"Frederik Pohl - The Celebrated No-Hit Inning" - читать интересную книгу автора (Pohl Frederick)

The Celebrated No-Hit Inning
This is A TRUE STORY, you have to remember. You have
to keep that firmly in mind because, frankly, in some
places it may not sound like a true story. Besides, it's a
true story about baseball players, and maybe the only one
there is. So you have to treat it with respect.
You know Boley, no doubt. It's pretty hard not to know
Boley, if you know anything at all about the National
Game. He's the one, for instance, who raised such a
scream when the sportsvmters voted him Rookie of the
Year. "I never was a rookie," he bellowed into three mil-
lion television screens at the dinner. He's the one who
ripped up his contract when his manager called him, "The
hittin'est pitcher I ever see." Boley wouldn't stand for
that. "Four-eighteen against the best pitchers in the
league," he yelled, as the pieces of the contract went out
the window. "Fogarty, I am the hittin'est hitler you ever
see!"
He's the one they all said reminded them so much of
Dizzy Dean at first. But did Diz win thirty-one games in
his first year? Boley did; he'll tell you so himself. But
politely, and without bellowing. . . .
Somebody explained to Boley that even a truly great
Hall-of-Fame pitcher really ought to show up for spring
training. So, in his second year, he did. But he wasn't con-
vinced that he needed the training, so he didn't bother
much about appearing on the field.
Manager Fogarty did some extensive swearing about
that, but he did all of his swearing to his pitching coaches
and not to Mr. Boleslaw. There had been six ripped-up
contracts already that year, when Boley's feelings got
hurt about something, and the front office were very in-
sistent that there shouldn't be any more.
There wasn't much the poor pitching coaches could do,
of course. They tried pleading with Boley. All he did was
grin and ruffle their hair and say, "Don't get all in an
uproar." He could ruffle their hair pretty easily, since he
stood six inches taller than the tallest of them.
"Boley," said Pitching Coach MagiU to him desper-
ately, "you are going to get me into trouble with the
manager. I need this job. We just had another little boy
at our house, and they cost money to feed. Won't you
please do me a favor and come down to the field, just for
a little while?"
Boley had a kind of a soft heart. "Why, if that will
make so much difference to you. Coach, I'll do it. But I
don't feel much like pitching. We have got twelve exhibi-
tion games lined up with the Orioles on the way north,
and if I pitch six of those that ought to be all the warm-up