Eric Taino reared back, lunged forward and smacked a wicked first serve. The ball spun downwards as it went over the net, bit into the court, shot past the outstretched racket of Nikita Kryvonos and – yikes! – thudded into the tarp about six inches above my head.

As the crowd applauded Taino’s first ace of the match, I scurried out, totally unnoticed, to retrieve the ball that had nearly taken off my head. Another mission accomplished.

When I agreed to spend a couple days as a ball kid (they aren’t just ball boys anymore) during the Challenger Series event at Atkins Tennis Center in late November – purely for research purposes, mind you, and not at all for the chance to watch Mark Philippoussis play up close – I knew it wouldn’t be a tough job. And it must not be, at least judging by the fact that most of my co-workers were around age 10 and seemed to handle it just fine.

But now that I have spent a couple days doing it, I feel obligated to pay tribute for my goofy looking brethren, the unnoticed keystones holding professional tennis matches together.

All I ask is that you try not to hit us.

Before I took the court for the first time, I decided to consult with the experts. I had a friend that had been a ball kid years earlier, and she told me that a professional had once taken aim and intentionally fired several consecutive serves at her. Uh-oh.

But the true veterans offered a more positive outlook. I talked to Tanya Deckert, an 11-year veteran and one of the Atkins “ball babes” – ball chasers that couldn’t quite be considered ball kids anymore. She told me that there were certain players known for screaming at the ball kids, but that the worst of them, Justin Gimelstob, hadn’t come this year.

Other than avoiding the mean players, though, Deckert said being a ball kid was pretty easy.

“It’s not rocket science,” she said. “You just have to pay attention. The best thing to do is wear good shoes and watch the players and watch the ball.”

When I finally stepped onto the court, starting out in the prestigious position of “net runner,” my chair umpire introduced himself as Jim Rose and thanked me for coming out.

In the second game of the match, while I was sprinting for a missed first serve, I bumped the net post and watched its cap clatter to the floor.

Jim spent most of the rest of the match nicely admonishing me about all the things I was doing wrong: “Eric, make sure you sprint all the way to the corner”; “Eric, stand farther away from the court during points”; “Eric, try not to fidget while they’re playing.”

The other net runner, a fifteen-year-old named Billy, got no such reprimands. Afterwards, I told him he was a much better ball kid than I was, and he grinned and said, “Well, I did it last year too.”

My struggles as a ball kid weren’t unprecedented. Three years ago, while working at the tennis center, I agreed to work as a ball kid on a day when they didn’t have enough volunteers. Right away I was assigned to a match involving the defending NCAA champion, Amer Delic.

It was a see-saw battle that culminated in a third-set tiebreaker. Before a pivotal point, I tossed Delic the ball to serve – only it wasn’t his turn. He jolted in surprise as the ball hit him in the back, turned and glared at me, and then proceeded to lose every point the rest of the match.

Now, as a slightly-scared reporter, I asked Delic if he had any good ball kid stories. But instead of remembering me, he recalled his own experience. As a freshman, Delic played in the Atkins Challenger and lost an intense first round match to the fifth seed, a tough professional player.

The next day, the 6-foot-5 Delic, like all the Illini, had to act as a ball kid.

His first match featured the player he had squared off with the day before.

“Of course, I was the tallest ball boy ever, so I kind of stuck out,” Delic said.

Recently, ball kids have been getting more attention, but not all of it good. The ball boy trainer at Wimbledon complained that kids weren’t fit enough to handle it anymore.

At a professional event last year, a player flung his racquet in frustration and nailed a ball kid. And several professional events have decided to use models to collect the balls instead of children – to rather mixed reviews.

As for me, I’m neither a model nor a child. I asked Rose how I’d done after the match, and he told me I’d been pretty good – “if only you would just sprint to the corner.” I asked him if he knew of any ball kid incidents, and he told me that the tennis officials were very careful to protect them at all times.

So it may be that children are better suited for the role, and not just because they are small targets.

I was terrified of making a mistake on the court, but the younger kids seemed totally unconcerned, even when balls were whizzing past their heads. After my first shift, an 8-year-old named Vuk approached me and asked what I wanted to be when I grew up.

I told him I wanted to write, and he laughed, so I asked what he wanted to do. He told me he wanted to “play tennis or paintball.” I told him that paintballs hurt a lot, but Vuk just sniffed.

“I’m really good at dodging,” he said, then went out to scurry after more balls.

Makes sense.