We ended up doing the hitting evaluation for the guy at the front of the line before the players waiting in the dugout.
Trevor was right to wonder if we might upset the locals if we kept new try outs waiting too long.
Interestingly enough, as soon as I had the giant usher the guy at the front of the line through to the park, I recognized his face right away. Why he was lined up with totally new prospects when he’d already been told he’s on the team is beyond me.
He was one of the guys who’d attacked me at the soda machine, and tried to put me into a coma - not to mention holding me captive. One of the Quallon clan, if memory served. He’d probably queued up with the rest of those trying out because he was too stupid to know otherwise.
Everything within me wanted to scream at him, and tell him to get lost. But, I knew the System was watching, and it demanded I add these three evil brothers to the team, so I had no choice.
When he walked up to the break in the infield fence near the home dugout, he didn’t lift his head at all, refusing eye contact with me. If I could’ve shot lightning with my glare, he would’ve been a pile of ash.
“Let’s go,” I said to this greasy haired demon, abruptly. “Which one are you? Which Quallon?”
“Jorn,” the little maggot replied. His voice barely registered over the winter’s breeze.
He grabbed a batting helmet, and picked up a bat from the dirt, and took up his stance on the right side of the plate.
Let me tell you, it took all the restraint I had inside of me not to drill him with the first pitch. But, I remained professional. That said, I wanted this guy to fail in every aspect. Yeah, he was going to be part of the team regardless, but I didn’t have to like him, or find him of any value to the franchise at all.
Unfortunately, he turned out to be a better hitter than I’d hoped. Both in terms of contact, and power.
Jorn Quallon:
Contact: 6/25 = Above Average
Power: 2/25 = Above Average
Go figure, the two men behind Jorn in the queue were his despicable brethren. Just to get them out of the way, I assessed their hitting next.
Jeremiah Quallon:
Contact: 1/25 = Poor
Power: 1 (line drive, as opposed to a deep fly ball) /25 = Below Average
One strange note about the third of the three Quallon cannibals I’d evaluated. He (called Jux), didn’t have a preference as to which side of the plate he batted from. He said he felt as comfortable batting from the left side, and the right. He actually made decent contact from either side. For those unaware, in baseball terms, this would make him a ‘switch hitter’. I was glad to have this kind of versatility on the team roster, even though I disliked the source.
Jux Quallon:
Contact: 2/25 = Below Average
Power: 2/25 = Above Average
With those idiots out of the way, I went back to the rest of my rostered players waiting in the dugout.
My friend, the reformed barbarian (I only keep referring to him as that, because that’s how he seems to prefer describing himself) was next.
Quite an imposing sight to see this seven foot bearded warrior standing over home plate with a baseball bat in his hands.
Gak Bar:
Contact: 2/25 = Below Average
Power: 2/25 = Above Average
Both of Gak’s power shots were huge bombs. He sent the ball way out into deep center, and well past where the fence would be. No, I wasn’t surprised.
Maybe I should’ve been however, because his musclebound friend couldn’t hit for power at all, in spite of his stature.
Torag Gill:
Contact: 1/25 = Poor
Power: 0/25 = Poor
Kestrel’s eldest son, Denton came to the plate next. Given his stocky build, I expected natural power off his bat. And, to my mind, he looked more like an actual baseball player to me than everyone we’d seen up to this point. My power prediction for him proved correct, which I was happy to see.
Denton Carkner:
Contact: 2/25 = Below Average
Power: 3/25 = Elite
“Nice job,” I said to Denton.
“Long way to go,” he said. “Wish I’d hit more pitches.”
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“We’ll work on it,” I said. “With training, you’ll get better.”
“Maybe,” Denton said.
“You will, I promise.”
With that bunch done in terms of hitting evaluation, Trevor allowed another familiar face in from the line up. It was the former athlete, Ulrich. If he made my 40 man roster, I had little doubt he’d be our oldest player. I wasn’t sure of his exact age, but he had to have at least ten years on me.
He looked good, and fairly natural with the bat in his hands though. His movements were lithe. I could see he had no tension through his shoulders. Athletic competition was nothing new to the man.
His tan, leathery skin crinkled at the corners of his eyes while he waited for my first pitch. My wish for him was that he’d do well, partly because I’d imagined he could be a leader in the club house, and partly because he’d look good in the uniform.
Ulrich Farrowhill:
Contact: 1/25 = Poor
Power: 1/25 = Average
His output was a bit of a disappointment, but I had an entire line up of potentials waiting to be seen, so he still had a chance of making the roster.
He scowled though, as he left the field. The old panther glided off, his shoulders down. I could tell he was disappointed in himself. Time catches up with us all. And, in fairness, the man had never played baseball in his life.
Credit to Trevor, we progressed through everyone lined up outside the ball park with great efficiency.
I traded pitching duties back and forth with Proctor so we didn’t exhaust our arms completely prior to the throwing assessments. I had the idea as well, to do the fielding, and running speed evaluations prior to the throwing and arm strength drills, just to give us both a bit of extra time to recover as much as we could.
It took a while to churn through all of the hitting assessments, but we eventually got there. Then I circled back to my friends to evaluate their fielding skills, one by one.
Just as it’d been for hitting, Proctor went first.
He opted to wear a catcher’s mitt to start his assessment. For anyone unfamiliar, a catcher’s mitt looks quite different from a regular, standard baseball glove. To me, it resembled a clam shell when I’d see major league catchers wear them while crouched behind home plate. When held open, you could see the palm of the glove has thick padding along its top and bottom. You’d want that extra cushioning when receiving hard pitches from the mound.
But, to me it always looked like a trade off, because with all that extra padding in the palm of the glove, it also appeared to make it trickier to field balls popped up in the air, or on regular throws from other players. That extra padding would mean you’d have to be more accurate with the positioning of your glove to ensure you’d receive the ball cleanly, without it hitting the edge of your glove, and you dropping the thing.
More of a margin for error, I suppose, is what I’m getting at.
I think Proctor felt the same, and so he wanted to get catcher’s mitt fielding plays done first, before moving on to using a regular glove which has a more forgiving (as in, larger) palm area.
So, Proctor took up a position with his catcher’s mitt on his right hand (he threw with his left hand, which was a completely foreign concept to me) standing near home plate. And, I had Denton stand with a pile of baseballs in shallow center field.
Denton would throw as many balls to Proctor stationed at home as possible until I had ten decent enough throws (i.e. in close enough proximity, and at a reasonable height) to Proctor that I could properly assess his fielding ability with that particular type of ball glove.
Aannnnddd… yeah, it didn’t go great for my friend Proctor when it came to the catcher’s mitt. He dropped the first five decent balls thrown to him by Denton. He caught the following five, but I think he made it clear he wasn’t going to be the Moonlight Magic’s starting catcher.
“Not my best,” Proctor said. “I do apologize.”
“You have nothing to be sorry for,” I said. “So, you weren’t cut out to be a bat catcher… just wait until you see how I do. I’m not confident.”
“Couldn’t do much worse, could you?” Proctor said.
I didn’t want to admit it, but his fielding was pretty awful.
Proctor Smythe:
Fielding: 50% = Poor
Nerves gripped my stomach, as my turn came around. I wanted to get the catcher’s mitt stuff over with first as well, so I did those drills right away.
We changed throwers too, and I had Dillard throw balls toward me enough times to make a proper evaluation. Proctor watched to keep me honest.
Yes, I was every bit as bad with the catcher’s mitt as Proctor. I only caught half of the balls thrown to me with the bloody thing on my hand. But, I did improve slightly on other plays, which included pop ups in the infield, catches at first base from shortstop, ground balls to shortstop, and fly balls into the outfield.
Still, I didn’t do great. As a team we were not off to a good start, fielding wise.
Adam Bridger:
Fielding: 60% = Below Average
Dillard turned out to be much more of a natural. He made both Proctor and I look like amateurs. I was shocked.
Dillard Coal:
Fielding: 80% = Above Average
Here’s how the rest of the fielding evaluation broke down for the other familiar faces on the team.
Denton Carkner:
Fielding: 70% = Average
Gak Bar:
Fielding: 70% = Average
Torag Gill:
Fielding: 40% = Poor
Ulrich Farrowhill:
Fielding: 60% = Below Average
Jorn Quallon:
Fielding: 90% = Above Average
Jeremiah Quallon:
Fielding: 70% = Average
Jux Quallon:
Fielding: 70% = Average
Winding our way through all of these guys to evaluate their playing ability got my competitive juices flowing. I regretted being one of the first to go through both the hitting and fielding assessments, because seeing how people were doing after I was done, I was gaining insights into how they went about approaching the drills.
Being the franchise owner, I suppose I could’ve called for a ‘do over’, and not count my first attempts, but I wasn’t trying to cause a mutiny either. Fair is fair, but I hated that the Quallons were better than me at fielding the stupid ball.
More than that, I resented having to look at their stupid faces. Amazing how being violently assaulted, and kidnapped by certain people will cause you to kinda, sorta loathe them to the very core of their being.
What would the System do to me if I cut them from the team… just like that? You’re cut, get lost, and don’t come back. Ever.
Or, what would our alien over lords do if I just so happened to, say, brutally murder all three Quallons with a baseball bat right then and there for all the crowd to see?
A huge part of me was eager to find out.
These hoodlums and their half way decent fielding skills. Get out of here.
“Hey,” Proctor called over to me, and broke me out of my trance. “You looked like you were on another planet for a second. What are you thinking about?”
“Uh, you may not want to know.”