Batboy on the Worst Team Ever!
By
Matt Musson
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PUBLISHED BY:
Batboy on the Worst Team Ever!
Based on the incredible true story of the losingest team in Baseball History and the first Southern ballclub to break the color barrier!
Copyright © 2009, 2011 by Matt Musson
This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each person you share it with. Thank you for respecting the author's work.
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Table of Contents
Chapter One: The Signs and Wonders of 1951
Chapter Two - Birthin’ Pains
Chapter Three – Slim Pickens
Chapter Four – Black Cats and Bats
Chapter Five – Joking, Laughing, and Carrying On
Chapter Six – Cuba Libre
Chapter Seven – War and Baseball
Chapter Eight – The Names Change but Nothing Else Does
Chapter Nine – Building Character
Chapter Ten – Surprises
Chapter Eleven – From Bad to Worse
Chapter Twelve – Rain Out
Chapter Thirteen – When is a Cuban not a Cuban?
Chapter Fourteen – Who Owns Baseball?
Chapter Fifteen – A Promise Kept
Chapter Sixteen – Crises Time
Chapter Seventeen – The Final Stretch
Chapter Eighteen – Sunshine Patriots and Quitters
Chapter Nineteen – Finale
Chapter Twenty – Wrap Up
About the Author:
Secret Alternative Chapter 18!!!
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Chapter One: The Signs and Wonders of 1951
Even before the season started, we should have realized that something amazing was going to happen. I mean we were practically showering in signs and wonders. There were omens everywhere.
Like every other ten year old mountain boy, I grew up knowing all about omens. Why just by reading omens and studying moon phases, a fellow could find true love, improve his fortune, and even prognosticate the weather.
So, I already knew that truly powerful omens came in groups of three. And, sure enough, three omens was exactly what we received - special delivery.
It all started when a white redbird came to a birdbath at Mrs. Halifax's home on Falls Avenue. The local paper even interviewed Mrs. Halifax. And, there it was in black and white on the very front page below the fold: Local Woman Spots Albino Cardinal.
Now a white redbird obviously omened something special!
Then two days later Jimmy Speer was fishing in Town Lake, at the cove just off Pearl Street, and he caught two fish on one hook.
Yep. You heard me right. He pulled a shell cracker and a red ear out of the water on the very same hook!
Now that's right out of ‘Believe It or Don’t.’ I mean I had never even heard of such before. I'd a not believed it if Taylor Keech hadn't been along to back up Jimmy's story.
(To be fair, Jimmy Speer is the one who once told me that if I held my breath my pores would close and then bees could not sting me. I found out the hard way that was pure baloney.)
So, we had two fish on one hook and a white redbird. But, then came the clearest most amazing omen of them all.
Irish Gillhooley and Martha Seldomridge were sitting with me on the swings at the old park off Lake Street. Suddenly, flying along bathed in the sunlight of a bright March afternoon, we all three of us beheld the most holy grail of omens.
Fluttering along in the big ole middle of the day just as if it was his business to be out and about, was a furry haired black winged Big Eared Bat.
I'm serious. Right in the middle of the day!
Now mountain folk do tend to be a superstitious lot. Sometimes we see Omens everywhere. Why you might even think omens were 3 for a quarter down at Rayfield's Grocery.
But, this was not superstition. This was fact. When you boil it all down in one pot, a white redbird, two fish on one hook and bats in the daytime, why it was biblical.
And, sure enough, just four weeks later, it came to pass and it was the biggest thing to hit Granite Falls since Moses was a pup.
Mr. Finley German who owns the Chrysler dealership out towards Hudson, and some other local businessmen, announced that they were starting a genuine professional baseball team right here in our very town. And, we are not talking about Mill League. We are talking about world renowned Western Carolina League Baseball.
Heckfire, that's real baseball!
We weren't going to be playing Rhodhiss or Whitnel anymore. We would be going head to head with the big cities like Shelby, Lenoir, and even Gastonia!
Yessiree. We were big league, big time and Granite Falls was finally on the map.
Baseball fever gushed up like a fountain in a parched desert. And, the citizens of our little community were buzzing like honeybees on a busted melon.
Professional baseball was coming to Granite Falls, and it was welcomer than an outhouse breeze!
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In 1951, in rural North Carolina, baseball was IT. Baseball was the be all and end all.
Besides, except for vacation bible school and the odd tent meeting, there was nothing else to do all Summer long but eat, sleep and breathe baseball.
Even Carolina Basketball was just something you played till the spring thaw, and it was warm enough for batting practice.
With seven textile mills running three shifts a day, Granite Falls had long been a powerhouse in the Mill Leagues. So, I guess it just seemed that with the post war boom and all, a professional baseball team was a ‘patriotic investment in America's future'.
I know you are wondering how, with every kid in town wanting the job, I ended up as batboy for the Graniteers.
The simple answer is because Captain Ricky has not come home from The War.
You see, in 1940 Mama was away at school in Chapel Hill and while she was there she fell in love with Captain Ricky. Of course, back then he was not Captain Ricky yet. He was plain old Richard McRainey, from Greenville, NC.
Anyway, Captain Ricky came home with Mama for Christmas vacation to meet Grandpa and Grandma Tooley. They must have liked him, 'cause Mama and Captain Ricky got married before the New Year's bell rang.
Miss Iola Pumpkin once told me that if a crow sings outside a bride's window – nine months later she will have a baby. Well, in Mama's case there must have been a whole flock of black birds singing cause; I came along the following spring.
This might be another omen when you come to think about it. I mean spring being baseball season and all.
Anyway, along came ‘The War.’
Captain Ricky joined the Air Corp to fight the Damnjaps. According to Mama he just about beat old Hirohito single handed. But, one day she got a telegram from the War Department saying Captain Ricky did not come home from his bombing mission.
I was only three or four at the time, but Mama told me not to worry because Captain Ricky had made her a promise that he would come home no matter what.
Well, a promise is a promise and Mama has held onto that one for about six years now. Each year she puts another present under the Christmas tree for when Captain Ricky finally comes home. We keep our white flag with the blue star hanging in the parlor window. And, every Thursday night Mama still makes ketchup meatloaf because ketchup meatloaf is Captain Ricky's favorite.
So, with Captain Ricky still away at The War, Gr
andpa Tooley decided I needed to be around some grown up baseball players on account of, he was afraid I was going to end up light in the loafers and wearing lace on my underwear.
I know this because back when Mama made me start taking violin lessons, I heard Grandpa Tooley warn her in the kitchen one night that violin players were all light in the loafers.
Then one day Grandpa Tooley came by the house and found me helping Mama bake cookies and wearing an apron. Grandpa got a real funny look on his face. And, when they sent me outside to play, I hid below the kitchen window and heard him say boys that wear aprons will end up wearing lace on their underwear.
So, anyway, when Grandpa Tooley heard that Mr. German was starting a baseball team he asked his old friend if I could be the bat boy, so I did not end up light in the loafers and wearing lace on my underwear.
And, Mr. German said yes. So, I was the first Graniteer hired by the club right after Coach Charlie Bowles.
And, that was fine by me because I really love baseball lots more than playing the violin. And, I would rather wear baseball cleats any day of the week than wear loafers.
And, besides, wearing lace on your underwear seems awful girlie when it comes right down to it.
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Chapter Two - Birthin’ Pains
Now way back before I was born there was some hard times around here called ‘the Depression'. From what the old folks say there weren't any jobs during the Depression so people had to eat dirt, and they ran around naked.
Well, they did not actually say they ran around naked but they must have! Cause if they wore clothes, then we would have made them in the mills and people would have had jobs, and they would not have had to eat dirt.
Anyway, back during the Depression, President Roosevelt decided people needed jobs. So, he set up this group called the WPA. And, the WPA came to Granite Falls and gave people jobs carving a baseball stadium out of the hillside right next to Granite Falls Junior High. And, that's how we got the Granite Falls Baseball Stadium.
I guess building the baseball stadium did not make enough jobs for everybody because Grandpa Tooley says that the WPA spent most it's time and money down at the beach digging holes to let the tide go out.
Well, that didn't make much sense to me, but I guess it was still better than eating dirt and going naked. Besides, Mr. Roosevelt was elected ‘President for Life’, so he must of knowed what he was doing.
Anyway, Coach Charlie Bowles sure knowed what he was doing, too. When he was hired away from Hickory to coach the Graniteers he had just ten days to build us a team. He had to find players for every position. And, he needed to get them down to Granite Falls lickety split, so he could start teaching them ‘Good Baseball.'
As you might could imagine, Coach Bowles picked off the best Mill League players we had around here and he hired some players away from other teams in the area. But, most of those players were either old and about ready to hang up their cleats, or they were wet behind the ears rookies trying to see if they had big league juice.
But, believe or don't, Coach Bowles actually signed us a genuine Cuban baseball player, direct from Cuba and everything!
Unfortunately, that Cuban player was in Cuba at the time, and he did not get here for the first couple of weeks of the season. And, we sure could have used his help right off the bat.
From the very first day, Coach Bowles started calling me ‘Bobby Roy the Batboy.' And, to tell the truth, I kind of liked it. I probably would have gotten my friends at school to start calling me that except school was almost out for the summer anyway.
The other thing that happened right away was Coach Bowles organized the ‘Clubhouse Crew'. The ‘Clubhouse Crew' was made up of a bat boy, an equipment manager, a groundskeeper and a gopher.
I reckon you figured out already that I was the bat boy.
The equipment manager was Leonard ‘Chopper' Gaines who was built like a barrel and strong as an ox. He was the shortest home run champion in the history of the Carolina Mill Leagues. It was as if his bat was tipped with fire, and it seemed like he knocked the ball out of the park, whenever he felt like it.
During The War ‘Chopper' Gaines was in the army at some place called ‘the Bulge' over in Europe. He fought at this Bulge place right smack in the middle of winter. It was so cold that Chopper Gaines froze his toes right off. So, today the best baseball player in the history of the Catawba Valley can barely hobble from base to base.
Damnkrauts.
The groundskeeper, Bill ‘Big Bubba' Smith was blacker than the inside of a crow but, he was the hardest working fellow I ever did know in my whole life. He spent all day cutting, watering, digging, and smoothing until the field looked like something out of a picture book.
And, then Bubba grabbed a quick nap and worked all night as a doffer over to the Shuford Mills.
Bubba was once a catcher for the Asheville Blues in the Carolina Negro League. The Blues traveled all around Carolina playing exhibition games against white teams and usually beat them like a drum. Even Coach Bowles said the Blues could sweep our League everyday and twice on Sunday. Except, they could not play in our league because they were colored.
Speaking of colored, the last member of our Clubhouse Gang was the gopher. In our case the gopher was a little colored shoeshine boy whose job was to clean and shine the player’s shoes before each game. Plus, the players always sent him up to the diner for lunch sandwiches and sweet tea.
‘Shine’ did not get paid for working in the clubhouse. (Heckfire, I didn't get paid either. I just got two baseballs a week for trade.) But, Shine did get tips for cleaning shoes and bringing lunch.
Shine was a sneaky snake and always talked some player into ordering a milkshake. He knew that the milkshake maker at the diner made too much milkshake to fit in a take away paper cup. So Shine drank the leftovers and always came back with lunch sporting a milkshake mustache.
Me and old Shine became regular pals, even if he did send me running up to Yount's Sporting Goods one afternoon cause, he said, “Coach Bowles needs a ‘bat stretcher.'”
Let me tell you what, I frogged Shine a good one that day.
I frogged him harder the next day, when sent me back for a bag of ‘knuckle balls.'
But we were friends. Old Shine and me would sit around in front of the dugout before the game, wiping down and cleaning all the bats, and I would always say, “What'd you have for breakfast today, Shine?”
Shine a would always tell me about the best most wonderful breakfasts with crisp bacon, home fries, sawmill gravy and flapjacks.
It's a wonder that boy did not swell up big as a hog.
Anyway, on April 23rd, 1951 the Granite Falls Graniteers opened their season at home against the Lenoir Red Sox.
The Lenoir Red Sox had been in the Western Carolina League for years and years and had a strong bull pen full of first rate pitchers. And, we were not even sure if we were going to have nine players on the field. But, in the end we fielded a team and even made a game of it.
The Red Sox jumped ahead 1 to nothing in the first, on a walk, a single, and a single. But, in the bottom of the second a wondrous thing occurred.
The Graniteers first batter in the inning, Wally Carpenter, came up and hit an heroic home run!
Wally caught that fastball and his bat cracked like the shot of a gun. And, that ball just kept rising. The Lenoir outfield just stood there and watched it sail overhead. That piece of horsehide flew out of the stadium, over the fence and into the darkness.
It was the longest ball anybody ever hit, ever, at the Granite Falls Baseball Stadium.
It was truly immortal.
It may have been the greatest moment of the entire season, right there on opening day.
Unfortunately, the Red Sox had a seven run third inning and wiped the floor up with us 13 to 3.
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Chapter Three – Slim Pickens
Grandma Tooley says that th
ere are only four people in the whole wide world who know the secret recipe for Cokecola. And, that sure is amazing when I think about it. But, I guess that's the way things have to be these days with Russian spies running all over everywhere.
Lord knows what those Commies could do if they got hold of that secret recipe!
Anyway, Grandma Tooley also says that because only four people know the recipe, the one fellow that makes syrup for the eight ounce bottles has changed it without the other three even knowing.
Now I never was sure if he adds more coke or more cola. Anyhow that's why eight ounces of Cokecola out of a bottle always tastes better than soda fountain Coke from a glass.
I guess that's why as the bat boy for the Graniteers I had to lift and tote so many cases of eight ounce coke bottles. It seemed everybody on the team was always drinking cokes.
Well, after all, it was summer, it was hot, and we were in North Carolina.
But, Coach Bowles used to slug down three bottles before he even turned in his starting lineup.
Why he even started giving out a free bottle of Cokecola to every player that scored a run. (Everyone else had to pay a nickel.) But, since we were not a real productive offense at the start of the season, before long he was giving free Cokes to anyone who got on base.
And, that meant that Shine and me were carrying case after case of eight ounce Coke bottles in the heaviest red wooden boxes that you ever did see. We stacked them up and iced them down right before every game and, at the end of the game we ran around gathering up the empties.
One day, like a bolt out of the blue, Coach Bowels just starts yelling madder than a wet hen!
He's yelling that the dugout is a pigpen with empty Coke bottles everywhere and how he is not standing for it. So, after that, Shine and I started policing up the empties between every inning and the Coach seemed to settle back down, and we got back to playing baseball.
It was not until after the game that Chopper Gaines told me why Coach Bowels went on that wild tear. It seems that our catcher, Spud Winkle had a big old chaw of tobacco in his mouth and nowhere to spit. So, he picked up one of those empty coke bottles and kind of refilled it, if you know what I mean.