Swing is poetry; his swing is perfect. I miss swings; but we miss Freddie more. "Give me a second," Freddie Freeman tells reporters. "I don't even know if I'll make it." On June 2
, Dodgers All-Star Freeman will return to Atlanta, where he played for 12 years before moving to Los Angeles this season. At the press conference, she chokes back tears and grabs a white cloth. Matt Thomas/San Diego Padres/Getty Images Watching the press conference on my laptop with my 10-year-old daughter Rose. He watched Freeman through hundreds of big hits and signature hugs to opponents and teammates alike. And on a sunny September afternoon against the Red Sox, he even sent Rose a wave on his birthday. Freeman is said to be the type to wear his heart on his sleeve. Around her neck is a chain with a cross that comes away to reveal a strand of her late mother Rosemary's hair. She died of skin cancer when Freeman was 10 years old. "He's with me everywhere I go," he previously said. But now, back in Atlanta, he is speechless. I like Rose's hand. He presses. We strive for Freeman to find the right word, any word. Mary Huhn wakes up one morning in 1926, when she is 2 years old, and her father, Henry, has disappeared. She and her mother take a train from Pittsburgh to Bowerston, Ohio, where Mary grows up on a farm with her grandparents. There, Maria listens to Tiger games on WXYZ. His hero is first baseman, number 5, Hank Greenberg. A Jewish boy from New York. Ball of Hammer. When the tigers are out of town, the radio crew recreates the action of the telegraph. Maria closes her eyes and imagines distant cities. As a teenager, he is told that his father died in a car accident outside of Chicago. He is not told the truth that he simply disappeared. He has a job on the farm. He plays basketball for the Bowerston High Trojans, wearing blue and orange jerseys. After dinner, he collects all possible facts about tigers from paper. Fifty years later, Mary tells me, her granddaughter, stories about Greenberg's 1938 season. Hank says that every swing at the club is a strike against Hitler. The world is preparing to set itself on fire this summer. Hank hears a scream. They are close. In the Dearborn office of Ford Motors, the German vice consul presents Henry Ford with a golden Maltese cross surrounded by four swastikas on behalf of Hitler. More than 20,000 American Nazis attack Sieg Heil at Madison Square Garden. From Woodward Avenue north of Detroit, Father Coughlin broadcasts anti-Semitic rants over American airspace. But Hank Greenberg locks up. He moves on. Home run after home run. For the fifty-eighth season. Maria cuts screen results, titles and photos. Greenberg was raised by the author's grandmother, Huhn, and his love of baseball ran in the family for generations. Courtesy of Jeremy Collins He graduates from high school in 19
1 and moves back to Pittsburgh. She falls in love with Bill Troppman, who, like Greenberg, goes to war. In
5 both return home because Nazi Germany has been defeated. Mary and Bill got married. And in Hank Greenberg's first game after four years overseas, he's coming home. Maria's heart swells. In 19
7, she becomes a mother, Hank Greenberg becomes a pirate. And every morning, the sunrise breaks off the waters of the Allegheny on the north shore of the city. Henry Huhn's body was never found. Freddie Freeman tells this story: He is 8 years old. His father, Fred, gives him batting practice at North Sunrise Little League in Orange, California. Rosemary walks behind the right field fence. Four years earlier, she was diagnosed with melanoma, but when Fred drops it, Rosemary is healthy. Freddie steps into his swing. The ball explodes. Rising, rising, it heads straight for him in right center. Father and son shout. He turns around. The ball hits the light post, he misses. His first home run. Rosemary rejoices; Freddie is breathing. He is a child; he is older. His joy is his relief. And every swing of Freddie Freeman's bat moves in that machine, an extension of that moment. Maggie Troppman - Mary's daughter; my mother – dodges and bends her elbows and swings forward. He is 8 years old, holding a baseball over the first base fence at Pittsburgh's Forbes Field. He's looking for the number 21. The kids are asking for autographs as the Pirates warm up. August 16, 1960. Double shot against the Phillies. Roberto Clemente runs carefully across and takes the ball. Maggie smiles. She wishes him an early birthday. From the baseball cards, he knows: August 18, 193
. Clemente smiles. He asks about her birthday. According to him, it will follow the next day. Clemente's smile widens. He gives her the ball and wishes Maggie a happy birthday. It is a ritual they repeat. Summer after summer, Maggie returns; and summer after summer, notes Clemente. ...After Greenberg, Clemente latched onto Troppman, who left the school untouched at Forbes Field. Neil Leifer/Sports Illustrated Clemente shines with towering lanky catches and laser shots. Maggie cuts up newspapers, pictures and sheet music and puts them in a box under the bed with autographed memorabilia. School practice follows him as he finds ways to cheer for the Bucs. ("Throw her a book," Mary tells the principal.) Maggie feels right at home at Forbes Field, watching #21. His baseball cards call him "Bob," though he insists on "Robert." To be black and Latino in Pittsburgh is to be doubly the outsider. That's how Clemente makes Forbes Field his home.
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