When Manager David Goode took the slow walk out to the mound in the eighth inning of the final game of the season, he wasn’t thinking about his pitcher, who had performed brilliantly, nor about the rookie reliever warming in the bullpen, but about the lights he’d seen two nights before, at the end of Friday night’s game, a little after ten pm. This afternoon—it was not quite 4 pm—the sky was as clear and as blue as the pool at the hotel where the team was staying. No sign of the twinkling, sparkling colored lights David had glimpsed two nights ago during each of his three trips to the mound.
Where had they gone? What caused them?
The lights interested David Goode more than the game at hand. It was the end of another losing season—the Yuma Bulldozers would rack up 117 losses, dead last in the league once again, and Friday night’s game against Aurora was just loss 116. No big deal.
But those lights!
Staring up at the sky, Goode stumbled briefly when he stepped onto the mound. Bulldozer catcher Davey Burke caught his manager by the elbow to prevent him from falling on his face.
“You okay, Skip?” Burke asked.
Davey looked at the players gathered on the mound. For a moment he didn’t recognize any of them.
“Skip?”
Davey looked at his catcher. “You see those lights the other night, Danny?” He pointed at the sky. “Friday night?”
Burke, who had seen the team rise to the playoffs and then sink to last place, studied his manager. “Whatsa matter, Skip?”
“Those lights, you see ‘em that night?”
“Been a long season, Davey,” the veteran catcher said. “Maybe you oughta sit the rest of this one out, huh?”
“Fuck that. Gimme the ball.” Davey grabbed the ball out of the young pitcher’s hand, who looked surprised but knew where he was headed, so he started down off the mound.
“Wait a minute,” the catcher said. The pitcher stopped. Burke looked at his manager, whose gaze was directed somewhere beyond centerfield. “You can’t pull him now.”
“Who’re you to tell me what I can and can’t do?” Davey responded, spitting on the mound. “I can fuckin’ pull anyone I want, anytime I want. Right?”
“Yessir,” the catcher said. He looked at the pitcher, trapped in no-man’s land, off the mound but still on the playing field, waiting to learn his fate. Burke could see the disappointment in the pitcher’s face, so he dared to say, “But he’s throwing a three-hit shutout. Let him finish.”
“Ain’t your call, Burke,” the manager said and turned to the pitcher. “Whatcha waitin’ for? Taxi ride? Get your ass into the showers!”
The pitcher looked at his catcher, who shrugged as if to say, What can I do?, then headed for the dugout. Behind him he could hear his manager asking the infielders who had gathered around the mound, “Any of you guys see the lights in the sky the other night?”
The players studied their cleats or looked to the catcher for a clue what to do, but they didn’t say anything. After a moment, Burke asked Davey, “Who you bringing in?”
“Who you think?” Davey snapped. “The kid warming up.”
Burke waited a moment, then whispered so only Davey could hear, “Maybe you oughta wave him in then?”
“What?” Davey looked out at the bullpen in left field and saw the rookie reliever just standing on the warmup mound, waiting. “Damn rookie, couldn’t tie his shoes without a direct order!” With that, he waved toward the bullpen and the young pitcher started to trot onto the field.
Davey stepped up to the top of the mound, both feet on the pitching rubber, and looked down at his catcher. “You think you can manager better ’n me, Danny Boy?”
Burke refused to flinch. He spoke slowly, quietly. “Some days, like this one, when you’re not quite at the top of your game—sir—then yeah, maybe someone else should—”
“You think I’m crazy, doncha? You think I oughta retire, huh? Well, I got news for you and anyone else on this club who thinks I’m gonna step down. I got three years left on my contract, so fuck you all.”
Davey charged off the mound toward the dugout.
“The ball, Skip!” Burke yelled at him. Davey stopped, looked down at his hand and discovered the baseball, turned and threw it at the relief pitcher, who’d just arrived on the mound. The kid wasn’t expecting a throw like that, and it would have hit him in the hip if Burke hadn’t reached out barehanded to grab the throw. He scowled at his manager, who turned his back on the infield, the stadium, the game of baseball itself, and headed for the dugout. He no longer cared what happened.
After a moment, Burke placed the ball gently in the young reliever’s glove. “Two outs,” the catcher said, “that’s all we need. No ducks on the pond, just gimme what I call for.”
The kid nodded and the catcher turned to head back to home plate, then stopped. He turned back to ask, “Friday night, you were in the bullpen all night, right?”
The reliever nodded.
“By any chance you notice flashing lights, or colored lights, out over center field that night?”
Yashi Suto, born in Tokyo, had only arrived in the U.S. four years ago. Without the interpreter the club provided him off the field, he wasn’t sure he understood the catcher’s question. “Lights?” he asked and pointed to the stadium lights high above the field.
“No,” Burke said, realizing Yashi was the last player he should ask. “Never mind.” He headed back to home plate. The umpire signaled for the pitcher to begin his warmup tosses, then muttered to Burke, “What the hell were you guys jawing about out there?”
Burke pulled his face mask down and gestured to Yashi to begin his throws. “Manager’s gone crazy on us.”
The ump chuckled as Burke caught and returned Yashi’s first warmup toss. “Goode? He’s always been a little crazy.”
“But now he’s seeing lights—flashing lights, colored lights—in center field.”
“Friday night?” the ump asked.
“Yeah, how’d you—?”
“Northern lights, clear as a bell. I kept taking a peek at them every chance I got. My partner was behind the dish that night, said he completely missed a half dozen pitches ‘cause he kept staring at the lights.”
Burke returned Yashi’s next warmup throw. “Northern lights, eh?”
“Yup,” the ump said. “Aurora Borealis.”
Yashi’s next pitch smacked into Burke’s mitt. He sidearmed it back out to the mound. “Is that where the team gets its name?”
“You just figgered that out, Burke?” the ump teased. Three more pitches popped the catcher’s mitt. “Kid’s got stuff.”
“You just figgered that out?” Burke said as he whistled the last one back out to the mound.
The rookie pitcher gestured he was going to throw a curve.
“Watch this,” Burke said. The ball snapped across the corner of the plate, dropping several inches at the end of its flight.
“Major league,” the ump said.
Burke chucked the ball back to the pitcher. “So maybe old Goode isn’t crazy.”
“I wouldn’t go that far,” the ump said.
“He wasn’t seeing things. Aurora Borealis, you say.”
“There’s a lot Goode ain’t seeing these days,” the ump said as the final warmup toss plopped gently into the catcher’s mitt. “Sweet pitch,” he said as pulled his face mask down and yelled, “Baddah rup!”
The rookie left hander snapped the first curveball just off the corner of the plate for ball one. Danny held onto the pitch a little longer than usual, then said to the man in blue behind him, “You couldn’t give that one to the rookie?”
“Cuz he’s a rookie? He’s gotta earn ‘em.”
Burke tossed the ball back to the mound, put down two fingers again, and watched the young lefty snap another curveball toward the corner of the strike zone. The Aurora hitter fouled it off straight back. Burke didn’t even move. The ump had stepped back out of the way, anticipating Burke chasing the foul ball. When he returned to his position and handed a new ball to the catcher, he muttered, “You couldn’t bother chasin’ that one? For the rookie?”
Burke said nothing, just waggled one finger down and set up a target inside. Suto wound up and threw, and the batter promptly punched the fastball past the second baseman.
“Not one a’ your best calls, Burke,” the ump chided.
“You trying to get my goat?” the catcher said as he stood and signaled to the fielders that there was one out.
The ump was silent, but Burke could see a hint of a smile on the old man’s face behind the mask, so he kicked some dirt around the plate, forcing the umpire to bend over and sweep the plate clean. When they returned to their positions, no one spoke.
After another curve missed, Yashi painted the black with two curves that started at the hitter’s belt and finished in Burke’s glove flat on the ground. The batter swung wildly over both.
Ahead one-and-two, Burke called for a fastball. The batter bounced a slow grounder to the second baseman, who fired the ball to the shortstop covering second. Out two.
Burke called for curveballs, three in a row. One was fouled off, one missed the plate, one froze the hitter. One ball, two strikes, two outs. Burke called for the fastball.
Behind him the ump muttered something and Burke stood up and called time. He jogged out to the mound.
“Can’t believe that fuckin’ ump, he’s questioning my calls!”
“Hum pire?” Yashi asked in his limited English.
“Yeah, the fuckin’ umpire!”
Yashi smiled and nodded, watched Burke’s response, then nodded some more.
“Yeah, that’s it,” Burke spit out, “you keep nodding like you wanna throw the fastball, but throw the curve, okay?”
Yashi stopped nodding. Pitcher and catcher stared at one another. The umpire began his slow trek to the mound to break up this conference. Before he could get there, Burke whispered to Yashi, “Number two, okay? Number two.”
Yashi smiled and nodded. He knew what number two was.
Burke headed back to the plate before the ump reached the mound.
“What you two jabberin’ on about? Rook don’t even speak English.”
“Oh, he knows more than he lets on,” Burke said. When the batter settled into the box, Burke shouted, “Okay, Yashi, let’s get this over with!” He flashed a series of meaningless signs, then wiped his glove across his chest, the sign to erase all previous signs. He smiled. Yashi smiled back.
The pitcher came to his stop, checked the runner on first, and tossed the loveliest curveball of the day about three inches off the outside corner of the plate. The batter swung like he was sewing seeds, the bat flying out of his hands and into the dugout.
“STEEEE …” the ump bellowed and the inning was over. Yuma still led 2-0.
Burke didn’t figure to bat in the top of the ninth, so when he reached the dugout he asked where Manager Goode had gone. A couple players shrugged, but the bat boy glanced down the runway to the clubhouse, so Burke headed down there. He had a bone to pick.
Yuma’s leadoff hitter walked, the second batter was hit by a pitch, and then the third base coach—operating on his own initiative with the manager absent from the dugout—called for a sacrifice. The batter laid down a nifty bunt moving both runners into scoring position. The Dozer bench came alive.
The Borealis brought their infield in, but the next batter promptly belted a double to score both runners. The fans were silent. They weren’t used to watching Aurora lose. Yuma’s next batter drilled the first pitch high in the air to left. The runner on second tagged up and advanced to third on the out.
Which brought … wait a minute, where was Danny Burke? The catcher was up. The bat boy went running down the tunnel in search of him.
“What’s the hurry, sport?” Burke bellowed at the batboy.
“Yer up!”
“I’m a comin’,” Burke said calmly.
“No. Now!”
Burke jogged out of the tunnel just as the umpire leaned into the Yuma dugout and shouted, “Get me a hitter or the inning’s over!”
“Right here,” Burke said, pulling off his chest protector before grabbing his bat from the rack.
“Mighta known,” the umpire sneered. “You makin’ a reputation for yourself, Burke.”
Danny pushed his way past the umpire and stepped into the box. The Colorado catcher was laughing.
“What’s so damn funny?”
The catcher pointed at Burke’s legs. He was still wearing his shinguards.
“Damnitall!” Burke hustled over to the dugout where he flipped the snaps on his shinguards and tossed them to the bat boy. When he stepped back into the box, the ump said, “Are you finally ready?” before giving the pitcher the signal to go ahead. The pitcher came set, and Burke took a pitch several inches off the plate.
“Strike one.”
Burke spun to face the man in blue, who just smiled. “You got sumpthin’ to say, Burke?” Burke stared for a moment, then shook his head. “Did’n think so.”
Danny stepped out of the box to think it over. After what he’d said to his manager in the clubhouse, nothing he could do would make any difference. He stepped back into the box and drilled the next pitch straight at the left fielder, who caught the ball without moving. Three down.
So Danny Burke put on the tools of ignorance one more time.
On this, the final day of the season, Yuma was blessed with three shining performances from the team’s moundsters. Seven innings of shutout ball from starter Melvin McNeal, followed by the rookie Suto’s inning of unhittable curveballs, and finished off with Jeffery Brown’s shutdown ninth inning. A 4-0 win over the Borealis to finish a season of 117 losses.
The boys should have been celebrating in the locker room, right?
Should have. But McNeal had been told before his final start that the Dozers planned to trade him at the Winter Meetings for a first round draft pick. Suto was traded before the Winter Meetings. And the team dangled Brown’s right arm in front of every team in the league in need of a reliever, finally swapping him for a couple of other pitchers and two draft picks. So, none of the three pitching stars on the last day of the season would be playing for Yuma next year.
When the final out was recorded, Burke headed out to the mound to shake the hand of his relief pitcher, Brown. Before he could say a word of congratulations, Brown asked him, “You heard anything?” Burke’s mouth hung open a moment, expecting to enunciate some trite word of congrats, then closed as Brown clarified, “About my trade?”
Danny shook his head and put his arm around the young pitcher. “You can’t be focusing on that shit. It’s outa our control.”
“That’s what you told me a week ago, when I learned I was on the to-be-traded list. Season’s over, when else am I ‘spozed to think about it if not now?”
Danny couldn’t disagree. Now was precisely the time to think about being traded, to prepare for changes, to make a few of the innumerable arrangements necessary when a team moved you to another city. Wives and kids had to be informed they might be moving, bills paid up in case accounts had to be closed on a moment’s notice, autos serviced in anticipation of a cross country trip, and equipment recovered from team locker rooms, in case you needed to have it shipped across the country.
But most of all you had to get your head around the idea that the team you just performed so brilliantly for could up and decide they don’t need you anymore.
Danny put his arm around the young relief pitcher’s shoulder and walked toward the dugout with him. There were high fives and butt slaps from teammates, but Burke and Brown were not smiling. Brown’s face looked rather solemn for a youngster who’d just finished a fine rookie season in the majors. He wasn’t thinking about the game but rather his immediate future.
Burke, on the other hand, looked downright stoic. He wasn’t happy the season was over because he knew what lay ahead. He was no youngster anymore, and every season’s ending brought with it a long winter in which his muscles and his bones grew a little older, a little less flexible. He knew when spring came, he’d face a month of pain getting used to squatting behind the plate again. His knees would scream until the weather warmed and his aging body adjusted, finally, belatedly—later every season. The only silver lining he could find in his cloud of pain was the knowledge that he’d be here, nowhere else, next year and the year after, a Yuma fixture behind the plate. Burke had a $20 million contract for the next four years, and at age 34 with his most productive years behind him, he knew he wasn’t going anywhere. Aging catchers with big contracts were not a high priority item in the baseball universe.
So though he was secure, Danny wasn’t looking forward to the next season. Instead he was thinking back to less than an hour before, when he’d run down the tunnel to speak to Manager Goode, to tell him it was a mistake to yank McNeal in the 8th when the pitcher had allowed only three hits. But before he could even start, Goode was yelling at him!
“Burke, you worthless excuse for a hitless wonder, if I could trade a dinosaur like you I’d do it in a heartbeat, you pitiful excuse for a—”
“You got no heart,” Danny interrupted, then added as sarcastically as he could, “Sir.”
Goode did a double-take. “What?”
“You had no business pullin’ McNeal in the 8th. He was throwin’ a three-hitter! You pulled a boner, Davey, admit it.”
“I pulled a boner?”
“You pulled a boner.”
“You haven’t got a boner to pull,” Goode sputtered, splattering spit all over his catcher’s face. “You haven’t gotten it up all season—”
“Who can’t get it up anymore, old timer?”
“—just look at your stats, man. You’re no better than a, a—”
“A what?”
“I don’t know what! You’re worthless. The boss oughta trade you for a draft pick—a low draft pick.”
“This club wouldn’t know a good trade if it bit ‘em in the ass,” Danny said. “What kinda organization is it that lets someone like you manage a major league ball club?”
Goode thrust his face into Burke’s and whispered, “Just you watch it, boy-o!”
“Or what?” Burke smiled.
“I’ll banish you to the bullpen, that’s what!”
“A 20 million dollar all-star catcher in the bullpen? How long you think they’d let you get away with that?”
“Former all-star,” Goode snarled. “Very former. No one tells me how to run my ball club.”
“The only reason they keep you around, Davey, is ‘cuz you’re cheap.”
“Fuck you, Danny.”
“Wouldn’t you like to? But you couldn’t get it up.”
The manager started to take a swing at Burke, then noticed the bat boy running down the tunnel toward them. “Yer up, yer up,” the boy was shouting.
“Okay okay,” Burke said, “I’m comin’.”
“Now,” the kid yelled. “Yer up now!”
As Burke followed the kid up the tunnel toward the playing field, Davey Goode muttered to himself, “I ain’t takin’ no more of your shit, Danny Burke. No more.”
And he didn’t. That’s what Danny Burke discovered the next day when he saw the headline:
YUMA TRADES ALL-STAR CATCHER BURKE
He didn’t bother reading the article. It was time to start packing.