Coach. Mom’s passion is baseball, thus my passion is baseball. She loved baseball, especially the Yankees as her dad was a huge fan for as long as she can remember. She worked for the Colorado Rockies for several years and even ran a local youth baseball league.
When she found out I was coaching a 7 and under youth team this year with a close friend she was thrilled. Unfortunately, she passed before the season started and I couldn’t share the progress our team made over the season.
I coached youth and high school baseball for over 12 years and there is no comparison to coaching 6- and 7-year-olds. They have an attention span of a few minutes, love building sandcastles in the dirt, chasing bugs, and enjoy laying down out in the field, all of this during games. They need help to tie their shoes and when they get out, they start crying. They have trouble keeping their hands to themselves and keep asking when practice will be over.
During our first scrimmage, which we lost by 20 runs, I turned to my friend and asked what he had gotten me into. That scrimmage was a day after mom passed and it was so therapeutic. Seeing kids who are just starting out their journey in life, juxtaposed with someone so special whose life just ended, was both sad and beautiful.
This past weekend we ended our season, going further than anyone expected and finished 3rd in our league. The parents were crying tears of joy and pride and the kids were crying tears of disappointment.
The great thing about coaching is that it’s so much more about the life lessons you teach the kids. Showing them that with hard work, incremental improvements, being a great teammate, and having fun, you get better each day. And over time you improve as a player, a team, and a person. And the kids also teach us adults lessons about the joys of celebrating small successes, about how important having a positive role model is in their life that supports and loves them unconditionally, and that sometimes we all need to take a break and build a sandcastle or catch a bug, even in the most important of times.
Life is strange, it has its ups and downs, ebbs and flows, good days and bad days. It’s also precious and beautiful, even during the toughest of times. #baseball #coach #lifeisbeautiful #growthanddevelopment #bettereachday #alwayslearning #1%better #enjoyeverymoment