[Pommpie]

Originally Posted by darkcloud4579

Well nonetheless, this was a great start and good work. You'll be back and we'll look forward to it when you do.

You're right!

As you can doubtlessly see, this story is not, in fact, dead.

You see, what happened was this: I'm an idiot. I thought that I kept my Out of the Park files on a different physical hard drive than the one I actually kept them on. When I formatted one of my hard drives, I said "oh snap" and bemoaned the fact that Pancho González, Adam Wallace, and Xiang-ling Xun were dead forever. Then, one fateful day, I noticed that the saved game file was there. Which was great. It made me happy. The actual text file containing the story wasn't, but that wasn't a huge deal. I didn't lose anything irreplaceable.

Things are a bit weird with it, mind you. For example, when I first opened it up in a Windows XP virtual machine I'm running on my Linux machine, half of the logos no longer appeared. Later, I opened it again the old-fashioned way, with OOTP running happily under Wine. The logos are now all there, but Facegen doesn't work. Previous generated faces show up as normal, but when a new one is generated it... isn't. You just end up with a blank background, as if the baseball world was populated entirely by the invisible. It's weird. I have no idea what's going on. If any of you have any tips, that would be appreciated, but I'm relucant to report it as a bug since running OOTP under Wine isn't exactly a supported configuration.

Still. There's story going on. So that's nice.

Chapter Nine: Chutes and Ladders

For a man of middling height and mediocre build, there was something about Bill Williams that made him seem larger than life. On a baseball field, anyway; if you ran into him hitting on your girlfriend at two in the morning on New Year's Day, more than one boyfriend wouldn't hesitate to give him a piece of his mind. But if, rather than going in the back alley and trading punches in the traditional manner Williams was to challenge the opposing party to a home run derby, there would be few who could accept his offer and win. Because by God, Bill Williams could rake, and everybody knew it.

Even the fans in Eugene, Oregon knew it. Pacific Bell Park was packed to the rafters when the Civics rolled in on May 1, 1998. They came not for Luis Reyes, Xiang-ling Xun, Pancho González, or any of the team's other stars. They certainly didn't come to watch journeyman pitcher Melvin Stewart getting the start for Edmonton. They came for the man who was making his Civics debut that night, the high-priced star who, in spite of missing the entire season thus far, had been slotted straight into centre field and fourth in the batting order, bumping Xiang-ling Xun to third and Pancho González, hitting .375 to date, down to sixth.

When Williams strode to the plate in the first inning, there was a chorus of boos from the Cranes faithful. Williams's career batting average against Eugene had been described by Cranes starter Doug Forrest as "like, .750 or something". Forrest was the Cranes' own big off-season pickup, coming into Eugene from the Japanese league, a veteran of 49 games with Arlington in the American Baseball Association and 79 at Japan's top level, only 30 years old, a deceptively strong right-hander who could throw six pitches for strikes. Seemingly the ideal starter to quiet the Civics' loud bats. The first inning, however, had gotten off to a bad start for him: after forcing Luis Reyes to fly out he had allowed a triple to Denny King and then walked Xiang-ling Xun on only five pitches. The sight of the slight but solid Williams gyrating his bat furiously in the batter's box was not a welcome one with runners on the corners, one out, and perhaps the fastest man in the United League aching for a fly ball on third.

Forrest stood on the mound, bend over at the waist, his right hand concealed in his glove in front of his chest, shifting the ball about in his grip, staring at Corey Schmitt's fingers as the signs came in. It was a fastball first, zipping slightly outside, Williams not budging as Forrest did his job against the best hitter in the United League. The next pitch was another fastball, clipping the high outside corner: a ball and a strike. Again, Williams did not stir, and this time the Cranes fans cheered their approval. Williams once again waggled his bat and Forrest once again stooped, his copper-red moustache twitching slightly in the May heat, maintaining a look of perfect concentration.

Doug Forrest was a veteran of high-level baseball, but he was new to the United League and had never faced Bill Williams even in exhibition. Reading scouting reports was great but it was no replacement for experience, and when Schmitt called for the curveball Forrest shook him off. The circle change was Forrest's favourite pitch in these situations: it had more movement on it than most players could expect and after a couple rapid fastballs it had thrown more than one batter off in time for the lethal curveball to finish them. Schmitt again insisted on the curve. Forrest again shook him off. The catcher hopped up and jogged to the mound, pulling his mask off with an irritated expression. Like Forrest, Corey Schmitt was a rookie to the United League, but he'd been kicking around the Cranes reserve list since he had been released by the Washington system in 1995 and had spent years learning from Eugene's excellent veteran catchers Wilfredo Delgado and Harry Steward, and he knew this league as well as anybody.

The pitcher and the catcher turned their backs to Bill Williams, holding their gloves in front of their faces and exchanging hurried, angry words. Xiang-ling Xun took a few steps off of first to try and listen in to the conversation, but it was futile: the gist, however, was obvious. When Schmitt jogged back behind home plate, his anger was obvious for that second before he pulled his mask down. The veteran shortstop, guessing what that meant, smiled.

Forrest reared back and threw. As the ball arced high over his head and he twisted about to watch it fly to right, he perhaps gained a small measure of respect for his young catcher, but he certainly learned a thing or two about Bill Williams. Deigning to return Denny King's excited high-five at home plate, Williams walked back towards the dugout, utterly expressionless, having given his new team a 3-0 lead with his first swing of the bat. The Eugene fans booed lustily.

Melvin Stewart allowed a two-run shot to Ernesto Cabral in the bottom of the inning, but the game had already effectively been decided. Forrest managed only two innings as Xiang-ling Xun took him deep for another three-run homer in the second and added a solo shot in the seventh off Manny Alvarez. Williams did not get a hit for the rest if the night but he didn't need one, and Stewart, Masamune Okawa, and Félix Vásquez combined for an effective nine innings as the Civics won 8-3 and took their fifth win in a row.

Williams hit another home run in the fifth inning of his third game back, a game in which the Civics saw their winning streak end at six with a 5-4 loss: Roberto Sánchez notched his first loss of the season when the Cranes won it with a bottom of the ninth single. But Williams was struggling during his return. In spite of his newly healed wrist, Kelsey Bowden ran Williams into centre field to start every game, batted him fourth every night, and never, ever substituted him out. The nadir came on May 6 against Port Angeles. Williams went 0-for-3 to drop his batting average to .211 and struggled in the outfield: he missed a catch on a Benton Jones home run that he should have had and his arm strength allowed two runs across the plate. To be fair to Williams, the Civics as a whole were horrible that night: they lost 17-0, with Melvin Stewart leaving after two innings but still outlasting Félix Vásquez, Masamune Okawa, and Roberto Sánchez who came after him. It took closer Dusty Gill, as the last representative of the team's bullpen, to throw three and a third despite allowing three earned runs.

The next night the defense clamped down and the Civics in fact outhit the Angels 10-7 with a five-to-three advantage in walks, but the Angels got their hits in bunches and overcame seven innings of Adam Wallace to win 4-3, with Williams committing another egregious (but ultimately irrelevant) error.

The Civics were, in short, back to their old selves from 1997: occasionally brilliant but always erratic, capable of putting up fifteen runs one night and allowing fifteen runs the next. Xiang-ling Xun boasted a .287 batting average and seven home runs and was the team's second-best batter: Pancho González was hitting well over .400. But Luis Reyes was struggling to get on base almost as badly as Denny King: King could muster only a .238 batting average, with even journeyman Michael White easily outplaying him in the ninth spot. There were simply not enough players getting on base for the Civics: the most obvious offender was Greg Hubbard, a man never known for batting average but who was still hitting an extraordinary .184 at third base. Jesse Cantrell's averages had all dropped fifty points from his previous season with the Pueblo Anchors.

On May 8, Roberto Espinoza took the ball against the Pueblo Anchors. El Stade Terrible in Pueblo was known as a hitter's park, but Espinoza had traditionally had success in supposedly hitter-friendly parks. Sure enough, he cruised through three one-hit innings with seven strikeouts. Opposing him, Dominican youngster Jaime Murillo matched him blow for blow, and through three innings it was a pitcher's duel all the way, with Murillo wavering only briefly to allow a single run. But rain was in the forecast, and as Espinoza threw in his warmup pitches at the bottom of the fourth, it came. The tarps were rolled out, and both teams retreated to the dugouts to wait out the delay, while the Pueblo fans fidgeted anxiously.

The rain delay lasted nearly an hour: a singularly unpleasant wait during a cold, damp Colorado evening. Espinoza fidgeted irritably in the dugout while the other Civics tried to keep themselves busy: Bill Williams sat aloofly in a corner and occasionally looked up irritably at the field, Pancho González started up an impromptu Texas hold-em game with Michael White, Greg Hubbard, and Xiang-ling Xun (who, in spite of his arrogance, was quite happy to take money from his teammates), various others chatted about baseball, women, and the relationship of women and baseball, and Kelsey Bowden stood on the centre step on the dugout, staring out into the rain as if willing the clouds to part.

When the pouring finally let up, Espinoza and his defense jogged out to retake the field against Men Virgolino and the Anchors. Virgolino led off the half-inning with a double, a hard liner roaring into right-centre before Bill Williams could chase it down. Espinoza cursed quietly, accepting the ball from Ángel García as He Liu came up, only to see Kelsey Bowden jogging out of the dugout.

"Jesus Christ," Espinoza murmured, hiding his blasphemy behind his glove. Exchanging a glance with his batterymate, García stood up and shrugged, pulling his mask out and jogging out to the hill to join the skipper and the pitcher. But as he ran, he noticed another figure coming to join them from the bullpen: Masamune Okawa was coming into the game, concealed behind Espinoza's shoulder as he looked out towards the approaching Kelsey Bowden.

"Okawa's coming," García cautioned Espinoza as he arrived on the mound before the chubby manager, perhaps hoping to calm the pitcher with some advance warning. It didn't work. The instant he heard his catcher's two words, Espinoza wheeled his gaze to Bowden, blue eyes buring with anger, his expression so furious that Bowden actually paused midstep, teetering on the edge of a precipice for a moment before stepping up to the side of the mound and giving his pitcher a pat on the rear.

"Did well tonight, Robbie," Bowden murmured, eyes slightly downcast, but Espinoza's anger was not dissolved by Bowden's compliment. "Three innings, skip! Jesus Christ! What are you doing?" His voice went up an octave, bewilderedly glaring down at his boss, while Ángel García stood a step aside and rubbed the bridge of his nose wearily.

"With the rain delay and all, if you're struggling a bit..."

"I let out one hit!"

"...they've got some good batters coming up and I'd rather get somebody fresh out there. You're probably stiffening up." Another pat on the rear, this one more forcefully, pushing Espinoza off the mound as Okawa stepped up, pulling off his cap to wipe his forehead with his sleeve. García returned to his spot behind the plate, but not without sparing a glance backwards towards the still-reluctant Espinoza.

"What the hell?" he murmured under his breath before setting himself for Okawa's warmup tosses.

Four pitches later, He Liu drove Virgolino home on a ground-ball single getting between González and White. Mario Durán legged out an infield hit to Greg Hubbard, Manuel Ruíz doubled (scoring Liu), David Bowers ground out to short (scoring Duran), and, at last, Okawa struck out Aaron Miller to make it two out and potentially escape a jam without further damage.

Naturally, Kelsey Bowden returned to the mound. Having pulled his starter after three innings, Bowden pulled his long reliever after two-thirds, and Roberto Sánchez came in to retire the side.

"Smart move," Espinoza muttered derisively from the bench. If Bowden heard it, he didn't react.

In the top of the sixth, Pancho González struck a two-run home run, his third long fly of the season, to tie the game. But in the bottom of the inning Sánchez flinched just long enough to allow the Anchors to retake the lead. It took until the eighth inning for the Civics to take their first lead of the game: Diego Guzmán made the mistake of allowing a single to the speedy Denny King to lead off the inning. Worse, a balk to Xiang-ling Xun moved King to second, but Xun's double made the balk moot as he hit the ball hard enough to score Denny King from first base in a different stadium and tied the game. His always-erratic control shakier than usual, Guzmán intentionally walked Bill Williams to get to Jesse Cantrell (popped out) and Pancho González (ground out, though he moved the runners). With two out and runners in scoring position, Guzmán walked Ángel García, bringing up Greg Hubbard and his batting average a healthy distance below the Mendoza line.

Inevitably, Guzmán allowed Hubbard to single.

Less inevitably, the ball was bobbled out in centre. Hubbard chugged his way to second while both Xun and Williams crossed the plate, giving the Civics a two-run lead. In the bottom of the inning, Roberto Sánchez came into his fourth inning of the night and returned the favour: a firm hit from Mario Durán ricocheted off Sánchez's glove and Men Virgolino had scored before Sánchez could recover.

The top of the ninth, however, ended all suspense. Once again, Denny King began proceedings by getting aboard, only this time a steal rather than a balk moved him to second. Once again, though, Xiang-ling Xun rendered King's skill on the basepaths moot, this time by hitting a ball ridiculously hard to centre field, clearing the deep wall at El Stade Terrible by a dozen feet. Another walk to Bill Williams (this time unintentional) put him aboard, a Pancho González single moved him to third, and left-hander Scott Deakin came in to pinch-hit for Ángel García.

Kelsey Bowden had endured a mixed night, but this move was the right one: Deakin hit a triple, clearing the bases and putting himself in prime scoring position. A Michael White double scored Deakin and Greg Hubbard (who had walked in the interim), giving the Civics a six-run inning and a sure easy win.

In the bottom of the inning, four consecutive hits scored two runners. Félix Vásquez, trying to close the game out, allowed three of those hits and followed it up with a three-run home run off the bat of the dangerous Virgolino. All of a sudden, the tying run was on deck. Fortunately for the Civics, He Liu struck out and Mario Durán grounded out to first, and Edmonton ended up with a rollicking 12-10 win.

Both Edmonton and Pueblo had torn up their bullpens in the contest, so with the unremarkable William Lafontaine facing the 0-3 Luis Castillo, another high-scoring night seemed likely the next day. But, with the weather equally terrible, both pitchers came to play, and a Xiang-ling Xun solo shot in the fifth proved the winning margin as the Civics took a 2-1 victory. Lafontaine and Castillo both pitched complete games: in Lafontaine's case, he allowed six hits and five runs against only three strikeouts, but in 143 pitches he managed to allow only a single run.

"Figures," Roberto Espinoza had murmured from the bullpen as Lafontaine laboured into the eighth. "Now he leaves somebody in." The Montrealer picked up his second career complete game in remarkably inept but successful style.

The pair of victories had the Civics back in the division chase with a shout.

The highlight of the month, however, was yet to come. On the 19th, the Civics went into Smuckers Field in Trail to take on the Smelters. William LaFontaine would start against veteran Luis Vela, and neither would end up the highlight of the night. The Civics would lose 7-6, but this wasn't the story either. The story began in the top of the second inning. Bill Williams and Jesse Cantrell had hit back-to-back singles to lead off the inning, and a Pancho González strikeout had sent Ángel García to the plate with runners on first and third. On a 2-2 pitch, the catcher reared back, swung, and struck a mighty ball into left field.

Scouts often said that Ángel García was "fast for a catcher". What this means in baseballese is that García is capable of outrunning a snail provided he's allowed to overrun the base. But when the deep fly ball ricocheted off the left field wall on the hop, García turned on what passed for the gas. By the time Williams and Cantrell had scored, García was still chugging, and the ball flew in, and flew in late. The third baseman swiped to apply the tag but was far too late: Ángel García, of all people, had a two-RBI triple.

"That's the goddamned stuff!" Pancho González had roared from the dugout, joining many of his teammates against the rail as they roared their approval. From third, García tipped his helmet: he had posted a triple in his rookie season with Pueblo as well but he was no extra-base hitter by trade, and even as he grinned widely his shoulders heaved with his small 23-year-old's efforts to catch his breath. When Michael White singled García home he was met at the top of the dugout by his comrades, and even the often sullen catcher couldn't hide his excitement. "I really hit that thing!" García exhulted to nobody in particular with a grin. "Wow, did I hit it! If I got under it a bit more that could have been two home runs!"

"You'll have to get under it next time," Bill Williams muttered from the bench, glancing at the celebration with an irritated look in his eye. The celebration when he scored had been far more subdued.

Unfortunately, García didn't get under the next one, slapping out a rather mundane single in the fourth inning. In the top of the sixth, however, the middle of the order came up again.

Bill Williams led things off by taking two balls. In his typical way, he looked bored and inattentive, almost as if he was trying to figure out how much he'd be getting paid per hour if he could just strike out looking as quickly as possible and head back to the dugout. And, as usual, when Luis Vela found himself slightly lulled and tried to buzz in a cutter, Williams pounded it to left, hitting a solo home run and jogging around the base.

Jesse Cantrell struck out, but after watching a single strike buzz past him Pancho González stroked a long fly of his own, this one sneaking over the wall in left. Once again González did the jog around the basepaths, and as Ángel García strode to the plate the Smelters went to the bullpen, bringing in 25-year-old right-hander and United League rookie Rex 'The Eye' Wade. As Wade came towards the mound, Pancho paused at the plate and offered the young catcher some of his typically useful advice.

"They're scared of you, Ángel!" González declared, thumping the catcher on the back hard enough to knock him forward slightly. "Bill and I got these bastards primed for you, so don't let us down!"

He didn't. The ball barely cleared the glove of the leaping Ken Stout in left but it cleared it: another solo home run, a 6-1 Civics lead, and as García trotted around the bases the bench high-fived both each other and the catcher as, with a grin even wider than the one which followed his triple, ran down the stairs and touched gloves with everybody willing (even Xiang-ling Xun stood up to get in on the congratulation).

"You're a double away from the cycle, you know," Williams said acerbicly. Everybody ignored him.

The double was, perhaps, inevitable. In the top of the eighth with two out and nobody on, García launched a line drive into left field. The ball was well-hit: the sort of ball that would normally have a catcher playing it safe and stopping at first. But with history on the line García didn't so much as slow down as he rounded first, churning up a cloud of dust as he relatively flew down the basepaths, his teammates cheering him on the whole way, and when the throw came in late they burst up in celebration. The catcher had hit for the cycle. The catcher. The first catcher ever to do it, only the second non-outfielder in United League history, the fourth Civic overall and the first since Ethan Little in 1995 and, as it would turn out, also the first catcher to hit for the cycle in a game his team lost.

The Civics pitching simply collapsed. The mediocre William LaFontaine turned in another respectable start, throwing seven strong innings while only allowing four hits, two walks, and a single run, striking out four in the process. But when LaFontaine left the game, Masamume Okawa set a record for futility that was impressive even by his standards. Failing to get a single out, Okawa allowed four hits and four earned runs in the bottom of the eighth. Roberto Sánchez was normally reliable but the reliever had already thrown an immense number of innings in May: another multi-inning game proved beyond him. A two-run walk-off home run by Bob Lloyd ended the game with Vásquez only a single out away from victory, and the Trails walked out happy. In spite of the sombre defeat, Pancho González insist that the Civics treat Ángel García to a night of drinking to celebrate his unprecedented feat: a 15-8 loss in the second game of their series with Trail was their reward.

The Civics may have been struggling with their pitching (Mark Stewart failed to get out of the second inning against Trail, Masamune Okawa's ERA was over 7, and only Adam Wallace, Roberto Espinoza, and Dusty Gill were proving in any way reliable), but their bats were making up for it. Pancho González, a year removed from his worst season as a Civic, was having a career year: his pace was down but he was still hitting a blistering .404 and, in the loss to Trail, he hit safely for his twenty-sixth consecutive game. Xiang-ling Xun was on fourteen home runs, leading the United League. Though his cycle the previous night was the highlight of his season so far, Ángel García was hitting over .300 with decent power numbers and was putting in one of the league's best offensive seasons for a catcher.

Most importantly, Bill Williams was finally coming on. In the previous series against Boise, Williams had mustered nine hits on twelve at-bats with three home runs. Another three homers came in the Trail series, and on the twenty-second against Salem Williams hit two long balls, giving him a four-game home run streak and home runs in nine of his last eleven games. His batting average was now hovering around the .350 mark, and in spite of his late start he was second on the Civics in home runs and gaining fast.

The tone between the team's two top sluggers was not civil. Xiang-ling Xun and Bill Williams disliked each other, and had done so from day one. Perhaps it was inevitable that the flashy, arrogant outfielder and the isolated, quiet shortstop would clash, but when the former was trying to usurp the position of the latter as the team's home run king, their disagreements took on a different tone. In the last game of their series against Trail, for example, the two let their grievances become public.

It was the top of the eighth inning, and the Civics held a 2-0 lead. Adam Wallace was pitching a gem for the Civics: he had walked two and allowed two hits to that point while striking out eight. Milo Sellers had gotten the start and did not do badly on the hill for the Smelters, but as usual, the combined force of Xiang-ling Xun and Bill Williams was too much for him: both players had solo home runs, and Xun was leading off the eighth.

By this point, Sellers had given way to Trail's young reliever Jim Sutton, an erratic thrower with control problems, the sort of player United League teams had been padding out their rosters with since the beginning of time. Facing Xiang-ling Xun for the first time in his career, Sutton's control was just as bad as usual, and when combined with a natural desire to pitch around Xun and the shortstop's patience at the plate, Xun drew an easy five-pitch walk to bring up Williams.

When Williams strode into the box, he swung his bat with the cocksure assurance of the accustomed United League superstar. Sutton wavered slightly on the hill, and Williams grinned. More than one rookie had been ground into the dust by the bat of Bill Williams in these situations, and as if sensing the outfielder's attention, Xiang-ling Xun's voice came in from first. "Nobody out. Move the runner. Get an insurance run." Williams didn't so much as acknowledge Xun, and when the first pitch came in, Williams took a mighty cut.

Too mighty. The ball didn't duck where Williams expected it to duck, and Bill Williams hit a harmless pop fly: deep as hell, but the Trails would face no peril. Centre fielder Fernando Vásquez got under it and retired Williams. Jesse Cantrell and Pancho González followed him back to the dugout and Xiang-ling Xun was stranded on first when the top of the inning concluded.

Xun jogged back to the dugout to get his glove as he prepared to go out on defense for the bottom of the inning. As he did so, he glared up balefully at Bill Williams, pulling off his batting helmet a little too quickly. "Next time you're in that situation," Xun said, voice acidic, "just try to get it into the outfield. A 3-0 lead is a lot safer than a 2-0 lead."

"And a 4-0 lead is safer still," Williams snapped back, looking back at the shortstop and returning every ounce of the hatred in his eyes. "I get paid to hit home runs. I'm going to hit home runs. And if you don't like being the second-best slugger on the team, you can go to hell." With that, Williams turned about and jogged out of the dugout, as if intending to put an end to that argument right there.

Unfortunately, Xiang-ling Xun was just fine with yelling at somebody's back. "Are you here to play baseball or cash a goddamned cheque?" Xun yelled loudly enough that even some of the Trail fans looked uncomfortable, and Kelsey Bowden looked outright mortified.

"Get the hell out of my face!" Williams yelled, though he was by this point practically at the warning track and, compared to Xiang-ling Xun, his face might as well be in Siberia.

Both players were clearly frustrated: when Joe Whitfield hit a harmless grounder to Xun in the bottom of the eighth, the shortstop scooped it easily and with all the anger he could muster sent a rocket to Pancho González at first, nearly decapitating the large first baseman with a perfect strike and beating the slow Whitfield by about a million miles.

"Jesus Christ!" the normally unflappable González yelled in alarm, twisting his face out of the way but somehow managing to glove the fastball and retire Whitfield. "Ease up, Xiang-ling!"

For the first and last time in his baseball career, Xiang-ling Xun looked very slightly contrite. "Sorry, Pancho!" he called, causing González to look even more frightened than he had when facing imminent death by baseball. In centre field, Bill Williams grinned widely, but he had nothing to grin about: when Jorge Tejada hit a sure-fire single to Williams in the bottom of the ninth Williams turned on the jets towards the shallow arc of the ball. The ball was clearly fated to bounce in front of Williams, but the centre-fielder, adrenalin still pumping from his earlier altercation, clearly had something else on his mind.

"For the love of..." Kelsey Bowden murmured from the dugout stair, burying his head in his hand.

Williams leapt for the ball, diving with the reckless enthusiasm of a motorcycle stunt driver. The ball bounced in front of him, flew over him, and seemed headed for the outfield wall. Luckily, Luis Reyes had been paying attention: he soon got to the ball in Williams's wake and fired it into second in time to prevent extra bases.

Stooping to help Williams up, Reyes smiled at him, politely. He was a veteran and had been around seemingly every league in existance at some point in his baseball career, so his words carried the weight of his years. Patting his fellow outfielder on the back, Reyes said in a friendly voice, "If you try that sort of thing again, I will actually murder you." Then he returned to left field.

The Civics held onto that 2-0 lead: Adam Wallace went eight and two-thirds before allowing a pair of runners in the bottom of the ninth, but Dusty Gill came in and got the save with a single well-thrown pitch. After the game, even Kelsey Bowden felt obliged to say something - anything - about the confrontation between his two stars.

"If you two have a problem with each other, fight on your own time," Bowden declared to the duo, having sequestered them in the locker room after the game. "Don't let it get onto the baseball field, and if I see any of that... that bologna again, you're both suspended for a week." The motivational power of the skipper's speech was somewhat lost by his constant stuttering and stammering and the fact that his voice positively dripped with worry that he would, at some point, have to suspend his two best players for a week. None of the three parties left that locker room happy.

Events continued to unfold on the field. Pancho González's hitting streak ended that night: at twenty-six games, the longest in Civics history and the longest in the United League since 1995, and when the Civics returned home to face the Salem Bingoes at AGT Field, González got a nice ovation for his feat. However, the series went against Edmonton, as the Bingoes swept them at their own park to give the lead in the North Division to Boise. And the Billings Barnstormers were coming to town: for the first time, Bill Williams would face his old club.

The series began on May 26 at AGT Field. Perhaps rattled by meeting his former comrades, Williams struggled at the plate, going 0-for-4. Adam Wallace, starting the game for the Civics, walked four batters and thus allowed Julián González to score on a sacrifice fly in the fourth. But, when his control was on, he was unhittable.

Literally.

The Civics took a 6-1 victory over the Barnstormers to open their series, and Adam Wallace was the star of the night with his first career no-hitter at any level. The no-no was the first in the United League since 1995 (a good year for milestones) and the first by a Civic since May of that year when Zhong-qi Phan turned the trick. No pitcher in the history of the United League had ever thrown a perfect game but Wallace's no-hitter was the tenth in league history: his four bases on balls were actually fairly typical for a United League no-hitter. In 1985, Matt Pace in fact walked seven in his.

"I guess the United League's just not that good," said Wallace philosophically when a reporter informed him of this fact in the post-game interviews. His mood was almost completely unaltered from his usual calm, glib, and blunt manner. Though the Civics lost the next night (as they always seemed to after one of the players achieved something, although nobody was fond enough of Adam Wallace to take him out for drinks), William LaFontaine kept up his bizarrely successful season the night after. LaFontaine pitched eight innings and got plenty of run support thanks to two home runs from Greg Hubbard and one each from Pancho González, Luis Reyes, and Bill Williams. Being William LaFontaine, he still allowed five runs (and his successor, Masamune Okawa, allowed four in two-thirds of an inning), but the Civics won 13-9. In an exceptional achievement, Billings starter Stewart Horton went a third of an inning, walked three, allowed two hits (one of which was González's homer) and five earned runs, threw twenty-five pitches and got tagged with the loss.

The Civic's erratic play continued the next night, when they lost 9-5 in Eugene. But in the last game of the month they won 5-4: Adam Wallace, Roberto Sánchez, Félix Vásquez, and Dusty Gill combined to hold off the powerful Cranes offense by the skin of their teeth, and a two-run Bill Williams home run in the seventh provided the margin of victory. The win kept the Civics in the hunt for the division title after a 13-13 month, but there was work to be done. The Idahoes remained at the top of the North Division and the Trail Smelters were in the thick of it. Only the Billings Barnstormers were out of the race for the moment, following up an excellent 1997 with a spiral into oblivion in 1998. But with the strength of their division, the Civics would need a big month to take the lead.

Coming up: Chapter Ten: Old Time Rock and Roll