In the chap­ter titled “I’m Play­ing! I’m Play­ing!”, the nar­ra­tive fol­lows the South­ern Cal­i­for­nia Cubs foot­ball team’s chal­lenges as they head into the play­offs. The chap­ter starts with the rev­e­la­tion that some­times the most sig­nif­i­cant adver­sary isn’t the oppos­ing team but rather health issues with­in the squad. Jory Valen­cia, the Cubs’ lead­ing wide receiv­er, suf­fers from walk­ing pneu­mo­nia, which great­ly affects his per­for­mance and jeop­ar­dizes his par­tic­i­pa­tion in the cru­cial play­off games. Despite a high pain tol­er­ance and urg­ing from his fam­i­ly, Jory is put on strict med­ical advice to refrain from stren­u­ous activity—a direc­tive that threat­ens his chances of play­ing in what could be his last high school game.

As the play­offs com­mence, the Cubs are the No. 1 seed and set to face the Lead­er­ship Mil­i­tary Acad­e­my Wolf­pack, a team known for its tough and dis­ci­plined play­ers, includ­ing star line­backer J’wan Wil­son. Their pre­vi­ous encounter with the Wolf­pack had been close, height­en­ing the stakes for the rematch. Notably miss­ing become piv­otal play­ers, the Cubs are deter­mined to rise to the chal­lenge, even as their coach­es devise strate­gies to lever­age Jory’s pres­ence on the field, albeit as a decoy if need­ed.

On game day, against med­ical advice but dri­ven by com­pet­i­tive spir­it, Jory joins his team­mates, embody­ing a mantra of deter­mi­na­tion, “I’m play­ing! I’m play­ing!” His ill appear­ance belies his pas­sion, and even amidst skep­ti­cism from his father, he par­takes in the pregame rit­u­als, hop­ing to con­tribute despite his ill­ness. The game pro­gress­es, reveal­ing the Cubs’ dom­i­nat­ing per­for­mance over the Wolf­pack, though Jory strug­gles with his own lim­i­ta­tions and does not score.

Tragedy strikes as Chris­t­ian Jimenez, a cru­cial play­er and my body pres­i­dent, suf­fers a severe injury, frac­tur­ing his fibu­la. This injury adds to the team’s mount­ing chal­lenges as they strive to main­tain their win­ning momen­tum with­out key play­ers. The chap­ter poignant­ly con­cludes with Chris­tian’s real­iza­tion of the poten­tial end of his foot­ball career, stir­ring emo­tions among team­mates and fans alike.