Mighty Casey is the hero of “Casey at the Bat,” a baseball poem from 1888 published in the San Francisco Examiner. The poem is set in Mudville, whose baseball team is losing by two runs in their last at bats. Two weaker hitters are able to get on base, bringing “Mighty Casey” to the plate. He takes the first two pitches—both strikes—as a show of his own confidence, and then strikes out on the third pitch. The poem was a hit well beyond its author’s dreams … and the author denied writing it for some years afterward.