George W. Bush's most terrifying moment in office wasn't during 9/11

[...] He thought about the pitch itself. He thought about the other time he'd thrown a first pitch as president, at a Brewers game. He'd put it in the dirt. His dad had bounced it when he was president too. Both he and his dad had played baseball at Yale — the senior Bush was team captain, the younger never made varsity. And bouncing it had been mortifying. "We're pretty competitive people," he said.He hadn't had much time to prepare, squeezing in a game of catch with his press secretary, Ari Fleischer, in the South Lawn to loosen up. So he knew he faced the prospect of embarrassment in front of a stadium of people who hadn't voted for him, and more.As he walked out to the mound, wearing an FDNY pullover over a flak jacket, as the voice of Bob Sheppard — "Ladies and gentlemen" — faded into the great sound of the crowd, he had a sense that something more was at stake than pride.