Baseball

Growing up we were mostly a soccer family. I have an older sister who was great at soccer playing many years on many comp teams. I have a younger brother that was huge into soccer, again playing on several comp teams all through his youth. I played soccer and basketball for the most part. I wanted to play baseball but I always wanted soccer more and the seasons overlapped and logistically it wouldn’t work. At least I want to say is was logistics but I’m guessing it was more due to the fact I sucked at sports and my brother was much better so he took precedence with the comp leagues. I’m good with it now (sniff sniff). Finally, when I was around 12, after failing to make a comp team for the 29^th time, I quit soccer and decided to try my hand at baseball. Let’s just say the results were not pretty. I was playing ball with kids that had been playing since half of their lives, coupled with a coach who thought he was the second incarnation of Tommy Lasorda. I tried my hardest but I just couldn’t get it (again I think this is because I’m about as coordinated as Bambi when he tries to walk on ice). I kept playing until I was 16. I got marginally better. I could hit once in a while and I actually became pretty decent at 3^rd base (3^rd base in baseball. Get your mind out of the gutter).

Though I was not good at baseball and my first year was awful, I stuck with it because I loved it. The constant chatter back and forth between teammates, the sunflower seeds in the dugout, the root beer at the concession stands (if you are one of those people who played in the Centerville league you know the root beer I’m talking about. No and I mean no root beer has ever tasted so good before or since), the bruises from missed balls and the feeling after a frozen rope into the gap in left field. There is no greater satisfaction then throwing someone out at 3^rd base from right field. None. I met one of my best lifelong friends in that league. I always hit last, he always hit 2^nd to last. Again but we both loved it. To this day I wish I would have started in baseball sooner.

Fast forward 20 years to now. When Alex became old enough we put him in soccer. He played two years but he didn’t like it. When he turned 7 he came to me and said he wanted to play baseball. Alex was one of those weird kids who actually liked watching baseball on TV. He was three years old when I was watching the Cubs and Cardinals on ESPN one Sunday evening. He was running around the house being a three year old when he stops, looks at the TV, and drops on the floor to watch with me. He has always loved the sport. When it was Connor’s turn for a sport he didn’t want to play anything. It was no to soccer and no to baseball. He tried basketball last winter but didn’t want to play this year. We forced T-ball on him last spring and he thought it was ok. We forced baseball on him this spring and he is liking it more and more. In fact here is Connor at his first game.

Yes that is my kid being that kid that picks grass and sits down during the game. That all changed after he got his first hit of the season the next inning. He was so serious running down the baseline but all smiles when he arrived at the base. Then he was able to play first base the next inning and all was well in his world.

Alex on the other hand lives and breathes the sport and thank the lord above that he has more of Mandy’s coordination than mine. There were tears after they canceled our first two games due to rain. Tears when we couldn’t practice outside because of the rain the last two weeks. As soon as dinner is over its outside to throw the ball around. When he found out this year was team pitch, he wanted to learn to pitch like his favorite pitcher Jared Weaver. So now instead of fielding practice it’s pitching practice, every night. My right shoulder will never be the same.  His first game was Wednesday night. His coach comes to me after the first inning and tells me to start warming Alex up, he was pitching the next inning.

 

For his first time pitching in a game off a mound, he did great. He tackled (sorry different sport metaphor but it works here) that mound with all the grit and determinedness that I have come to expect from him. He was so tired after but that grin didn’t leave his face until he fell asleep that night. This kid just loves the sport. Next to the Hobbit, The Rookie is his favorite movie. We are going on a trip this summer to see an Angels game and Padres game and they are both so excited. The Angels are both their favorite team. We saw Mike Trout play with the Bees when he was here for his short stint last spring and they have been fans ever since.

I hope both of them never lose their love of the sport. Baseball is the American pastime. I know that football is more popular and I love football, but there is something poetic, romantic and nostalgic about baseball. There is nothing better than playing catch with your sons. It’s so simple, so pure. If you’re a man that even remotely likes the sport and doesn’t tear up at the end of Field of Dreams when Ray plays catch with his dad at the end of the movie, well, you’re just not human. Go listen to the speech that Terrance gives at the end of the movie and you’ll understand.

“The one constant through all the years Ray, has been baseball. American has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It has been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt and erased again. But baseball has marked the time. This field, this game; it’s a part of our past, Ray. It reminds us of all that once was good and it could be again.”