September 14^th, 2019 : London, England

It was a long hard opening week sitting in the London bullpen waiting for my chance. Sure I learnt a lot listening to the tales from a major league bullpen and marvelled at how much better my fellow relievers looked when they warmed up but it wasn’t the same as actually doing it myself, in front of such vast crowds.

Finally my chance came, on Sunday the eighth against Gloucester Fishermen in Paul Moots Park the bullpen phone rang in the seventh and it was me they were after. I fairly sprinted to the mound, barely noticing the departing Santiago Estrada shaking his head. Wilson Berry waited for me on the mound alongside manager Sergio Manetti. “Keep it tight” Manetti said to me “We’re down 2-1 and need to hold it”. I nodded excitedly thwacking the ball into my mitt repeatedly, not listening to a word. All I could see was Gloucester’s Riley Cole waiting to step into the batter’s box. The crowd departed from the mound leaving me alone with my thoughts and nearly 40,000 people baying for my blood. I haven’t a clue how many fingers Berry put down let alone what position they were in. I just nodded and immediately reared back and hurled as fast as I could. “BALL” screamed the home plate umpire and I gave him my best WTF glare. Twice more he called ball before finally I got him to shout strike. Easy ! Now I’m getting the hang of this! My fifth ball in the majors screamed in towards the plate and I flinched visibly as I heard the crack of the bat. I twisted with mouth open as the ball zipped past me on the way to centre field. Thankfully though it got down and Tuo-zhou Yang cut it off. The damage had been done though as Cole pulled up standing into second base and I kicked the rubber in anguish. I looked even more hurt though as I turned to face the plate again only to see Manetti out of the dugout and already signalling to the bullpen. That was it ! My major league debut? Five pitches and a double?

We returned to London and I sat two more days in the bullpen staring at Manchester’s finest before I got a chance to make amends. One out in the top of the ninth and Hiroyuki Nii had finally run out of gas. I walked a measured

pace onto the Wembley Stadium mound for the first time in earnest, determined to listen to everyone this time. Pepe Espinosa stood in the batter’s box staring blankly at me. Berry put down the finger and I gave it everything. There was a satisfying thwack as Berry raised his glove to show the umpire the ball therein. “Striiiike Onnnne” hollered the umpire. Smiling I readied myself to hurl again. I sent me best fastball in and stared in blind panic as Espinosa just caught it with the bottom of his bat and sent the baseball zipping along the grass straight towards me. Thankfully instinct took over as I scrambled towards it, bent down and snared it in the mitt. Breathing very heavily and praying to all the gods I knew and looked up to see Leonard Ramsey with his glove already extended at first. I hurled wildly in his direction and thankfully he reached wide and closed his glove on the spiralling ball. By now the whole infield was laughing at me as I’d continued towards Ramsey shouting “Give the ball to Coach, give the ball to Coach !” I desperately wanted that ball. My major league career was finally under way! I had my first out!!