The Rookie

"It's your turn, Coach," fills the room with thick anticipation, like smog swirling around a morning full of cool sunshine. The palm of his hand creates the perfect cup for the baseball, its dirt-caked and leather-torn sphere. His head nods, almost at a loss for words, almost at ends with himself.

He's nearly thirty-five now, a science teacher, a baseball coach, and nothing really looks as far away as the dreams he once had as a kid-to pitch in the major leagues.

Radar guns span the stretch from the pitcher's mound to dusty home plate, where the catcher sits almost stunned.

"Whenever you're ready," the scouts breathe, questioning this "old-timer".

Thoughts of his childhood gallop through his mind-his father's disappointment, how life wasn't all that it was cut out to be . . . well, in terms of dreams, anyway. His father had been hampered from signing with the Mets just weeks before his turn to shine, so it was hard being the one in a position that just happened to call for vicarious pushes and shoves by his father. But, this was different-this was Jim's dream.

Jim touches the brim of his tested ball cap, kicking up the dirt from the mound. Breathing now, the catcher's mitt doesn't look so far . . . away. Smack! It hits.

95 MPH

Reads the radar gun. Truth is, the scouts have to shake and prod the guns to make the skyrocket of a velocity read!

Smiles brims across the spectator's faces as Jim reaches for another strike. Smack!

"Jimmy Morris, I'd like to talk to you about playing for us . . . what you threw out there was amazing." Phone calls roll in like clouds before a storm.

Woosh, and the wind takes this thirty-five year old father to the minors.

And then, he reaches the moment-racing out onto a field of blinding green grass and immaculate lines of white. The field never looked so big and grand, gleaming in the ivory lights overhead.

Two seasons of this dream flew by, and Jim returns to Texas, growing along with his proud family.

When asked about "just two seasons?", Jim replies with a hearty smile and a gleam in his eye that says more than, "I wanted to be home with my kids and see their dreams come to fruition. I want them to be kids-to have a childhood because I really never had one."

A far reach from the thirty-five year old science teacher . . . but Jim Morris sure reached for the sunny sky and met it with a golden glove of opportunity and a little smile from a few dreaming angels.

When a movie stirred to recreate the dreams of his past and his future, Jim smiled and said:

"I don't know if I want anybody to walk away from the movie thinking about me specifically. I do want them to walk away asking themselves, 'Well, if I get a second opportunity at something, I should walk through that door.'"

- Jimmy Morris

---Quotes taken from The Rookie---