Page 1 of The Fall Classic

CHAPTER ONE

Logan

Fix your grip, genius.

It’s called a knuckleball for a reason. Fingernails in. Knuckles out.

No. Palm.

This is the supportive self-talk every pitcher needs when he’s already given up a run and three hits in the ninth inning.

I take off my cap. Wipe the sweat dripping down my forehead before it gets into my eyes. Replace the cap. Kick my foot into the dirt. Blow into my hand—almost spitting my bubblegum out in the process.

Why hasn’t Fletch taken me out already when I’m such a disaster?

We were three runs up going into this inning. The setup man did his job perfectly, holding the lead for me. Closing the game—making sure we win—is my entire job, and I’m floundering at best. The Nashville Outlaws have runners on every base and their cleanup hitter is staring at me from the batter’s box like he’s got my number.

He probably does.

The leather ball is too hot in my hand, the laces too sharp, the stadium lights too bright against the dark sky. Rationally, I know none of these things is true, but rationally, I also know I’ve been throwing the best knuckleball of my life in bullpen sessions, when it’s just me and my pitching coach. I’ve been so good that the Chicago Firebirds—one of the best teams in Major League Baseball and the team I’m on the extended roster for—called me up twice this season, because their GM was certain I’d finally worked past my mental block.

Two call-ups and two increasingly humbling bus rides back to Mullet Ridge later, he realized I had not, in fact, worked out my mental block.

I have the yips.

And boy, are they yipping today.

Not even the team’s sports psychologist has been able to fix them.

Time seems to slow as I stand on the mound in the heat of an August night with the league’s leading home run hitter watching me from the box. The pitch clock has more time left on it than should be possible, but then my anxiety can cover a lot of ground in a short distance. The stadium lights are so bright overhead they’ve turned everything beyond the outfield wall into pure black, and the air out here is ninety-two degrees and humid enough that I may as well be pitching in soup.

Or floating in the sensory deprivation tank Dr. Chang’s having me use.

That’s right. I can pretend I’m in the flotation tank—less the panic attack I had the first time I got in. But it’s so hot, I can’t tell where my skin ends and the water—or air—begins.

Good. That’s good.

I breathe in. Hold. Out. Hold, letting the crowd noise fade and the awareness of runners on base and the pitch clock blur into nothingness.

Fingertips. Nails dug in. Knuckles out.

Then I lift my stride leg to a balance point and⁠—

My gum shifts wrong between my teeth and I bite the inside of my cheek so hard my eyes water.

Pain shocks me back into my body mid-stretch, but the cleanup hitter is in the box and I’m already moving and can’t help but throw anyway.

And I palm it at the last second, holding it for a heartbeat too long like I always do because I can’t let go of anything and⁠—

CRACK.

The ball launches, carrying higher and farther while I run through math as basic as it comes.

A grand slam is four runs.

We’re only up by three.

I groan, unable to watch until a roar from the stands has me whipping my head to see our right fielder chasing it, jumping halfway up the fence⁠—