I will always be indebted to both my kid’s teams for the opportunity to bond with them on those long car rides. The time with them playing baseball and softball has been truly the best years of my life. There are so many other memories that it’s difficult to choose from, but here are two of the most recent memories with my son and the game of baseball.
We came on to the baseball scene late, ignorant of the showcase/recruiting process. In the middle of his Junior season he became one of the team’s best pitchers. His team went on to win the title for their district and he was asked by a Legion coach to join their team for the summer. At the Legion games, other parents asked what showcase team he was on. Showcase team? At the end of the summer we scrambled around to try and find one but as you can imagine, by then most were pretty much all set with their rosters. We did find a team though that was willing to give him a tryout. The tryout would be the real deal though playing at a tournament at ECU! We found out the day before that he was invited.
ECU is a two hour drive from our home and the first game was at 8:00am at a high school (nearby ECU). Up at 4:30am, he tried to sleep during the drive but he was too excited. We were early and he paced around, so ready to get on the mound. The other teammates had never met him before yet they were wonderful, welcoming him even though they had several good pitchers already. We were winning for most of the game but in the 6th, we almost lost it. We were now only one run up and the bases were loaded. This is the point in which most coaches put him in as he throws the batters off just enough to bring us back into safety. Being a lefty doesn’t hurt either. It’s VERY nerve-wracking as a parent to know that your kid will almost always be the one that gets put in at this point, but he somehow thrives on it and I’ve learned to trust his abilities. And yet the coach still didn’t put him in. He let the pitcher get to a 3-1 count on a lefty batter and THEN put Sidearm Son in! He ran up to the mound and threw a couple of warm up pitches. I love this point in the game because you can see the looks coming from the other dugout as the players start to wonder if they can hit this weird pitch. His first pitch is a fastball, low and just on the inside. Strike! The batter gives a look to his coach like “What the heck was that?”. The second pitch was a nasty curve and, after only two pitches, inning over. The whole team came out of the dugout to congratulate the new kid on the block and show their appreciation for getting them out of a jam. He went on to help the team be undefeated that tournament pitching relief or closing. Unfortunately, there were few scouts at our games and a rainout on Sunday prevented him from showing his stuff to his desired schools. But as he got in the car at the end of the weekend, he turned to me with a sheepish little smile on his face and said, “Momma, I think I made the team”.
The second memory is how I felt after reading one of his scholarship applications. He worked so hard on it and except for a few typos (spelling is definitely not his thing) I thought it was written well. The scholarship is for community service work. Every year, Sidearm Son runs a free clinic for the Boy’s Club of Raleigh. He founded the clinic and does all the organization himself. He ended his application with the following story:
One day while umpiring at one of the club’s little league games, a young boy was very upset because his team lost. I thought he showed potential and I was concerned with him being so upset over losing a game. When I asked him what was wrong, he told me that this was his last game before he had to move away. I told him that losing was part of playing baseball and that because he had so much potential, he’d have plenty of other chances. I brought a smile to his face when I told him I’d be looking for his name one day in the Majors. After I said that, the little boy gave me a look that I will never forget. It was a look of hope, possibilities and dreams. As he ran to his family, I realized how much one small gesture can make a huge difference.