It's Time to Test Fate at the Plate

Last week, I began reading a book titled A Day in the Bleachers by Arnold Hano, which details the journalist’s trip to the Polo Grounds for Game One of the 1954 World Series—a contest made infamous by Willie Mays’ legendary “Catch.”

The introduction, penned by one of the author’s colleagues, presents the account—given Hano’s penchant for writing in the first person and weaving his personal opinions and experiences into the narrative—as a pre-1960s example of so-called “new journalism.”

I was inspired. I’ve had the opportunity to cover many exciting and compelling events as a rookie member of the Crimson sports staff this year, but seldom have I been part of the story.

I set out to change that.

I knew I couldn’t play in a game, so I settled for the next best thing.

On a whim, I e-mailed Harvard softball coach Jenny Allard and politely invited myself to participate in the team’s next practice.

Her response began courteously, but with unmistakable trepidation: “Hi, Jonathan. I have never had a request like this.”

Allard is her 11th season at the helm of the Crimson, meaning I was the first in over a decade to have the ingenuity or gall to offer to spend my late afternoon over on Soldiers Field in Allston running drills with the Harvard softball team. Meaning I was on exactly the right track.

As the note went on, Allard generously consented, adding that the workout would be optional, short, and generally low-key. The team was still recovering, physically and mentally, from a rigorous 17-day span that saw the squad play 18 games and its Ivy League title hopes ignited, and then dashed.

So I set out from my dorm around 3:30 on Thursday afternoon and began the trip across the river. Along the way, I encountered freshman pitcher Shelly Madick. As we finished the walk together, Shelly told me of the disappointment she felt in the wake of the team’s two losses to Cornell three days prior that eliminated the squad from the Ivy race.

But the conversation soon shifted to a lighter note. Inquiring about the optional nature of the practice, she relayed that many members of the team were busy catching up on sleep and work.

She was no different, with a final test looming the next day. What would I rather do, she told me she asked herself. Study or play softball?

The answer was clear and unspoken. And I felt the same way.

So while Shelly broke off to join a good percentage of the squad in the trainer’s room, I proceeded on down to the field.

I arrived to find a smattering of players standing around the batting tees and laughing. Someone’s pants had just been pulled down. I didn’t ask.

They were forgivably surprised to see me. Even Allard—apparently I had forgotten to RSVP—was a little taken aback. She gathered the team together and explained her plan for the practice in addition to why this crazy-haired reporter with too-small sweatpants and a black baseball glove was hanging around. The reaction seemed an appropriate mixture of apprehension and amusement.

As the huddle dispersed—the pitchers to pitch, the catchers to catch, and the hitters to warm up in the batting cages—I gingerly trotted out to centerfield to shag flies for the first group of hitters taking live BP.

My first chance was a solid drive off the bat of junior co-captain Kerry Flaherty. I lined it up and snared it for an entirely misleading beginning.

From that point on, it seemed that every sinking liner took a sudden, last-minute dive toward my left foot. Racing around the outfield grass in pursuit of the fly balls, I must have appeared something like a chicken without its head.

At one point, it got so bad that when I decided to play one particular frozen rope, destined for a patch of green a mere five feet in front of me, on the hop, Danielle Kerper shouted in my direction: “You’re supposed to catch it in the air.”

I just shrugged.

The atmosphere, meanwhile, was heart-warmingly loose and familiar. These players knew the bitter taste of adversity, the sting of injury, and the cruel hand of fate, but still put their hearts into preparing for the season’s final four games. The seniors present—left fielder Lauren Stefanchik and senior Annie Dell’Aria—joked and smiled with the rest, even in the full knowledge that they would be part of the first class during Allard’s tenure to graduate without an Ivy crown.

Thus, I got a warm reception when I made my outstanding fielding play of the afternoon. Seeing a well-struck Michele McAteer hit heading for the gap in right-center, I got on my horse. I made the one-handed grab in stride with a leaping flourish.

Kerper yelled a redemptive “There you go” in my direction.

Next, we moved on to infield drills where I got in line to take a pair of sharp ground balls. When my turn came, I smoothed the dirt with my sneakers and got my leather down in position. And bobbled the roller. In my haste to recover, I rushed the throw, sailing it high and beaning assistant coach Erica Morgenstein—innocently standing and chatting with a player—squarely in the back.

Oops.

Finally, my chance for unlikely heroics came in the form of the practice-ending home run derby. The squad was divided up by year, and I naturally joined the freshman group.

They urged me to hit first, so I took a bat Amanda Watkins described as “powerful”—God knows I would need all the help I could get—and trudged up to the plate. I had five outs—five chances for glory.

The first pitch I fouled off weakly the right side.

Chump.

On the second pitch, I produced a sure single to center. Competent.

The third pitch I struck near the trademark. The bright green orb soared off into right field.

Hero?

Not on this day. The ball dropped in harmlessly, a good twenty feet shy of the fence. My final two efforts were lame and the sophomores went on to capture bragging rights in the derby.

Walking off the diamond with a dull pain in my lower back and a pleasant lightness in my step, I realized the chance to be a superstar had passed me by. Instead, I was just one of the girls.

—Staff writer Jonathan Lehman can be reached at jlehman@fas.harvard.edu.