I've often thought about writing a short story about "The Walk Off". I hit so many in my career that it would have to be a 10 volume epic. Not really. I can count the number of walk off game winning home runs I have hit in my life on one hand. This story in particular is the best one I have ever seen, because I was there and heard it. One time in junior high I scored 6 points in the last 15 seconds of a tournament to bring home the victory the emotion and excitement was about the same. So I hope you enjoy this one. People close to me have encouraged me to write more and this is my plight to do more to let people into my pretty quite life.
THE WALK OFF by Greg Shepard
It was another humid night in the South Atlantic League. Greensboro Bats (New York Yankees) and Hickory Crawdads (Chicago White Sox) were playing at L.P Franz Stadium in Hickory, NC. Greensboro had many good players like Nick Johnson, who was an 18 year old giant out of Northern California. Donnie Leon a great third basemen and many others. Tonight the Bats had a hard throwing right hander that was dominating us. We managed two runs in eight and a two thirds innings. Our starter had manage to hold a very good hitting squad to only 3 runs. It was a just a solid pitching and defensive night. This Hickory team was no push over. It was one of the best teams I ever played on and the core of this team went to Winston Salem the next year and had 21 last at bat come from behind wins. It featured Jeff Inglin ,who had 100 rbi's and scored 100 runs, Joe Crede who played 3rd base for the 2005 World Series Champions, McKay Christiansen the Million Dollar Morman Missionary, Chris Heintz, who made it to the majors with Minnisota, and a cast of characters that rivals the Durham Bulls in Bull Durham. Why is this night so special to me? It changed a lot of the way I thought of myself. My self worth and self belief. I was a 26 year old player in an younger mans market. Guys my age were playing in Double and Triple A ball. Not kicking it around in Class A ball still. I have always been able to do one thing well and that was hit. I have willed myself to be a good hitter and after I really learned how to hit I was relentless in my pursuit of excellence. So this night was a special on for me and when ever I think about it I can only smile. One time I had a very successful business man ridicule me and put me down in front of his peers. Then I asked him if he ever hit a walk of home run in front of 3500 fans? At that moment he shut up and he was no longer the most interesting man at the party. After this night I was more confident then ever when put in these types of situations. Baseball is a game of failure and you have to deal with it all the time. As a hitter you are more likely to fail then succeed. It's the same in life, but in life if you fail 7 out of 10 times on your job you get fired. In baseball they pay you 2.5 million a year!
So now it the bottom of the ninth and we are trailing by a single run. Since Greensboro's starter was dealing and had four right handers coming up their manager had left him in. Who knew what would transpire next. The lead off hitter grounded out to second for the first out and Jeff Inglin flied out to center field. Joe Crede came to the plate with two outs and hit a hard grounder between third and short for a base hit. Nobody was panicking yet, still one run lead with two outs. Chris Hientz comes to the plate and with two strikes he hits a tough ball to the glove side of the second basemen and bobbles if for an error. That's the end of the right handed hitters on the ninth inning, because now the music from White Zombie starts playing from the track Thunder Kiss 65, if you have never heard it just watch some of my videos here and you will get so pumped. The announcer announces now batting for your Hickory Crawdads #29 Greg Shepard and out walks their manager to take out the right hander. Now Greensboro had two guys warming up in the bullpen, two twin brothers from Panama. Both hard throwers and both were all elbows and knees. One brother was right handed and the other left. I was praying for the righty, but out runs the lefty. This feeling of frustration come over me because I am always telling myself, "when the game is on the line I am the guy." The reality of minor league baseball in my situation was as a platoon player was right hand pitcher left handed hitter late in the game and left handed pitcher right handed hitter. It happens all the time even at the major league level. Not for starters, but for platooning players that split time. Our bench was stocked with all kinds of power like Dan Olsen, Durante Hollins, and Chuck Klee. In many situations the manager just made the smart choice of changing up the hitter and pitcher match up. As an arm chair manager I make this move all the time. I even lived for this moment myself getting the opportunity well over a hundred times at the professional level to come in the ninth inning and face the dirty nasty stopper. So tonight I say to myself, "Well Greg your night is over." I start walking back to the dugout. Tonight was a little different night. I had been on tear and Chris Cron the manager calls me down the third base line and says, "Right man right spot." I had been pleading with management to leave me in against lefties and final I was going to get my chance. So I watched this leggy lefty fire pitch after pitch into the catchers glove. One thing I did like about Hickory and I never saw it anywhere else was that everyone in the stands had these hand held radios and would listen to the play by play while watching the game. It was like actually watching the game from the batters box with a slight delay. The pitch would be delivered and thrown back and I would hear. " Hear comes the pitch fast ball strike one. One time the pitch was a curve ball and I heard the radio guy say fastball. I shot him a quick look and I hear him say, " Shepard disapproves with me on that one so curve ball for strike one." I would laugh and call time out to gather myself. One time while on the Disabled List with a broken finger I went up to the press box and did a 1/2 inning of play by play with the radio guy from Winston Salem and it was a blast. We would be talking abpout a player and right in the middle of my sentence he would just blurt out here's the pitch, fastball outside ball one. I would want to talk bout the game and he would want to do what he was conditioned to do and that was call it. Okay now the left hander has had plent of time to warm up in this story. Final the Umpire says, "Play!" I step into the box and I'm saying get down early and find the ball. My knees are a little shaky and I am nervous. FFFFFTTTTTT POP Strike One! Holy Crap I didn't even see that pitch! I step out of the box to calm myself I even start praying to see the ball. I'm in a panick. I take a piece of grass from the ground as punishment for missing that first pitch fast ball, but I'm laughing because even if I would have swung at it I wouldn't even have touched it. I look at the radar gun reading on the center field wall....93mph. The sight of it makes me swallow hard. I take three deep breaths and look at the label. Then step into the box, left foot and then right. This time something is different. This time I heard nothing. I'm quiet, the chatter in my head is gone, and all I hear is my breath. No fans screaming, no teammate yelling, no radios chirping. It hard to explain this state unless you have experienced it for yourself. But that was where I was at in that very moment.....silent. In slow motion the skinny lefty from Panama rocks back and fires it looks slow and is up in my eyes. Then out of no where a voice says swing and swing I did. It was a reaction and it was like I swatted a fly out of the air.
Dam! As soon as it left my bat I thought the game was over. Fly ball to right field and I throw my bat to the ground in disgust. Why would I swing at that pitch n my eyes, I'm so stupid, what an idiot! I know I can't hit that pitch. In my mind I say a few other curse words that are not on the x rated side. I can hear the radios in the stands saying looks like the game is over...then I hear, " Wait a minute that ball is still going!" Then I look up and stop at first base. I see the ball coming down and the right fielder is slowly creeping backwards. It still looks like a routine fly ball. "Wait a minute the radios echo, wait a minute!" says the radio announcer. Now the outfielder is getting ready to jump and catch the ball. As he jumps he hits the wall and his glove doesn't make it to the top of the fence. Home run, home run, that ball is over the fence, Crawdads win, Shepard has just hit a walk off...... I can no longer hear the radios because I am sprinting around the bases. The emotions that went through me in that short span were amazing. From failure to hero, from self doubt to belief in myself, anger to jubilation. The best part is coming home and my teammates were waiting for me. I was so excited I almost got sick, but I choked it back. I'm tough like that.
I have had other times in my life where I have been quite and a voice in my head has said move, go, or swing. It is not always sports specific, but in sports specific situations I tend to have this experience more. When I trust these guts instincts I have always benefited from them. It has taught me to trust myself and not to doubt myself. I'm sure you have had times in your life where you guts said to do something and you didn't listen only to say, "Why didn't I listen to myself?" I say go with the gut feeling. It could be God, or your angel, or just your psychic intuition talking to you.
