Coffee with Crawford | Louisville's Eddie King didn't try to be a hero — he just moved the ball

LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- Eddie King Jr. didn't step to the plate looking to be a hero. He was just trying to "move the ball," he said — to keep the inning alive, give fate a chance to deliver.

In a tie game in the bottom of the seventh inning of Louisville's Game 3 Super Regional matchup against Miami, no one in the stadium would've blamed him for stepping to the plate with heroics on his mind. The Cardinals' season was in the balance. King had homered twice in the previous day's loss. He was 0-2 with a walk and itching to make a mark.

Beyond that, he had come back to Louisville for his senior season for this very at-bat, this exact moment. He had family sitting just feet away, directly behind home plate.

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The first important thing he did was take a pitch — which turned out to be a wild pitch — which moved Jake Munroe to second base and into scoring position.

With the count 1-2, he did what he always does with two strikes. He choked up on the bat. There would be no home run swing. That might've been the stylish outcome of this at-bat, but his team didn't need style. It just needed contact.

"I was just trying to hit the ball, honestly, just move it, put the barrel on it, let it go somewhere," King said. "Hopefully, it falls, and I get a hit. But it was just my mindset. I didn't want to strike out or try to do too much. So, if I just move the ball, I have a chance of getting a run in."

With a packed stadium pulsing and a city holding its breath, he swung and sent the ball arcing into center field. Michael Torres, the Miami center fielder, had been playing deep and could not make the diving catch. The ball careened off his glove and took off toward left field.

After sliding into second, King stood and turned toward the dugout. He raised both hands — and like a conductor in cleats, heard a chorus from the stadium.

"Ed-die! Ed-die! Ed-die!"

"I've never experienced anything like that," King said later. "I don't know if I'll ever go through anything like that again. ... It's definitely something I can remember for the rest of my life."

Louisville coach Dan McDonnell took it in.

"He might be the sweetest kid on the team," he said. "He is loved. He's such a good person."

Pitcher Ethan Eberle was in the dugout. He joined the cheers.

"It sent chills down my spine," he said.

Louisville outfielder Eddie King Jr. holds up the team’s “championship belt” after delivering the go-ahead hit in a Game 3 win over Miami. “I’ve never experienced anything like that,” he said.
ERIC CRAWFORD

Some postseason moments are planned. Some are claimed.

But the best ones? They just happen — and the players who own them more often than not are the ones who aren't thinking about being the star. They're just trying to move the ball.

Sometimes, it's enough to do your job the way you've trained — no flash, just focus. And sometimes, in the right moment, that alone can become heroic.

Just move the ball.

Quick Sips

- Everybody is talking about Kentucky assistant Vice Marrow's reported decision to become general manager for Louisville's football program. Rick Bozich wrote about it.

- I wrote a quick introduction to Louisville's College World Series Game 1 opponent, Oregon State, on Monday, and that was the most-read story I had of the day. It was put on the front page of the website, and on the web, position and promotion are everything. The story that resonated, though, was a column I posted the night before on Dan McDonnell, which got hundreds more social media shares and generated more reaction. So I'll shamelessly plug it one more time here, if you haven't yet seen it.

The Last Drop