Page 24 - Way Out to the Old Ballgame

Framing the Pitch

I couldn’t buy a hit. Ended the season with a .227 average and was
the player to be named later in a three-team trade. That’s how I
ended up with the Ferrets. But somehow I couldn’t beat the jinx.
They moved me down in the batting order, then cut me after they got
a couple of prospects at the winter meetings. I can play out my
contract in the minor leagues or forfeit the last year of it. And I need
the money: ex-wife and a lot of bad investments, thanks to my
former agent. But the idea of going back to that jerkwater stadium,
the funky locker rooms, the bus rides and cheap hotels and fast
food—well, I just thought when I saw your ad that maybe there was
a chance for me to get back to the show.”
“Well, maybe there is, young man!” Dr. Fort for a few seconds
became heartiness incarnate, an effort as unusual as it must have been
costly to his limited reserves of bonhomie. “Come in, take off your
jacket and have a seat over there—no, no, don’t worry, it won’t hurt
you: just an old ophthalmologist’s chair I rigged up for reaction-time
testing.”
Matthews had the look of a pitcher told by his manager to walk
Ruth to get to Gehrig. He slowly approached the indicated hand-
rigged assemblage of spare parts, mundane and exotic. “Your notice,”
he said in low tones, “said that you were looking for a baseball player
to participate in an experiment which could result in improved
performance. It did not give any other details. Listen: I don’t want
any drugs. Testing is mandatory now. You know about the steroids
scandal, right?”
The professor, on the verge of slipping from unctuous to anxious,
strove to keep his smile untoothy.
“Quite right, Luke—may I call you that? No chemicals are
involved in this—nor can I give you any guarantee of success. You
must, of course, sign this release. Merely a formality, I assure you,
imposed by the university’s bureaucratic legal staff.”
The ballplayer glanced around the room as if looking for a hole in
the infield through which he could punch a line drive. The trappings
of orthodox scientific inquiry met his gaze at every angle: antiseptic,
impersonal, emanating an aura of objectivity if not sanctity. He had,
he reflected, signed worse contracts.

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