take all” playoff game. The Indians did not play at all that well in this last game. I think the war chants got their blood up and it was just way too much adrenaline. We were in the last of the seventh inning, two outs, bases loaded, with one of my “prima donnas” at bat. As he went out to hit, I heard one of his teammates tell him that this pitcher was going to put it over the plate. He went out there, and sure enough got two quick called strikes and then stood there as the third called strike hit the catcher right in middle of the plate. He was very irate and said some things to the umpire, and on his way back to the dugout told me that those were three (expletive deleted) bad calls. I didn’t say anything to him because I know he felt bad, but my thought was, “If you’re going to be a prima donna, you’d better perform. Otherwise, turn in your tutu or jockstrap – whichever is most fitting.”
There was a pizza party after this loss, and the parents had gotten together and presented me with a little engraved pewter cup that was meant to act as a disguise for the “cold one” after future games. I thought that was very nice, but what they didn’t realize was this cup had a glass bottom and when I tried to use it, it leaked like a sieve. I still have it, but use it principally to hold my crayons.
Moral of the story – The old baseball saying of “wait’ll next year” is just so much horse pucky.
J.J. Addingnuttin 