“Yes,” I said. “Kevin Mitchell did it in ’89 when he was with the Giants.” Then I did a little math in my head. “There have been over 100,000 games played in major league baseball. Anything that could possibly happen on a baseball almost certainly has.”
Usually I’m not good at prophecy, but the game that day demonstrated my words better than I could have imagined. In the bottom of the first inning, the Giants’ center fielder Gregor Blanco doubled and moved to third on a sacrifice. Buster Posey came to bat and lined another double to right field to score Blanco. A run appeared on the board behind center field, and we cheered what appeared to be a good start to the proceedings.
At that moment, Dodgers manager Don Mattingly came out of the dugout and said something to the umpires that made them to gather for a discussion. Then, shockingly, one of the umpires pumped his fist with the “out” sign. Posey argued briefly but soon walked back to the dugout. Blanco came back to third base, and the run came off the scoreboard. The crowd booed loudly.
“What happened?” Jillian asked.
“I think they batted out of order,” I said. “I’ve heard of this sort of thing, but I’ve never actually seen it.” I remembered I had a radio with earbuds in my backpack. I pulled it out and gave it to Jillian. “Here,” I said. “They should be explaining it about now.”
Jillian put a bud in her ear. “Boy, the signal comes in great.”
“Yeah,” I said. “It helps when the announcer is about a hundred feet away.”
It turned out that Giants manager Bruce Bochy had intended Posey to bat fourth instead of third and had handed out a lineup card to that effect. A new electronic board that the Giants had recently installed in the clubhouse, however, showed Posey batting third. A computer glitch, of all things.
Fortunately the Giants had Madison Bumgarner, their sole reliable starter this season, on the mound, and he restored order by retiring the Dodgers in the top of the second. The Giants scored three runs in the bottom of the inning, which turned out to be enough for the Giants to squeeze out their first victory in a week. The win felt good, but the best part of it all was that after that first inning, Jillian kept her eyes on the field and the bud in her ear for the rest of the game. She may be starting to feel what the magic is all about.
