batting practice

Monday night at bedtime Matthew had been rattling off the birthdays of the Braves players and coaches. He gets the game program and pours over it for hours, like I did as a kid. Went to the Braves game last night. Not too crowded, since it was a school night, not many early arrivals for batting practice. Jim Brower threw Will a ball not long after we got there. Later Jeff Francoeur had a ball, but had to pick between Will and another boy. Francoeur asked who knew when his birthday was. Matthew was seated there on the front row, of course pouring over his new program. I pointed to Matthew and told Francoeur that he knew, but naturally Matthew was speechless at that moment. Francoeur tossed the ball to Matthew, who almost caught it on his own. Not long after that Francoeur threw a ball to Will. When the Phillies came out, Jon Leiber tossed me a ball for Matthew. Later he threw a ball to a guy standing way up near the big Coke bottle...the guy made a nice catch. We weren't there begging the players for balls (well, maybe Will), but it just worked out that we got a bunch. A couple of batted balls came close, but I wasn't fighting through people for them. One of the balls was marked 'practice'...had never seen that before. Tried to get Matthew to go do other stuff before the game, but he wanted to sit there during BP, though he'd just sit there and study the program. When the game started, though, Matthew stayed focused on the game. Says one of the boring parts of the game is the 7th inning stretch. Will was trying to break 60 mph on the radar gun, then Matthew wanted to try, and he whizzed some 29 mph pitches. We were going to sit near Francoeur's Franks, but they didn't show. Two things I noticed in relation to the big hi-def screen. In the tough situation, Sosa had Jimmy Rollins down 0-2. They flashed on the board that Rollins was batting .333 against Sosa. This seemed to invigorate Rollins, hanging tough, hitting one HR distance, barely foul. Later Francoeur came up, and there was a live shot of him taking his stance. I noticed some hair out of place, just above his sideburn. He seemed to notice it as well, as he discretely brushed his hair away from his face. Of course, it may just be me. No comment on the wild west night, but the western photos seemed to be computer generated. Will’s been putting the balls up on that shelf that Chris Freund helped make. It’s his room, but I thought it should be only special or autographed balls. Last night I was thinking that maybe some could be put away, or even into my bucket we use when me and Will go out (most of those balls had been wet and are dead). But when we got home there was Will, making space on the shelf. The ball Leiber threw was in real good shape…white, one little mark. I took it to work, for my desk.