UNIONTOWN, Pa. -- A T-ball coach's desire to win at all costs became a crime when he twice asked an 8-year-old boy to hurl baseballs at a disabled teammate for $25, a prosecutor said Tuesday.

The trial continues Wednesday.

Mark Downs Jr., 29, who lives in Dunbar, Pa., is charged with criminal solicitation to commit aggravated assault, corruption of minors and reckless endangerment.

Prosecutors said Downs did not want then-9-year old Harry Bowers Jr. to play in a T-ball playoff game last June because the boy didn't play as well as his teammates. Bowers has autism, mild mental retardation and a speech impairment.

So, prosecutors say, Bowers offered a player $25 to throw balls at Bowers to make sure he couldn't play.

Downs' attorney said his client was joking and it was taken out of context. The defense said Downs joked during an earlier game that he'd pay any of his players if they hit an umpire with a line drive, The Pittsburgh Tribune Review reported.

Another player, Keith Reese, testified at a preliminary hearing that he hit Bowers with baseballs first in the groin and later in the ear. He said he did it because Downs offered him $25 to make sure Bowers wouldn't be able to play.

"He told me if I would hit Harry in the face he would pay me $25 ... so he wouldn't be able to play the game," said Reese.

League rules require each player to play at least three innings. Reese said after he hit Bowers in the groin, Downs told him to hit the boy again, harder.

"He said, 'His mom's letting Harry back in the game. Try hitting him harder in the face,'" Reese testified, according to the Pittsburgh Tribune Review.

"I went back out there and threw the ball and hit him in the ear," Reese said.

Bowers' mother, Jennifer Martin Bowers, said she complained to the league and spoke to the state police after she heard what happened. Days later, she had to take her son to the doctor because his ear became infected, she said.

The paper reported that Downs was a third-year volunteer coach in the league, and that the Falcons team included his twin daughters.

Eric Forsythe, the president of the RW Clark Youth Baseball League, said Downs did not ask to return as coach.