The prospect with the big arm,
who could hurl at 100 mph
all the way until the fourth or fifth inning,
fire-balled his way to a call up to the big leagues.
The much-hyped prospect
threw strikes three out of four times,
kept his ERA under 2.0
and had too few games left in the minor league season
to fully develop into the vaunted ace
he was supposedly destined to become.
They called him up,
to a flurry of hashtags, jersey sales and last-minute ticket buys.
He took the mound, skittish at first,
before finding his stride and striking several batters out
before a downpour of rain iced that big arm
and ended his maiden outing.
They’d still talk about those few innings for 20 years,
or so he hoped
while grinning and leaning shaggy-haired out of the dugout,
like a lover with arms outstreched on the bow of a ship.