I started playing baseball when I was 5 years old. There was a church league way back then and my church had several teams in all different age groups. The pastor of our church asked my dad to coach a team and that's when my love of baseball began. I wasn't old enough to actually play, but my dad let me practice with the team and I was the batboy. We wore those old gray wool uniforms with green trim, the church acronym across the front in green letters and green and white stirrup socks with a green ball cap. My first uniform and back then it was awesome.
I found out later in life that my dad had never played baseball and really didn't know that much about the game. When he agreed to coach the team, he went out and bought a couple of books on how to play the game, read them and brought what he had learned to teach the team.
Dad always brought a bag of bubble gum to every practice and game. I remember one time, a kid came running off the field after the third out in an inning of a game smiling and telling everyone that he had blown his first bubble!
Baseball shaped some of the most important parts of my life. First, I got to spend a lot of quality time with my dad. Even if it wasn't practices and games, it was playing catch when he came home from work. There was many a time when I would be sitting on the front step with gloves and a ball waiting for him to pull in the driveway. There were a lot of times when he wouldn't even change clothes and just start tossing the ball with me.
Second, I made life-long friends from those teams. We played ball together for 13+ years. We grew up together. It didn't matter that we all went to different high schools, we still hung out together all the time. The stories we have about playing baseball or going to Ranger games are endless. We were in each other's weddings and still talk today. Best friends for life.
Third, I developed a love of baseball. When I was young, it was just the opportunity to play. Catch with my dad, practices, games, neighborhood games and playing a our own version of grounders and flyballs-just play. It moved from there to listening to Ranger games on the radio and catching a rare game on TV. Saturday mornings were reserved for watching "This Week in Baseball". I started reading about the game in newspapers, magazines and anytime I had to read for school it was a book about baseball. Baseball cards were just a natural extension for my love of the game. I'm not sure why it took until my high school years to find baseball cards, but it did.
I've been blessed to share my love of baseball with my family. All three of my boys love baseball. My daughter too. Baseball was something that we got to do together. I coached all three of my boys as they grew up. Went to and watched so many Ranger games that I can't even begin to count. Now, none of my kids got into baseball cards, but two of my sons coach high school baseball. When my daughter got engaged, she took her non-baseball fan fiance to a Ranger game. At that game, she caught an opposing team's home run ball and threw it back! My wife was not a baseball fan when we first met, but with me taking her to Ranger games, watching it on TV all the time and most importantly, watching her boys play, she became a fan too. Now, I get to share that love of the game with my grandsons. I'm blessed to watch them play T-Ball and coach pitch and I've gotten them into card collecting... a little bit. They're still pretty young so it's a little too much right now, but they are beginning to enjoy it. I get pictures from my kids of my grandsons sitting in the floor surrounded by cards.
I guess to wrap this up, baseball has been and continues to be an important part of my life. (I didn't even mention that I get to do baseball for a living too!)
This started out as an intro to my ramblings post, but turned into something entirely different. I can't post this without at least a couple of pics of baseball cards. These are just some of the cards I've picked up recently.
These are all for my players collection.
These are all for my subset builds.
Absolutely an awesome story! God bless baseball :)
ReplyDeleteSounds ideal. I played baseball as a youth but it was mostly informal, games in the yard or with friends down at the high school. Later played in a very informal league (no actual uniforms). For me, baseball cards came before all of it, I wasn't even watching games on TV when I started collecting.
ReplyDeleteI started playing in a church softball league when I was in 2nd grade. My Uncle was the coach, and he let me play even though you were supposed to be in third grade before you could join the league. I started coaching when I was 14 and am still coaching today. My current coaching positions are for four sports that our local Special Olympics delegation competes in. I am having the most fun with this group. Enjoy the hobby all!
ReplyDeleteI absolutely love reading about people's Little League or youth baseball stories. I played, but my story is a little different from yours. Although I did get to know a bunch of people from baseball, none have been lifelong friends. Although I eventually crossed paths with this one pitcher who dominated one of the leagues I played in decades later. He became my contact person at the local sports card distributer. Woudln't call us friends, but we have shared some stories. And instead of my dad teaching me the game, my mom was the one that really supported me in baseball. She was often the team mom... and up until maybe 9 or 10, she'd toss the ball around with me in the yard and would be my catcher when I practiced pitching.
ReplyDeleteBut stuff like watching This Week in Baseball and collecting cards are things we definitely have in common.
Sports are a wonderful thing to bring people together. Thanks for sharing your story!
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