Quin starts working with the pitchers

He had just finished making his resolution when he tuned back into Jack’s speech in time to hear, “OK, I’m going to hit infield. Wilson I want you to hit flies in left, and pitchers you go with Coach Holsten over to right and to the visitors’ pen. Coach Holsten, Draver will go with you and catch. I’d like you to work with Mullen first. All right, any questions. OK good let’s go hustle to your spots.”
By now Quin’s head was positively swimming, but he managed to get his bearings and jog somewhat confidently to right field, where seven pitchers and the catcher Draver gathered around him with curious looks.

“Well,” Quin “began hesitantly, Coach Preston is quite a speech maker, I ought to have him come in and give a pep-talk about lit-ur- a- chure.” Even though it was crummy humor the pitchers all chuckled a little bit, and Quin relaxed a little bit. Preston’s speech had somewhat altered the way the players viewed the literature Prof. He had no clue where to begin so he went with the first thing that popped into his head, “Categorize them.”

“OK let’s have you separate into relievers and starters if you know that yet – if you’re not sure, you’re a reliever for now, relievers on my left and starters on my right.”

Having, thus organized them, he went around quickly and had them give him their names. He quickly readjusted to a world where everyone went by last names. He then got them going on the first pitching drill that popped into his head from his Stanford days.

Once they were sufficiently into the drill he asked the catcher Draver, “OK who were we supposed to work out?”

Draver who looked like a catcher responded, “Mullens, Coach.”

“Is he any good?” Quin asked conversationally.

“He throws bullets, but he’s wild, and has no off-speed pitch.”

Quin instantly liked Draver. He was obviously a student of the game. “OK we’ll see what we can do,” Quin said in his best, I know exactly how to fix that voice, as if he were a mechanic who had just diagnosed a dead battery. “Which one is he?”

“The tall skinny kid.”

Quin looked at the kid who had been watching him intensely as Jack had given his speech. He knew he was in one of his classes and sat somewhere near the front and to the right. He watched him work through the drill. He could tell that the kid was being careful to follow his instructions, but that the motions of the drill were awkward to him. The drill would not have been awkward for anyone who had been well coached in pitching. It meant that the kid had mostly been poorly coached or he had coached himself. However, he was not the only one looking awkward, there were others who looked equally uncomfortable. “These kids don’t have a clue.” Quin thought.

“OK Mullens head over to the pen and get loose.” The kid instantly sprinted towards the mound of the visitor’s bullpen. Quin started the rest of the pitchers on a different drill, the second one that had popped into his head. As he made sure the other kids knew what they were doing he casually observed the skinny kid starting to warm-up. His delivery was a one – of – a – kind amalgamation of about everything wrong to do in a pitching delivery. Once Quin was sufficiently sure that the other kids grasped the essence of the drill, he casually walked towards the bullpen.

When he was about fifteen feet from the mound he said, “OK, you warm yet Mullen.”

The kid turned and faced him and smiled broadly. “Yes sir, I am Coach.” He paused and kept smiling, but there was a dark brooding intensity around his blue eyes. “I want to say Coach that it will be an honor to work with you. I think your lecture on the first day of class was the most eloquent and passionate talk I’ve heard outside of church. You must really love what you do.”