Читать книгу Rage. The Legend of "Baseball Bill" Denehy онлайн

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The highlight of my childhood was playing in Little League. In Middletown, Connecticut, when I was growing up, players were typically from ten to twelve years old. Ten-year-olds sat on the bench for most of the game. At age ten I would bug my coach, a man by the name of Roy Huffman.

“When can I pitch? When can I pitch?”

Finally a game was well out of hand, and Coach Huffman let me pitch. The batter stepped in, and my first toss hit the top of the backstop. I was nervous at first, but I settled down and got out of the inning. The following year I began pitching regularly. I had grown and put on weight, and no one threw as hard as I did. I was the best pitcher in the league, leading the Jaycees to the city championship.

In the championship game, the Jaycees played a team coached by a former high school coach by the name of Ed Collins. Ed’s son, Pete, was one of my close friends. Every time we moved a runner into scoring position, we squeeze bunted, and were successful every time. After the game, Ed Collins complained that Coach Huffman “wasn’t playing real baseball.” It’s what a lot of losing coaches say after they’ve been beaten by a squeeze bunt. We didn’t care. We won.