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who?”
    â€œMike Stammer. He’s the shortstop.”
    â€œHe’s short?”
    â€œNo! He’s the—oh, never mind. His name is Mike Stammer. His last name is on his uniform.”
    Abby took the card, felt around for a pocket, but then realized her porcupine costume didn’t have any. She tucked thecard into the clip on her board. “OK, but remember, I can’t talk to him,” she said.
    â€œI know. Thanks!” I left her in the sea of kids and hoped she’d remember Mike’s name.
    I also hoped that Mike would get what I was trying to tell him. Maybe a baseball card couldn’t break the jinx—but maybe it could. He would see that even a player who got a bunch of errors wasn’t jinxed on every single play—and if he wasn’t jinxed on every play, he wasn’t jinxed at all!

he Pines were winning by a score of 2–0 at the top of the ninth inning. The closer, Ryan Kimball, was brought in to save the game.
    Ryan glared at the Humdinger’s batter, Brian Somerset, and spun a crazy breaking ball past him. Ryan had a kooky delivery: His elbows stuck out every which way, and he did a little kick at the end that made it look like he was dancing. His nickname was “Hokey Pokey,” but I wouldn’t dare call him that to his face. Hokey Pokey or not, the guy could pitch.
    Brian swung and missed. Wayne Zane zipped the ball back, and Ryan threw another pitch, hard over the plate. Brian held off that one: Strike two! The crowd started to cheer.
    Brian had been nice to me, and it wouldn’t hurt the Pines if he just got a base hit. I found myself quietly rooting for him—even if he
was
a Humdinger.
    Ryan threw another fastball. Brian knocked it straight over the left field wall. I gulped. I just wanted him to hit a single, not a home run.
    â€œNice one,” I told him when he got back to the dugout. I had to be polite. I didn’t high-five him, though. I was still a Pine City Porcupines’ fan all the way. I had to draw the line somewhere.
    â€œThanks,” Brian said. “I got lucky.”
    The next Humdinger batter walked, and the batter after that bunted. It was a really goodbunt that rolled along the third base line and stopped dead. The runner from first reached second, and the batter reached first. Now the tying run was in scoring position, and the go-ahead run was on base. There was still nobody out. I couldn’t watch. I pulled the brim of my hat low so I couldn’t see.
    I heard a strike called, and then there was the crack of the bat.
    The crowd roared, louder than I’d ever heard. I lifted the brim of my cap and saw the base runners walking back toward the dugout.
    The Pines were swarming Mike Stammer!
    â€œThat was something!” said Brian Somerset. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”
    They showed the replay on the big screen. The Humdinger batter lined the pitch right up the middle. It was the kind of ball that goes so fast and straight that people call it a “frozenrope.” Mike Stammer jumped four feet high and caught the ball.
    That was one out.
    Mike touched second base before the base runner could get back to the bag.
    That made two outs.
    Meanwhile, the player from first was still running toward second; all Mike had to do was reach out and touch him.
    That was three outs.
    An unassisted triple play! The rarest play in baseball!
    The replay ran again and again, so I watched it again and again. It was a two-second masterpiece: catch, touch, and tag in one motion. It was a great, great play. There was no way Mike Stammer was jinxed.
    They showed the Porcupines’ dugout on the big screen too. The bench players all high-fived each other. Even Dylan got five, and Grumpscracked the first smile I had seen from him. I wished like anything I was over there.
    Mike ran toward the visitors’ dugout. The Humdingers watched in surprise. Was he coming to taunt them?
    â€œHey, Chad the