NLN: Opening Day: The Aurora Connection, Part 3
By Francis Ferry, NLN beat writer
read Part 1 and Part 2 of the Aurora Connection
April 3, 2012: Aurora, Colorado – Michael Topham sat above the field in the owner’s suite, watching the proceedings on the field. He had confidence in his son, but still he was nervous. Putting George Crocker out there instead of the PA announcer was his idea; perhaps a little insurance. He figured he could count on George saying something to piss Chris off. They were only here because Chris let his anger get the best of him. Chris would make one last bad decision because of his anger, and frankly, Chris had blown it.
Still, he was worried. He turned to the one person who shared the booth with him, Aurora CFO Edward Castle. “Please tell me this is the right thing to do.” Edward, who had been with the senior Topham from the start in their search for a sports franchise, said, “You were left with no choice, but frankly, I do worry about how this will affect the company’s bottom line. People will look at this unfavorably on the Street. Businesspeople will look at this as a radically ill-conceived move. Personally, I love it. Look at the crowd!” Edward Castle pointed to the packed stadium buzzing with anticipation as Chris Rodriguez began to ascend a ladder for the first time. “They may think you’re wacky doing this, but it was the slightly wacky view of John that they loved, whether it was a fair perception or not.”
Michael Topham looked at his feet and shook his head. “But will Aurora survive if Chris wins? Will this team and this city embrace Chris, or will he chase the fans away?”
“I really don’t think you need to worry about that, Mike.”
Not sitting in a luxury box, but rather just a plain pair of seats down the left field line, was a woman with deep, long red hair, keenly interested in the proceedings. The woman gazed out towards the field through a pair of binoculars held in one hand. In the other hand, a cell phone. Periodically she’d scan the crowd to see if anyone was looking at her. Apparently, no one was. “It’s really too bad about Chris,” she began on her phone. “Too bad he wasn’t like his father and brother. His father you had to work on to get your way; he was too smart. Chris? Just get him mad…”
“What do you care? You got what you wanted.”
Penny Flame put her binoculars down for a moment after watching Chris Rodriguez drop the first piece and climb down, then returned to her call with Ulderico Alfero. “Yeah, I know, but he had such potential.”
“Well, you’ve got your gyms. Now we can begin with that operation, and your friends will be glad not to be involved with Chris. Let him rot. That’s what I say. Win or lose today, we are free of him. And if he loses… well, then he has nothing, and it couldn’t happen to a better man!” Penny Flame raised her binoculars again and gazed out at the field as Will Topham reached the top of the Connect Four grid, preparing to drop his first piece.
Rodriguez and Topham took turns climbing the ladders and dropping pieces. Two played, then four, six, eight. Game on. The crowd sat on the edge of their seats as a tense murmur filled the air, until…
“Folks, I gotta tell ya, we’ve got a real barn-burner going on here!” blurted out George Crocker. “I don’t know who’s going to win this thing, but the bookies floating about in the stands had the odds at 5-1 for the Chillster. What do you think about that, Chrissy?” Chris Rodriguez was halfway up one of the ladders to make his next move. His breath was labored. He paused, looked down at that nuisance George Crocker and shouted something at him. The crowd never heard it, but Will Topham could tell you it was language his mother would not approve of. His father smiled up in the owner’s box. Good ole George. As loony and crazy as he may be, you have got to love the guy. Rodriguez dropped his piece, and before he even got started going down his ladder, Will Topham was scrambling up another, ready to drop his next piece.
The fact that the older man was struggling going up and down the ladders was not a surprise to Will. Building the tall structure with the ladders was part of his plan that he suggested to his father. “No little tabletop game, Dad. We need to build a huge one for the entire crowd to see!” That was certainly true – much more entertaining than using a camera to film the match and display it on the scoreboard – but Will’s true motivation was simple: A tired Chris Rodriguez will get angry faster. An angry Chris Rodriguez will make mistakes. That he knew. He never told his father this. He kept it to himself, and here, as he watched Chris Rodriguez climb once more to drop the 12th piece of the match, he could see Chris struggle to reach the top. His plan was working.
Ten pieces, then twelve, then fourteen. The cells on the board filled up quickly. Chris Rodriguez slowly climbing to drop his piece in, then Will instantly racing up to drop his piece before Chris had even reached the bottom, forcing Chris to almost immediately start climbing again. Chris would seemingly spend most of his two-minute strategizing time just trying to catch his breath, and at this stage of the game, not spending time studying the board was going to be a mistake. Will’s plan was working; keep the pace fast.
Michael Topham’s plan was also working. Throughout the whole event, George Crocker kept his mouth running – nonsensical jokes told to the crowd, claims of heroics he never accomplished but that his damaged mind told him he did. The crowd laughed as they enjoyed the scene, and then it happened. When it did, the smile on Will Topham’s face and the matching one on his father’s face grew at the same moment.
As Chris Rodriguez climbed the ladder for placement of the 17th piece of the match, he had to pause three times on his ascent, breathing hard and heavy. George Crocker found that he could not resist. George was not privy to the senior Topham’s hopes for him; George was just being George. “Hey Chrissy, looks like you’re having a real hard time there. You gonna make it? Looks like you’re gonna faint or something. You know, when I was in K-zoo, we used to have ladder climbing contests at the county fair. I set the record. I climbed this ladder, like, 400 times or something? I forget, but it was something like that; 400. Maybe it was 40? Anyway, I never got as tired as you, dude. Why…”
George never got a chance to finish his statement. As Chris Rodriguez reached the platform, he turned towards Crocker and shouted so loudly that he was heard through most of the sections in the park. And it was not pretty! He reached for his piece and, while still lashing out in a spittle-enhanced tirade directed at Crocker, he dropped it…
…in the wrong column. That was when the Tophams smiled their collective smile.
Chris had never been kind to Will Topham. Knowing that, one might excuse Will taking his time dropping the last piece. Instead of racing up the ladder quickly, as he had done the whole match, he just sat there, studying the board, giving Chris the chance to “catch up”. When Rodriguez reached the bottom and turned to study the grid, he was shocked that the GM of the Aurora Borealis was still there. He expected the kid to have already dropped his piece. He studied the board, and in a short moment the horror began to spread across his face. He had dropped his piece in the wrong column! He had given that snot-nosed punk the game. That lousy excuse for a human Crocker had distracted him, and he had dropped his piece in the wrong column. His jaw sank. He turned his head and looked at Will Topham, who just stood, grinning a satisfied grin at the former GM.
The crowd, too, could see what had happened, and as the piece settled and Will Topham officially won, they erupted into a frenzy. The match had lasted longer than most had anticipated. The “Connect Four Bookies” had the odds at 12 pieces; that’s how confident they were in Will Topham.
As he descended the ladder, many players came out onto the field to greet him. Bryant Burris, Augusto Quiñones and Octávio Pexego all approached Topham, congratulating him. Will was particularly excited to see “El Chupacabra”, as he had always been his favorite. Some players did not short Chris Rodriguez. Mark Richardson went up to Chris, shook his hand, put an arm around his shoulder and whispered something into his ear. One suspects that one goat was consoling another.
“Well, there ya go, boys and girls; we have a winner and his name is The Boy Wonder! Will Topham, congratulations, dude, on a fine match. Well played. And Chris, well played, too. Come on down and sign this document. You played tough, but what can we say? You choked, dude… like, totally choked it. Why it’s probably the biggest choke job since Ice…” That was as far as Crocker got, as Rodriguez decked him with a right that George never saw coming. Some would say they saw it coming, and some would say it was earned.
And so, as the grounds crew quickly dismantled the jumbo Connect Four board and did the last minute fixings on the field, Boone Reel, Aurora’s counsel, escorted Chris Rodriguez to the table and handed him a pen. For the first time in quite awhile, Chris exhibited an emotion that was something other than anger as a tear fell down his cheek. He signed the paper, picked up his solitary dollar bill, and turned. He slowly gazed at the sellout crowd of 45,000 fans in a stadium he was instrumental in building that housed the team he had built. He slowly turned around and studied the house. One suspects that it was as if he never expected to be back there. Then, as he finally finished and faced the visitor’s dugout, he walked head-down, despite all efforts to keep it up, into the dugout and out of the park, presumably never to be seen again.
Chris was not the only person not staying for the game, as Penny Flame had already left her seat when it became clear Chris had screwed up. Only a ticket taker questioned her as she left. “Not staying for the game?” She waved off attempts to have her hand stamped. She didn’t see Chris sign over the team, nor did she see the rare display of emotion other than anger. She had moved on. She had business to attend to. Important business with her new collection of gyms.
Will Topham did not see his father until he reached the owner’s box, and one can only assume that father was pleased. It took the boy GM quite awhile to get to the box. As a matter of fact, it was the second inning by the time he got there, as he was detained by numerous admirers as he climbed the stairs of the lower bowl, most of whom were teenagers themselves – girls that is. As Will slowly worked his way through the throng, the PA announcer began, “Welcome your 2012 Aurora Borealis,” and as the team took the field, “Chris Weaver in left, Salvador Bernal in center and John Knight in right…”
A new era had indeed begun in Aurora, and as Bill Bradley threw the first pitch of the 2012 season, the fog had finally lifted. Except perhaps for George Crocker, who, when he came to, reportedly asked the question, “Where am I? What happened? Did I get beaned again? Aren’t we playing Quito tonight? What’s the score?”
