After a Texas pitcher accidentally hit an Oklahoma batter, the former Little Leaguers and their families reflect on lessons from the viral moment.
The internet blew up. Texas East defeated Tulsa National, but that became a mere footnote. The video went viral. Everyone wanted to know more about Jarvis, the auburn-red mulleted shortstop from Oklahoma, and Shelton, the 5-foot-10, 172-pound pre-teen Texas hurler. Why did two junior high boys care so much? Whatever happened to them after that game? Did they become friends?
"I got to first base, and looked over at the pitcher and saw him with his glove on his face," Jarvis says."I saw his face somehow, and could see he was crying so I dropped my helmet and went over there." The Tulsa National team, assembled just a month earlier, had been considered an underdog as the boys advanced through regionals. The boys from Oklahoma lost their opening game in Waco, and staved off elimination four times. They won three of those games by one run. But they managed to stay loose, and every day when they went to the batting cages, they'd glance over to the limousine rental company and see a white Hummer limo and ask Kouplen if they could ride in it to a game.
They hung up and his phone kept ringing."CBS Morning News," The New York Times, The Washington Post and ESPN. Kouplen put Jarvis in a separate booth at the restaurant and held up his phone as Jarvis did 15 to 20 interviews. "We went to a lot of counseling," Melody says,"and he's been on anxiety medication for maybe two years.
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