Baseball Makes Me Batty...

For those that know me or have followed my blog, I tend to despise Little League Season. Despise may be a strong word, but detest and loathe may be more appropriate. Feel free to surf for my other baseball rants, but truly over the years, they seem to remain rather consistent so I would completely understand the desire to not surf.

My son moved up to the next league of Little League. I believe he is in the Majors. I have been the scorekeeper for my son's ball teams for the past...six years if not longer. I take any job I do, seriously, even if just volunteering. My son's past coach used to do stat spreadsheets and I was responsible for tallying not only hits and runs but strikes, balls, errors, walks, outs, pitch count, score...you name it, I did it.

This year, my son has a different coach. For one inning I had the reprieve from score keeping. Score keeping in many ways keeps me sane. It keeps me from cursing and yelling and getting overly involved in the game. Every year with almost every sport, a parent or a friend suggests that I coach. I know better.

I know my limitations. I know my competitiveness. I know my perfectionism. I know myself.

And that is why I do not coach. Other than that one time where I confronted my son's football coach for not allowing the children a water break after two hours in 85 degree weather and the kids were 8, I do not confront coaches. Better them than me I say.

Last week I hit an all time low with the frustration of baseball. As I've blogged recently, my son's team has six assistant coaches, aka father's, that help out the team. In a decade of baseball there has only been one female coach and/or assistant and not even on my son's team. Baseball clearly is a sexist sport. So while I sit quietly keeping the score, I know 98% of the rules - the other 2% are the obscure ones...like if there is an intentional walk and the pitcher chooses not to pitch (is that even legal?) and walks the batter, do you count four pitches?

So last week while our coach was on vacation or out of town or boycotting baseball by locking himself in his bathroom drinking away his baseball blues...the Assistant Coaches attempted to coach. All hell broke loose when I realized the wrong batter was batting. I attempted to talk to one, then two of the Assistants. They thrust some chicken scratched lineup at me. While trying to figure out what they were doing, I missed pitch after pitch. Bottomline, when they substituted players, they allowed the original youth in the order to continue to bat. A scorekeepers hell and completely WRONG in this league AND the league below us.

Sure, I get that these kids are 13 and 14 and it shouldn't be a big deal, right? But to me, I take my responsibilities seriously. I also had spent an hour trying to figure out the excel spreadsheet to enter in hitting and pitching stats earlier in the day. So when I had two batters in one batting position up to bat, go ahead try to keep track of that in the score book! After what seemed like ten minutes, I figured out the batting order for the coaches - at the one coaches request and he wrote the new order for the next inning. Needless to say, the next inning came up and the kids were in the previous order. Sigh...The coach from the other team came over and said, "I got a little confused last inning. What happened?" Ummm...yeah. I'm only glad that we didn't win as the boys would have been devastated to learn the win would have been a loss based on coaching and illegal substitutions and batting!

So the coach is back. We have shared a few emails. He thanked me for score keeping and understanding the rules - since I had even corrected him when someone had gone up to bat out of order. It happens, I get that. But if a pitch is thrown, it's also an out.

I found myself typing this response to him this morning when he said he would make things easy on me and thanking me for understanding the rules of baseball..."It would just seem that after most of our children playing ball for almost a decade and likely fathers that have either played ball or watched ball, that they would be knowledgeable about the game. Everything is fine. I do understand the majority of the rules although some of them do vary with the different age leagues. As far as substitutions, as long as I'm informed of substitutions, it's fine with me. Just would make it a lot easier if "Assistants" understand the rules of substitution as well. Because afterall, baseball can be rather sexist - and when trying to clarify what was happening, it was the realization that, I'm just the scorekeeper."

And then I hit cancel and decided to blog. 'Cause sometimes venting to cyberspace rather than to a person that really doesn't know you that you see on a regular basis is just better.

I feel better. That is until Tuesday night's game...

Beamed Balls...Practice

After opening day of baseball season, a male parent began to talk to my son and I about the best way to practice hitting. He advised that if you master his method, regardless of the speed of a pitched ball...you will hit it! Easy enough, right?

The Method (As described by said man): Purchase wiffle golf balls. Get a broomstick. Have mom/dad or said adult sit on a bucket about yeah distance away - from here to there (I'm depth and perception challenged...so say 10 feet away). Adult shall then throw the wiffle golf balls while said batter attempts to hit them. Batter will miss the first 20 or so pitches.

Easy enough, right? Off we went to the store and purchased three dozen wiffle golf balls. We debated the holes vs. no holes and went with the holes. 12 wiffle golf balls were 1.99 (-15%) whereas in the baseball aisle yellow colored wiffle golf ball sized 12 pack were 4.00. Then taking the smallest broom handle we own - which actually came from a child sized rake in the garage - I removed the rake and we had the "bat".

The weather wasn't really cooperating. I also didn't want to be chasing missed pitches and hits all around the yard. So what did I propose? (Really, I did graduate from college in three years - I realize one may not realize this, but honestly, I did!)...

Lock said dumb parent (aka myself) in the one car garaged with said 13 year old son to keep the balls in the garage. At first, to allow for air circulation we kept the garage open, which only allowed the balls to escape underneath. We eventually closed the garage door entirely - seeing that 36 wiffle golf balls can be thrown in a matter of minutes at most there was no way we were going to suffocate or trap ourselves with asphyxiation of my various gas cans and mowers!

Soon after beginning the process, my son started to get the hang of it. I'm sure you are much brighter and intelligent than I, so what happened?

I started getting beamed and pegged by wiffle golf balls. First it was the knee. Then it was the finger. Then it was the knuckle. The shin. The head. Ok, I may not be the brightest bulb!

When the line drive to the chest came, I couldn't help but scream, "Oh my God! I don't want to grow a third boobie!" as I wailed in subsequent pain. Needless to say, my son crossed his legs and doubled over in hysterics laughing, snorting and trying to get out, "You so did not just say that! That is SO WRONG!" Of course he continued to laugh. Me, I continued to grab my chest as if dying from a fatal shot (Afterall it was a rocket of a wiffle ball launched at me!)

Torture...is this what I signed up for? Of course it is...and since he beamed me in the neck I feared the hickie look to...maybe the bag over my head will be a better look for me!

Curtain Compulsion

I know that it has been a while since I blogged. No worries though, I haven't kicked my shower curtain compulsion. Really I have tried, just not successful to date. I did realize that to some surprise, I only own...eleven...shower curtains - well that was what was in the closet at least when I bothered to count!

Last weekend while out shopping and taking advantage of 15% off, I had to stroll through the shower curtain aisle. What is a shopping trip without? I found a shower curtain that was marked $9.99 that rang up for $17.99. When all was said and done and a minute at the customer service desk, my new shower curtain cost approximately $2.75. I still have yet to hang my super cool shower curtain I purchased earlier, but here's my dirt cheap one! I like the calming effect, even if it doesn't have any olive green in it...