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“You got this, Hunter,” Cammie encouraged. She’d followed us and was leaning against the fence to watch.
Hunter nodded at her before turning his attention to the batter.
He pitched two strikes and then a ball.
“Take a breath,” I called to him.
Hunter held the ball in his glove, looking off to right field as he took an exaggerated breath. Then he refocused on the catcher, wound up, and let a fastball go into the glove.
“Strike three,” the umpire said, and I heard Hunter say, “Yes.”
The second batter stepped into the batter’s box.
Brooke’s hand curled around my bicep. “Are you doing okay?”
“This is hard to watch.”
“He’ll be okay. He’s done this in the last few games.”
Hunter usually pitched the first inning and sometimes the last inning. The coach allowed other players the opportunity to pitch, but Hunter usually struck out two to three batters each game. He’d become so consistent that he’d get annoyed with himself if he only struck out two.
The only sign he was nervous was that he tended to pitch one ball after the other without taking a minute to breathe. When he rushed, his pitches fell short of the plate.
Abby stood off to the side of us, taking pictures with her professional camera. She was the picture of calm and ease. You wouldn’t even know she was his mother the way she held the camera steadily.
The batter swung and missed the next one, which was the sinker Hunter had been working on all week. It was slower than his fastballs, which seemed to throw off the batter’s timing.
“Way to make him chase it,” I called.
I wasn’t sure he even heard me; he was so focused on the batter. His expression was determined as he took a breath, wound up, and threw another fastball.
The batter stood there, looking.
“Strike three,” the umpire called.
The other coach approached the batter on deck. “This kid is throwing strikes. You need to swing at them.”
The batter nodded, and I felt a little sorry for him. There was no one on base and two outs. It wasn’t the best position to be in.
“He’s got this,” Brooke murmured.
“Are you going to videotape it? You know he’s going to want to see this later.”
“You’re right.” She removed her hand from my arm and stepped closer to the fence to videotape it.
The kid swung at each pitch, fouling two down the first base side before striking out.
Hunter ran off the mound on the last one and toward his team. They clapped him on his back and told him that he did great pitching.
“He’s going to be impossible after this,” Brooke said, watching the kids congratulate him.
“He has potential.”
Abby came over to us. “You better not encourage him to try out for travel baseball.”
“Why not?” Hunter was obsessed with baseball, and his pitching was great for his age.
“It’s a huge commitment. It’s year-round games and practices, and it’s expensive,” Abby said.
