SEATTLE -- The exchange has been made and the ball is in its rightful hands.
Mike Freeman was escorted down the Mariners' clubhouse hallway and into the underbelly of Safeco Field, then introduced to the boy from the right-field seats who caught his towering second-inning home run.
When he hit it -- the first of his career, hence the bat-for-ball tradeoff -- Freeman, the 29-year-old utility man in his third organization, envisioned it playing a part in the Mariners' first series win of the season. Instead, he sat alone in a subdued clubhouse after the Mariners allowed 10 unanswered runs and dropped the series finale to the Astros, 10-5.