Being a scorer for the\u00c2\u00a0Croydon Pirates -\u00c2\u00a0a team that sometimes struggles to get nine players to the ground in time for first pitch after a heavy session the night before -\u00c2\u00a0I have developed the specialist, and possibly unique, role of “pinch-filler”. In this role my job is to keep a spot in the line-up\u00c2\u00a0open for the\u00c2\u00a0ninth\u00c2\u00a0Pirate to show up. Since I typically end up in right field and bat ninth, it’s fitting that my roster number is 99.<\/p>\n
I have no problem with this, though, as I am\u00c2\u00a0happier\u00c2\u00a0holding\u00c2\u00a0pencil and paper\u00c2\u00a0than a bat.\u00c2\u00a0My high point as a player was my 1.000 batting average in 2008 (from\u00c2\u00a0one at-bat on a hit aided by a beautiful\u00c2\u00a0infield bobble). My low point was the seven-man infield that I faced in a tournament in The Netherlands, once the\u00c2\u00a0opposition\u00c2\u00a0realized that I would not get the ball out of the infield in a month of Sundays (I use this expression because the week’s right bookend is the British day of baseball).<\/p>\n
It is against this background that I was able to sympathize with a Mr Houghton, whose story I was relayed by John Thomas, a good friend of mine who played for the Liverpool Tigers in the 1960s. The story’s subject turned up to watch a Tigers game and asked John if he could play a bit of catch as he had never held a baseball before. John pressed the ball into his hand and they moved a few steps apart. The unfortunate Mr\u00c2\u00a0Houghton wound up to throw the ball but did not release it when his arm was perpendicular to the ground, or even when it was parallel. Instead he managed to throw it straight at his foot, breaking a toe in the process.<\/p>\n
It was not long after that Mr\u00c2\u00a0Houghton\u00c2\u00a0learned about the slightly\u00c2\u00a0less hazardous position of the scorer. The silver lining to his purple and blue toe was the beauty of the scoresheets that he constructed. I am very happy to say that John\u00c2\u00a0kept a scoresheet he was given by Mr\u00c2\u00a0Houghton from the 1962 national final, a game in which the Tigers beat the East Hull Aces 8-3.<\/p>\n
The scoresheet can be\u00c2\u00a0downloaded as a\u00c2\u00a0JPEG image file through the link below. Note that the route round the bases is\u00c2\u00a0rotated\u00c2\u00a090 degrees anti-clockwise compared with the standard configuration (the batter’s advancement to first, for example, is recorded in the bottom left rather than the bottom right).<\/p>\n