King of the Mound: My Summer With Satchel Paige (16 page)

Chet Brewer started the second game, which was against a team from Missouri, and in the sixth inning he uncharacteristically walked the bases loaded with Bismarck leading by just one run. Satch entered in relief and struck out the side, and the team went on to win 8–4. Games three and four were against the Wichita Watermen—the hometown team—and a team from Shelby, North Carolina. Satch dominated in the first game, aiding his cause by driving in two runs, and Brewer pitched a two-hitter in the second.

The fifth game was against the Duncan Cementers from Oklahoma. They were a brutish team with sluggers up and down the lineup, and to that point in the tournament they had been averaging the stunning total of thirteen runs per game. Mr. Churchill sent Satch to the mound, and he poured cold water on the Cementers’ hot bats, striking out sixteen batters in a 3–1 victory. When the team poured into the small locker room beneath the stands after the game, Mr. Churchill clambered onto a chair and cupped his hands to his mouth.

“That’s five wins and five thousand dollars!” he shouted to the cheers of the players. “Just two more and we win the whole darned thing!”

Nick watched from the corner, exhilarated yet also drained. He had spent almost every waking hour over the previous two weeks watching baseball—so much, in fact, that for the first time in his life he sometimes found his attention wandering during the late innings of lopsided games. When Bismarck wasn’t playing, his father was scouting the other teams, and Nick had spent days perched next to him behind home
plate as his father made careful notes in his little moleskin book. They almost never talked. Nick nevertheless liked the feeling of sitting together, and he actually didn’t mind the silence. It was easier to enjoy the rhythms of baseball when you were quiet.

Nick was therefore surprised when late in one of the games they were scouting—an error-ridden slugfest between two mediocre teams—his father turned to him.

“The pitcher’s tipping,” he said gruffly. “Can you spot it?”

Nick was quiet as he watched the next four pitches. He looked for anything unusual—a flare of the glove, a finger pointing toward the sky, a double clutch during the stretch.

“I think he wiggles his shoulders before a curveball,” Nick finally said. “Kind of like a shrug.”

His father nodded. “Yeah. Do you know why?”

“Maybe he’s reminding himself to stay on top of it,” Nick said. “Or maybe his shoulder is tight and he’s trying to get it loose.”

“It’s because he doesn’t trust his curve,” his father said. “But he knows they’re sitting fastball so he has to try.”

Nick nodded. That made sense. They watched another few pitches in silence, and then Nick glanced at his father out of the corner of his eye.

“Satch told me how he reads batters,” he said.

His father kept staring at the pitcher. “Yeah?”

“He says he watches the knee. It tells him if the batter is gearing up for a fastball or keeping his weight back for a breaking pitch.”

“I heard that one,” his father said. “It’s kind of like what I learned from a coach back in prairie ball. You keep your eye
on how the batter sets up in the box. If he’s trying to take away the curve, he moves as close to the mound as possible. If he’s worried that he can’t catch the fastball, he’s practically sitting in your lap.” He paused. “Of course, some batters are smart. They know you’re trying to read them, so they mix it up. That’s why we scout people. But when you can’t scout, you have to use every trick in the book.”

Nick was quiet again. He didn’t have anything to add, and he didn’t want to ruin the moment by saying something stupid. This had been the longest conversation he had shared with his father in years.

The morning of the semifinal game Nick awakened at his usual time and went downstairs to the little restaurant at the hotel to get bread and coffee for Mr. Churchill and his father. He left half the food in his room and then went down the hall and knocked on Mr. Churchill’s door. After twenty seconds without a response he knocked again and then pressed his ear against the wood. A moment later he heard what sounded like a faint groan.

“Mr. Churchill,” he called. “It’s time to get up!”

This time the groan was loud enough to carry clearly into the hall, and Nick tried the door and discovered that it was unlocked. He pushed it open a few inches and then spoke through the crack. “Are you okay, Mr. Churchill?”

“No,” Mr. Churchill said, the word trailing off into a long moan. “Get a doctor.”

Nick dashed downstairs, moving as quickly as he could on his bad leg—it was always stiff in the morning—and the
desk clerk dialed the closest doctor. Ten minutes later a tall man in a dark cloak entered the lobby carrying a black valise. Nick guided him upstairs and then stood in the corner while the doctor conducted his examination to a chorus of labored moans and grunts from Mr. Churchill.

“Your stomach is agitated,” the doctor finally said.

“I didn’t need a doctor to tell me that,” Mr. Churchill said. “I want to know what I can do about it.”

“Stay in bed,” the doctor said. “And drink lots of water with baking soda.”

A moment later he had packed his equipment back into the valise and was gone. Mr. Churchill rolled over in bed, his sheet drawn up over his body like a shroud, and stared at Nick.

“I hate doctors,” he said. “Five dollars to give you a bunch of common sense.”

“I met some nice doctors,” Nick said. “But they want you to do everything they say even though they’re sometimes wrong.”

Mr. Churchill gave him a pointed look. “Were they wrong about you?”

Nick shrugged, embarrassed. “Maybe.”

Mr. Churchill slowly sat up and tried to swing his feet to the floor, but halfway through the motion he hunched over, groaning.

“You’re supposed to stay in bed,” Nick said.

“I’ve got to get to the park,” Mr. Churchill said. “The team needs a manager.”

“If you stay in bed today, maybe you’ll get better. You don’t want to miss the final, do you?”

Mr. Churchill half smiled and then flopped back against his pillow. “You sound like my mother.” He stared at the ceiling for a long moment. “Who’s going to manage the team?”

“My dad.”

“Your dad is a good man. But I don’t know if he’s ready to be a manager.”

“Sure he is,” Nick said. “He was catcher and catchers always make good managers. Plus he knows more about the teams in this tournament than anyone.”

“I guess he does,” Mr. Churchill said. He rolled over on his side and looked at Nick, his face sallow in the faint light from the window. “Fine. Go tell your father that he’s running the show today.”

Nick nodded and then let himself out of the room before letting the huge grin spread across his face. His father was shaving in the common bathroom at the end of the hall, and Nick walked up behind him and then paused in the door.

“Mr. Churchill is sick,” he said. His father glanced up and looked at Nick in the reflection of the scratched mirror, his eyes dark and unblinking. “He can’t manage the team today and wants you to do it.”

His father drew the straightedge across the last bit of cream on his cheek and then carefully washed the blade before rinsing his face and patting it dry. When he was finally finished, he turned around to face Nick.

“We’re going to win,” he said. “Because if we don’t, there’s no future for us in Bismarck.”

The semifinal game was against the Omaha V-8’s. Before the first pitch, his father gathered the team and gave them a short scouting report on Omaha’s pitchers. Nick could tell
he was nervous by the way he gripped his notebook and the hint of a tremor in his voice.

“It’s simple,” he said at the conclusion of his scouting report. “Be patient because some of these pitchers can’t find the strike zone. And run the moment you get on base because that catcher’s got a noodle for an arm. And if we do that, we’ll get some early runs and win this one for Mr. Churchill, okay?”

The team nodded quietly in assent and then went out and did exactly what Nick’s father had asked. Five of the first nine batters walked, they ran at will on the opposing catcher, and by the time the dust settled they had won 15–6 to advance to the finals. As soon as the game was over, Nick ran back to the hotel with the lineup card. Mr. Churchill was sitting up in his bed, a tall glass of cloudy water perched on his enormous stomach, when Nick burst into his room.

“We won!” Nick said. “We’re going to the finals!”

Mr. Churchill punched the air and then looked at Nick, a huge grin on his face. “One more win,” he said. “One win and people will remember this team forever.”

The championship was a rematch against the Duncan Cementers from Oklahoma. Nick was so nervous that he barely slept the night before the game—maybe Satch had shut them down the first time they played, but it was hard to beat a good team twice. The good news was that the tournament had scheduled a few extra days between the semifinal and final, and Satch therefore would be pitching on a full three days of rest, which was more than he had gotten in months.

The team obviously shared Nick’s nerves because the players were quiet as they took pregame batting practice. Even Satch seemed affected; he hopped back and forth on the balls of his feet during the national anthem like a boxer trying to keep warm before a fight. The first few innings of the game were agonizing. Every Cementers hit felt like a punch to Nick’s gut—and they had plenty of hits. But Satch was also getting lots of strikeouts, and he managed to limit the damage.

In the top of the seventh it was tied 1–1, and Nick was reduced to huddling at the end of the bench, nervously chewing on his dirty fingernails. Joe Desiderato led off with a double, and Red Haley worked a tough walk before Double Duty hit a soft chopper toward third—an easy out at first, but good enough to advance the runners to second and third. The whole team was standing on their feet and shouting as Moose strode to the plate, but he lunged at the first pitch and hit a soft flare to the shortstop for the second out of the inning. Satch, who had been gently swinging a bat in the on-deck circle, glanced at Mr. Churchill.

“It’s good you pay me a lot of money because I’ve got to do everything myself,” he said with a cocky grin.

A moment later he was standing at the plate, his shoulders slumped and his bat twirling a lazy circle over his back shoulder. He looked too sleepy and lanky to be dangerous, but Nick had learned that was just an act. Satch watched the first two pitches—a ball and a strike—his body language betraying no interest in swinging the bat. But as the pitcher went into his windup for the third pitch, Satch crouched, his gaze suddenly intent.

“Come on, Satch!” Nick heard himself yelling. “Hit it!”

Satch had already started his swing, his bat moving forward in a smooth stroke as his head stared down at the ball. A clean
crack
echoed around the ballpark as a white blur streaked past the glove of the leaping second baseman. Nick was on his knees, fist pounding the dirt, as Joe and Red crossed the plate. It was 3–1. They were winning!

“Nine more outs,” his father said tersely beside him. “Nine outs to a championship.”

Quincy struck out to end the top of the seventh. Nick ran out to bring Satch his glove, but Mr. Churchill got to him first. He was so nervous that the words were pouring out of his mouth in a steady stream.

“How’s the arm?” he was asking Satch as Nick approached. “Are you still feeling strong? Should I get Chet up? We’ve got lots of relief. Hilton can throw too. Or maybe even Double Duty.”

Satch put a calming hand on Mr. Churchill’s shoulder. “There’s no reason to be all crazy,” he said. “Why don’t you go put your feet up and relax because old Satch has got it from here.”

And Satch was exactly right. He gave up nine hits in the game but struck out fourteen, and when the last Cementer swung and missed at a final sharp curveball and the team exploded onto the field in celebration, he just smiled as if the outcome had never been in doubt. He kept that same smile through the awarding of the championship trophy and the special ceremony where the writers covering the tournament gave him the MVP, which was an obvious choice since he’d won four games, gotten a key save, and struck out sixty batters—a
record that everyone agreed was likely to stand for a very long time. In fact, his smile didn’t fade until the team was back in the little locker room and Quincy Trouppe came over to him and Double Duty and Hilton Smith and Chet Brewer.

“I was just talking to a scout,” Quincy said. “And you know what he told me? He said that he would recommend signing all of us to play pro ball for a hundred thousand dollars each if we was white. What do you think about that?”

“I don’t want to think about it,” Satch said. He glanced at the trophy, which Mr. Churchill was cradling as if it were made out of solid gold. “I just want to enjoy this.”

“But that scout was right,” Hilton Smith said. “I bet this team would have a good chance of winning a pennant. If they’d just let us play.”

“No doubt,” Satch said. “And if we had Josh Gibson, we’d win that pennant going away. It wouldn’t even be fair.” He paused and glanced around the locker room. “I’ll tell you one thing and it ain’t just talk. . . . I’ve played on a lot of teams, but this just might be the best.”