The Green Monster

My three-year old grandson has what I call 1-12 power. Any longtime Start-O-Matic player should know what I mean. Way, way back in the day, players with big power, low batting-average numbers received cards where the homeruns required you to get snake eyes or boxcars with two of three dice thrown; two dice are yellow, the other white. Long story short, it was hard to get 1-12 or 3-2 (and next to impossible roll 1-2, or three ones). Hence, 1-12 power. What this means in practical terms is that most times Leo will dink the ball off the tee or swing at and miss pitches thrown his way. But every once in a while, he rolls that 1-12 with his bat and lines the ball at your head or other places. Wednesday, he hit me in one of the other places. On Labor Day, he put the ball in our neighbor’s yard to the north, this with the tee just a few feet from the fence on the south, so the ball went a good 25 feet on the fly. He’s also cleared a six-foot fence at home. Interesting and encouraging. So, as I was trying to catch my breath after getting hit in that place, I mentioned that, one day, he might put a ball over the Green Monster. My bad, because right now Leo’s world is populated with werewolves and monsters. Luckily, the Sad Sox are visiting Fenway for a weekend series starting tonight. Mom or dad will show him that the only people who should fear this particular monster are lefthanded pitchers. Or anyone on the Sad Sox.