More on the Catch

Saturday morning Will was miffed that he and MC wouldn’t make batting practice. It was her 18th birthday, and he wanted to catch a ball. He likes to catch them barehanded, but he wanted to make sure he got one, so he took his glove. Since they’d be arriving too late to get the dollar tickets, he bought two seats in the left field bleachers.

I was watching the game while folding clothes, paying more attention to Bryce Harper and Strassburg, and when the Braves were batting. I was in the room when Danny Espinosa hit the 3-run home run. After he hit it I continued folding clothes, as opposed to watching him run the bases…that play was over to me.

Later I noticed a text from Will, that he had caught the HR. I looked out for replays, but I couldn’t see much the two times they showed it. Near the end of the game I looked on MLB.com and found the video. Will and MC found it as well, on her iPhone.  

About that time Harper sliced a line drive home run just over the left field fence, near where Will was sitting, but into the area between the fence and the stands. Later Will told me he had taken his cup and rope device to the game. He took it down and was close to securing the ball. Since it was Harper’s third major league home run, years from now it could become quite valuable. Unfortunately, a stadium employee game along and grabbed the treasure, telling Will to sit back down.

Will and MC didn’t stick around for the post-game Scotty McCreary concert. After dinner at Wild Wing Café they came home. Will couldn’t stop watching the video over and over. Sunday he had another busy day: North Point, a teacher’s appreciation lunch, watching MC sing, bike riding, and Passion Church. Still, he found time to watch the video several more times.  

Monday he did yardwork, fixed the garage door, ran to Home Depot and back, hung hooks for the bikes, and attended a cookout…and watched the video more.

Tuesday I discovered a different photo of Will making the catch on AJC.com. The ball is in Will’s glove, and his face can be seen between all the outstretched arms. It’s amazing that in this day and age that this innocuous event could be captured by two different media…not unlike the recent unassisted triple play by the Sandy Springs six year old.