Read Online Wing Ding by Kevin Markey - Free Book Online Page B

glances.
    â€œThe yips, huh?” Dad sighed. “When I was a kid, our second baseman came down with a nasty case.”
    â€œHe did?”
    â€œHis aim got so bad, we had to close down the bleachers behind first base. Way too dangerous for people to sit anywhere in his line of fire.”
    â€œYikes!” I said. Hopefully we wouldn’t have to do the same because of Stump.
    â€œTell me this,” Dad asked. “Has he reached the twitching point yet?”
    Remembering the crazy way Stump’s arm jiggled, I nodded. “Scary twitchy.”
    â€œYep, sounds like Flapdoodle Flanagan all over again,” Dad said. “Not his real name, of course. We called him Flash for the longesttime. Kid had tremendous speed. Then his arm started jerking like a chicken wing, and some wise guy dubbed him Flapdoodle. Unfortunately it stuck. Eventually Flapdoodle got so discouraged, he quit baseball and joined the swim team.”
    â€œThe swim team!” I cried. I couldn’t imagine Stump ever giving up baseball. He loved the game too much.
    â€œTurned out Flapdoodle moved even faster in water than on dry ground. Plus, his right arm worked like a bionic paddle. For each stroke everyone else made, he completed three. Of course, he could only swim in circles. If pools were round instead of rectangular, he could’ve been an Olympic champion.”
    â€œThat’s a terrible story!” I grimaced. “Didn’t he ever get better?”
    â€œThe thing is, the yips only affected Flapdoodle when he felt nervous. During a tense baseball game, say, or at a swim meet. The rest of the time, he was rock solid. His hands wereso steady, he became a surgeon when he grew up. Operating on people didn’t make him nervous at all.”
    â€œSee?” Said Mom. “There’s hope for Stump yet.”
    Sure there was. If he wanted to be a doctor. Which I knew for a fact he didn’t. Not a doctor, a concert pianist, or, for that matter, a professional juggler. Stump loved to play ball, pure and simple. Baseball was his life.
    Still, my dad’s story gave me plenty to think about. Such as the connection between the yips and nerves. So what was making him nervous?
    That was the million-dollar question.
    If we could answer it, I was sure we could help Stump beat the yips.
    The wind?
    I didn’t think so. Stump’s arm had started acting up before the weather went haywire.
    The grasshoppers? I thought back to his first error, the one that started everything. It had happened during the game against St. Joe.Tugboat had just spotted the locusts and called time. Immediately after, Stump had hurled the ball into the grandstand. Ever since then, he’d been wilder than the Amazon rain forest.
    Maybe the bugs had spooked Stump more than he let on. He claimed he hadn’t seen them until after he threw the ball. But what if he had caught a quick glimpse as he set up to throw? The shock of it certainly could have messed up his timing. Once the ball sailed away, his nerves took over. Baseball was everything to Stump. The idea of failing at it would have shaken him badly, especially with the All-Star Game only a couple days away. In that case, the grasshoppers could have been sort of a—whatchamacallit? A Trojan horse.
    We’d learned about the Trojan horse in school.
    A long time ago, the ancient Greeks fought a war against the kingdom of Troy. The Trojans retreated within the walled city of Troy and held off the Greek army for ten years. Finallythe Greeks came up with a trick to end the war. They built a giant wooden horse on wheels, rolled the horse right up to the city gates, and pretended to go home. When the Trojans saw the statue, they figured it was a victory present. Who knows? I guess people really liked giant wooden horses back then. Anyway, feeling all smug, the Trojans pulled the statue into the city. Whereupon a band of Greek warriors sprang out from a secret compartment in