“I hadn’t noticed.” Greg reaches for his ankle and feels a sharp pain in his elbow. He winces but tries to lose the face before Jimmy spots it.

“You okay?”

“It’s nothing.” He waves. “Postgame stiffness. I’ll ice it today, good as new.”

“All right, brother.” Jimmy pushes himself up and flashes Greg a smile. “Gotta go warm up the kid.” The kid is Vásquez, a big guy from the Dominican Republic, so thick he’s nearly fat. He signed with the Lions the moment he turned sixteen and has been working his way through the farm system fast.

Jimmy looks down at Greg, adjusts his belt a notch tighter. No one’s told Greg outright, but he knows that he and Vásquez are both vying for the four spot. Any other team there’d be five starting pitchers, but Woody Botter is set on a four-man rotation and a deep bullpen so they can get Rogers on the mound as often as possible. That leaves one spot, two right-handers. Greg’s not a reliever, not since his freshman year—of high school.

“Don’t worry,” Jimmy says. “He’s a big kid, but doesn’t have near the control of you.”

“That’s a relief,” Greg says, but he’s thinking Jimmy’s the one to find Vásquez’s control, to steer and aim and cajole his young arm into shape. He’s thinking Jimmy might be loyal as Lassie, but that won’t keep him from catching another guy, and catching well. “Have a good game, buddy,” Greg says, but Jimmy’s already jogging off.

As the stadium starts to fill, Greg runs out of the complex, up the arroyo, and through the municipal golf course. In the year after surgery, conditioning was all he had: six months of long runs, stairs, and squats before he could even pick up a five-pound weight with his right hand. March of last year, he could run twenty miles but couldn’t open a jar of pasta sauce.

Eighty-five percent success rate, the doctor had said, and that’s what he keeps telling himself. Guys return stronger than ever—the doc had said that, too. He jogs alongside the dry riverbed, the banks of the channel paved in concrete. It hasn’t rained since he arrived in Phoenix.

He spots a figure running ahead of him, another nut exercising in the ninety-degree heat. Greg is going faster than the man, and the distance between them shrinks until he’s only a few strides away. It’s Jason Goodyear, the left fielder breathing hard, covered in a sheen of sweat. His soaked T-shirt is tucked into the waistband of his shorts. Greg slows his stride. To pass the All-Star would be disrespectful.

A few blocks later Jason looks over his shoulder. “You gonna creep back there the whole damn run? Come here.”

Greg strides alongside him. “How’s it going? I’m Greg.”