Eddy v.1
Story Output:
The Theory of the Fastball
Hi Kids.
Welcome to the first ever Artificial Editor storytelling attempt. This is the first output of my Eddy artificial editor program that I created back in 2019. We will retell History with all the correct elements so you can know the truth of Baseball. Here is the first output as it appeared onscreen with no edits from any other future version:
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Eddy version 1
Online output agent:
Story 1
The Art and History of Baseball as it was created by the first players of the formal game organizers.
:: .
Casey of Mudville was a mighty batter. He could hit a mighty fast ball. It was not the first time that I had to face him from way out in the left field.
I had never seen a man so mighty. His chest was at least two of me. The young girls swooned as he stood at the fateful plate. The day I saw him strike out. This is my eyewitness testimony:
Me and my buddy Alistair have been on the Leominster Doers for about 2 seasons now. We both love Baseball. We had just learned it from some travelers that came from just south of town. Big tall fella named Paul and a short skinny kid named John. Both of them taught us the game back in 1790. October 31st to be exact. He said it was some commemoration of the Protestant formal declaration day. That’s why the missionaries taught us Baseball.
This was now 1810 and the game had become much more popular and dangerous game. Filled with painful hits to the head from the ball. Women stopped playing around that time. When the men got too rough. They were happy to sit and watch, and cringe mostly. Some complained if they hadn’t had children, they would be out there showing them exactly how to run and throw and catch.
But there were real monsters to be fished, such as Casey of the Mudville Blues. We learned what the Blues were as we had never beaten the Blues since we had been playing on the formal teams. The Doers were just a bunch of guys who loved the game. We didn’t care that you won, we just wanted to play. But we learned a super-secret because we knew the makers of the game.
This is how Alistair did it:
Before that day Casey could taunt any fool who would come to the mound:
There were mighty fine pitchers from Cleveland to Champlain. Men who could toss the ball so fast it would nearly make you think—
Did he really throw 105 miles per hour? He needs to do it again; I think I blinked. But Casey would still crack the fastest pitches.
One, after one they all fell down, to the mighty Casey and the Mudville crowd. He’d hit the fastest around. Once there was a giant gathering of 5 teams, who all came to town to challenge Casey. Some of the fastest pitchers in the land like Michael Lacque and Anton Gkneali the Sparrow’s fastest arms. But even they couldn’t muster whatever it took to take down Casey.
Some used to think that Casey would be nothing without the crowd. But that’s not true, I’ve seen him down. I know what he did on that fateful day. The day he met, Alistair Shae of the Fitchburg farmers.
Shae was a Scottish “smarty-pants” who didn’t drink and loved the Lord loud. He knew his Bible up and down. Shae wasn’t the sort of pitcher Kacy was used to. He was a thinking man because he laid off the drink. He wasn’t the sort to make you feel you were just having too much of a time, he would always chime in with a cheers and a grin and put a few fine pints down. But at the end of the night when all was said and done, it was Shae who was carry’n them all home to start the day’s farming again.
It was lovely fun church ball and all. But the preachers have warned against it. After the war was over and America could rest again, we took to playing sports instead of shooting men. We often wondered who was good, the batter or the man who stood upon the little mound only inches from the height of the rest of them.
Do you really think that tiny ounce of height is going to give you much of a fight? Especially when Casey is standing in all of his might lazily prancing about as he sauntered to his position at the plate.
Casey has been trying to find a girl in the land to finally give him the 9 boys and help on the farm. Casey was the biggest rancher in town. He had 8 bulls and he could buy anything he wanted.
Shae on the other hand was poor, he worked for anyone that needed his help. Sometimes for food, sometimes for soda. It really depended on the kind of day he was having. I think I’ve seen him chew gum once or twice, but he just doesn’t seem to have a vice.
Fear! It’s on the heart of every man. Fear is how Casey will win this battle. He calls out to the crowd and greets the ump. He spits on his hands and takes up the bat. With one ferocious swing he cuts through the air, the woosh of it all, heard for near a mile. I think I heard the sounds of an owl take flight, somewhere out of the park.
Take the advice of the owl Shae, and run to the dugout. Run back to the bunker where no fighting is done. In there you can hide from the crowd and the sun, and stop pretending you deserve to be out on this field.
But we have already dug ourselves out on this lawn, so let’s all see who is the toughest of all. Slap your hand in your glove and realize you control the game. For you have the ball, Shae. The speed of the ball and the break of the ball are silly tricks played by men.
This story is simply David and Goliath. Mighty man with a sword vs. kid with a rock. The rock rules until the sword can reach. The sword is faster than any arm or leg, and words can always reach the brain. The pen may have an equal length, but it does no good to only have 1. Every man and woman should train at each weapon presented, in case danger come knocking on their door.
The crowd that gathered up that day was nearly everyone in the county. They were even selling buttered corn heated and popped in a bag. The women folk were also trying to sell cake and pie to anyone who would come to them and pay the nickel to them.
I was out in left fields wall, scratching my head. I did not know, how in God’s green, dusty, and filled with water Earth, are you going strike that big man out? With Cooney and Barrows down, and one to go. Shae turned back to second to look at Blake on second. He knew he couldn’t catch them stealing now. He focused on the man at the plate. He stared at the ground, not at Jack our captain catcher.
I remembered we did a study in the back of his house after church that day, we knew that “taunting Goliath” is the same symbol of Casey.
All Shae really need to do is trust in the “rock” in his hand, and down “Goliath” would go. He could place the ball anywhere but he did not throw that fast. Shae was only 5 foot 3 and kind of short compared to the other players. Casey was over 6 foot 4. Shae knew about climbing trees for height, as many men have tried to hurt Shae by repeatedly commenting how short he was. We call this bullying. But when you have a bully, all you need is a little help from the rules of the game. The tiny hill they place the mound is supposed to represent the hill of Zion. That height of the mound may just have helped Shae that day indeed. The higher ground is the smarter ground, Shae later told me, thinking about Casey’s size.
There he was on the mound, he began.
He took a very deep breath, as he recalled the story in his experience. Thinking—
“He hasn’t hit a single curveball since 1801 here we are it’s 1810 he’s got to be tired by now? Maybe one good fastball when he wasn’t thinking, would pass him right by over the plate.”
But I think Shae could only get close to what you thought was a fast pitch.
As he told me, I thought, what a dumb idea Shae. Why would you think a Fastball? “Did you stick with the curve?” I asked.
Little did I know, that is exactly what it would take.
He threw a curve ball at him slow. Casey swung and missed, as he often did, but this was where pitchers Lacque and Gkneali hardly understood.
Casey could learn how you pitch. Then you were done, and Casey would hit on, most likely to home run status. Each man’s curve has a limit. Then Casey could hit it. If he would just learn the same principle I’m talking about here.
The next time Shae threw, he did it with a fabulous curve. The best I’d seen. But Casey was somehow upon it. He swung, and it clipped the tip of his bat sailing into Sanderson’s field. The kids all went running to get them a Casey-ball, I think he has only signed 10.
Casey may make it to the big-league games, but for now he’s just our local hero, here in Massachusetts.
My uncle paid for Shae and me to get the uniforms and gloves it cost to be in this game of war. We both were happy to play this game that taught us about life and war.
Strategy is what it takes to win every battle. You have to have the upper hand to seize your victims plunder. Luckily, Shae was not out for blood, but only his pitching ability. He asked the Lord, is there a way to strike this man out?
The Lord replied and simply said, “what have I told you from the beginning?
The only life you ever find is losing the game you try and win.
–To give the man exactly what he wants, but something he didn’t expect.”
Once he sees that you have the upper hand, he will spin and twist trying to understand what you have given this day.
The fastball that he was longing for was presented in all its glory.
Sometimes losing, is also a form of winning. Like training your son for war. You must let them win to see a better way to lead.
As fastballs go, I wasn’t impressed by Shae’s obvious huff and puff were offering Casey the cleanest fastball in all of its prowess, like low hanging fruit.
It was a perfect pitch to send to the crow’s out in Martin Brimdard’s nectarine orchard. I knew Casey could’ve done it. He’s hit 3 balls over near there already.
I’m pretty sure it was from the idiot pitchers before Shae who thought they could strike him out. They couldn’t because they never thought to give exactly what was wanted.
The cheers of the crowd made me tear up and run. I was in so much disbelief I was crying as I jumped up and down, the happiest I have ever been since.
I ran to the mound and cheered for what seemed about a month. Shae had won and Casey had finally struck out. The game was lost, but Casey, was struck down by little Shae the magician.
He reckoned on the last pitch that he got a piece of it. He knew Casey would think Shae was done. No more tricks.
Casey swung an imaginary bat in his head, thinking “It’s either a regular curveball again, and then I murder him, or he will trick me with the slow pitch.”
“What about the fastball Casey?”
Casey laughed at how stupid he sounded, “Shae is no slouch, he knows that I will knock it into the field—a home run, with a runner on third and second? Preposterous. He wouldn’t do that.” At that moment, I remember Casey let out a loud “Ha,” as the whole crowd quieted down before the last pitch. He laughed at the reality of how he would be destroyed. Like Goliath.
When Casey finally realized that he was waiting for the pitch Shae was supposed to throw, the foolishness of the action made Casey go blank. He didn’t even swing.
It was as if Shae found a time hole in which he slipped his, murderously slow 78mph fastball, right by Casey.
Casey blinked a few times as if magic was just performed in front of him—as if the Great Houdini was in his fastball.
Magic Shae, as I have affectionately called him, eventually started a barber shop, but I think he went to work for one of those big factories later.
I asked Shae before he left, how he did it and he just told me; His father knew the man who invented baseball.
He invented the game based on Cricket rules, but it was a tool to understand life. While you are trying to hit the ball and run around the bases each position is a different question about life.
He only remembered a few of the principles his father taught before he left. But he did say John would always carry his ‘stick’. Saying he preferred wood to a gun.
“David killed Goliath delivering cheese,” he winked at me as he relayed that bit.
“That’s how I beat the Casey and the Blues,” As a lone warrior for God.
You have to trust, and not fear. Fear is the point of the game! To teach fearless combat in a safe environment. I just placed the ball when and where God allowed.
John travelled all around teaching his church ball to the churches around. First to pastors and then it spread like wildfire. Eventually it turned into a huge sport, first in Leominster on the other side of Fitchburg, before teaching it to Shae’s father as a young boy and starting the first team in Fitchburg—the Giants. The name came from John’s story of David and Goliath and how it related to the game. John traveled the world spreading the gospel, the apple fruit, and Baseball all over America. Sometimes he was invited as a preacher, but he eventually settled in Indiana where the inventor of Baseball died and is buried; completely unknown to the rest of the world.
The famous Legends of Baseball turned into folk heroes. The people forgot about them and only remembered their names. Players from the old days, like Bunyan and Henry. They seemed to make their swing more famous than the games they played. It’s true they swung the bat like an Axe and a Hammer, though.
He took his wagon back to his town. I never saw him play again. I thanked him as he rode off.
I wondered how Casey and the Blue’s would turn out.
I later found out he humiliated a poor young catcher named Jennings. Fella never played again. It was also rumored that he took Jennings girl after Casey made Jennings drop a pitch and the first time he let a runner steal home on a strike pitch. Jennings was let go later that inning.
It was only his first game too. Casey was a real bully, but only in the game.
This was game between the Muddville Blue’s vs. the Lancaster Gray’s. It was fated to have someone go down. We should have never allowed the teams to play with those names. We should have known.
John Paul Bunyan, grandson of the author of Pilgrims Progress, who was somehow later named just Paul Bunyan; maybe because of his own missionary journey, and he became famous as a traveling ballplayer. Paul later travelled as a lumberjack but during the summer to winter he travelled to Milford to play for the Blues. Casey., they said, was nearly as tall as Paul. They said he hit the ball just like it was an axe. Bunyan’s Blues Axe, and it became after hearing it pronounced in a heavy Scottish accent:
Ox.
Somehow it became a blue ox. A big, blue ox. Some had rumored that it was a sad and heavy drinking friend he supported his whole life like a brother.
The two missionaries met. Paul came into town and was a huge man compared to Chapman. It was odd that the both of them were at odds from the beginning. Chapman being a short planter, and Bunyan being a tall tree-cutter. After a while of talking they became friends and taught each other the game, before leaving with the challenge to see who would create more teams.
Their aim was to promote church camaraderie with different beliefs. “It’s not like a Catholic can’t accept a Jew or Protestant. We all claim to believe in the same God. Let’s play a game in fun.” Chapman would say.
“Maybe we can make church more involved in our daily life.” Paul pondered.
They both played the game together based on their father’s stories, life and the Bible. Bunyan taught him about the game of blocking the rock with a swing. Paul was really good, as he viewed it as sword fighting and dueling.
“You have to think of it as a fight,” Alistair kept repeating.
Chapman created the running to 3 bases to represent the 3 stages of life and the symbolic reference to 3 he felt was important. He taught Mr. Shae about the importance of calling the first position home, but the object to get back after a challenge. Fear, before returning home.
These were all Christian teachings. The 8 players represented David and his brothers. At the time Chapman invented the game, he only had 8 brothers and sisters. So he felt like he really was David as he began teaching the game, planting, and preaching. He chose the 7th inning stretch as a point of prayer and worship; the organ has never left the game. But the church seems to have exited the game. It’s no longer a community church game.
If you want the proof of any of it, it’s there to be found, if anyone would only try it on the mound. Or you can see statues of Bunyan up in Bangor, with a bat in his hands. You will easily see, it’s the whittling of a bat, just the way that Chapman had taught Shae’s dad, who now was starting a bat making business down in Kentucky. It seems most people who can leave this cold, Massachusetts state do.
But the remembrance of Chapman will be forever lost. He wasn’t the important one. Shae stopped. “It’s all about what He already did,” as he pointed up to the sky, very dramatically. He had a way of speaking that got into you. Like he listened. He would have been a great preacher.
He taught me a few other lessons that day, but none so important as that one. I remember it everywhere I go. I learned to ask the Lord, for He will go before me.
The Principle:
“Give exactly what is wanted, but is least expected.”