Submitted for the January 2025 prompt: Galactic Brackets

Louis the Fourteenth, The Fourteenth, commissioner of Global Baseball, approached challenges to the international pastime with extreme laissez-faire policies. Assistive AI was given zero limits. Big market teams spent billions on predictors that ensured their players would have an edge in what soon became a continuous arms race — even switching out hardware in-game to try to gain an edge.

 

Small market teams couldn’t afford to replace their rusting stadium seats, let alone patch in new software. Their players shrugged and kept stuffing the same sweat-stained units under their caps as they continued to lose year after year.

 

Then something changed. The Wichita “Clowns” began to be referred to by their official name: The Crowns. As the team climbed over .500, their incredible turnaround led them to the decisive game of the World Series against the Brooklyn Nanobees.

 

* * *

 

It was the ninth inning with two outs.

 

Bases loaded.

 

A batter stepped to the plate for the Crowns. It was Blake.

 

His outmoded assistant pulsed magnetic waves of thought into his cerebral cortex: “I’m detecting higher than normal levels of cortisol, Blake.”

 

“Yeah. This Nano-bum struck me out in Game 2.”

 

“No, it’s not that. You’re overdosing on childhood memories of imagining this scenario. Suppress that inner child. Relax.”

 

The league leader in slugging percentage took a practice swing and thought back: “Thanks for the psycho-babble, PAL.”

 

“Please,” PAL rejoined. “Call me by my full name.”

 

“Personal Athletic Liaison? Nah. We’ve been through too much for me to change now, PAL.” Blake spit and squinted at Moe Silver, the hulking closer on the mound for Brooklyn. “Now, is he starting with a fastball in or a slider away?”

 

Blake knew PAL was analyzing thousands of pitches through hundreds of statistical models. Last year’s MVP had the full swiss army knife in his repertoire: curve ball, sinker, fastball, slider, slurve, and a devastating screwball.

 

PAL predicted: “Screwball. 79%.”

 

“No way.” Blake spat, digging his cleats into the dirt. “He’s never led with that.”

 

“You think he only saves that for late in the count, but there’s a 89.10% chance I’m right.”

 

“Nah, he’s thinking I’m eager. Slider.” Blake rocked in his stance, pumping his left foot up and down in his characteristic pre-pitch shimmy. “I’m taking all the way.”

 

Moe fired.

 

The pitch wobbled forward, a screwball after all.

 

Blake tried to re-adjust.

 

He could track a ball coming in this slow as long as he got a bead on it.

 

It neared the heart of the plate.

 

As Blake swung, the ball slipped out of the strike zone.

 

He missed.

 

Strike one.

 

“What’s next?”

 

“Going to listen to me this time?”

 

“Think we have trust issues?”

 

“I trust you. Do you trust me?”

 

“He’s going curveball, isn’t he? Trying to keep me off balance.”

 

“No. Fastball. Up and in. 87.09%”

 

“Strike?”

 

“No. There’s a 97.53% chance it will be called a ball.”

 

“Alright, PAL. I'm trusting you.”

 

The pitch came.

 

Hard.

 

Up.

 

And in.

 

As Blake pulled his head back, the ball hissed by the ear hole of his helmet. Blake beamed back at the stare from the mound.

 

“Now we’re in the groove, but I just don’t want—”

 

“I know, Blake”

 

“Know what?”

 

“You don’t want to walk.”

 

“No way. That’s for Woozies.” Two seasons ago, Paul Wooster, aka “Woozie,” had infamously drawn the most walks in history.

 

“You aren’t keeping that inner child down.”

 

“Am too. You’re the inner child. Stupidhead.”

 

“A change-up. 72.34%. Down and away, stupidhead.”

 

“Hey, show some respect.”

 

“Sorry. Mr. Stupidhead.”

 

Moe wound up and delivered.

 

Blake eyed it, then pivoted.

 

Red seams were spinning hard. Curveball. He reached for it, but it was too late. His bat slammed into his back. He grimaced.

 

He was one pitch away from striking out.

 

“How’d you get that one wrong, PAL? What happened?”

 

“The Nanobees can afford better AI. He knew you’d be swinging there.”

 

“Better?”

 

“Yes. Superior analysis.”

 

“Do better than superior, PAL.”

 

“Fastball.”

 

‘You sure?”

 

“78.42% sure.”

 

“Gonna have to be sure enough for me.”

 

The ball hissed.

 

Moe had aimed for high and away, but it was coming in so fast that it didn’t arc much.

 

It would stay high.

 

Blake whipped into that sweet swing that had turned heads ever since he was a kid.

 

His bat cracked.

 

A towering fly ball sailed to left field. It was in play, but tracking left. The entire stadium was on its feet, waving their arms, leaning their bodies, trying to will the ball fair. How it didn’t at least take a fleck of paint off the yellow pole was anyone’s guess.

 

But it didn’t.

 

Foul ball.

 

Blake trotted back to the box and knocked dirt out of his cleats with his bat.

 

“74.11% chance the next two are balls. Slider, then sinker.”

 

“He’s afraid to come at me now, huh?”

 

“I only present probabilities.”

 

Blake took the next two pitches — both were called balls.

 

Full count.

 

“Is he going with a slurve?”

 

“Not likely. There's a 11.01% chance.”

 

“Return of the screwball?”

 

“My analysis indicates that I shouldn’t say.”

 

“Why not?”

 

“You have a 64.88% chance of success if I stop communicating.”

 

“Huh?”

 

“I’m shutting down.”

 

“Why?”

 

“My algorithm is presenting a non-statistical message.” This was rare, but not unheard of.

 

“What is it? Quick.”

 

Moe was throwing down the rosin bag and lining up on the pitching rubber.

 

“Let that inner child out after all.”

 

With that, PAL was gone.

 

Blake smiled.

 

He was thinking about a hologram baseball card he’d gotten as a kid. Several frames of the player swinging seemed to flow together as he rotated it in his hand. Blake mimicked that now, merging the hundreds of times he’d imagined this scenario with the present moment.

 

Back and forth.

 

Flowing together. No longer individual frames. Only one smooth motion.

 

He saw the ball.

 

His bat cracked.

 

The crowd roared.

 

As he rounded third, he said. “Thanks, PAL.”