I appear, by all accounts, to finally be recovering from some health battles these past two months.
In other news, I’m playing baseball this summer.
Baseball has always been a love of mine. From vacationing to the Field of Dreams in Iowa at 6 years old to playing catch under the streetlamp with my brand new first base mitt in 6th grade, baseball has always been a part of my life.
My love for baseball, and sports in general, started with baseball. I was channel surfing one day and came across a Twins game on TV. I was hooked. Looking back I think Nick Blackburn was pitching and the M and M brothers, Mauer and Morneau were in their prime/youth years. The Twins won, but really I won because I was hooked.
My father tried, really, really hard to get my two older siblings interested in sports. He failed. So much so he didn’t even try with me. Turns out, that’s how you get someone interested in sports, let them choose it.
I played in little league, and T-ball and all those sorts of things. I don’t remember a whole lot from those days, but I do remember playing in 6th grade for the first time. Dad and I went to Scheels and he bought me a nice first baseman’s mitt and a pair of cleats. That first game I was really nervous. In my first at bat, I got a pop fly single to center. In my third at bat I laced a double. You could say I was on my way.
Dad used to come talk to me in games. “What did you do wrong in that at bat?” He asked me in that same year, after I struck out.
Well, I told him, “I swung at pitches I shouldn’t have. I was in a hurry and didn’t get my pitch.”
He was satisfied with my answer.
I pitched for the first time at the end of that season. We were playing in a tournament and coach Tom Schultz asked who wanted to pitch. We didn’t have anyone. I volunteered.
I did well enough that next time the chance came up he gave me another opportunity. So my pitching career started.
I could write article after article, column after column about baseball memories from there on, but for now, let’s just say the rest is history. I played until I was 19, playing Legion ball for the final time six summers ago. My last game feels like yesterday. I went 3-3 and crushed the first pitch of my final at bat for a triple off the right field fence in New Richland. Coach Drew Paukert also had me pitch the final two innings of the game. I don’t remember the final score, but I know we won. It was bittersweet.
Out for a walk the other evening, I found a softball on the ground in the grass, picked it up, and all these memories and more came flooding back. So I texted Tink Larson the next day and told him I’d like to be on the team if they had a spot for me. He told me practice was Sunday.
In my baseball career, I played from 6ish years old through 19, coached junior high baseball for two years, and umpired from age 15 through about 22. One of those kids I coached I will now be playing alongside this summer, Ben Schoenrock. I couldn’t be more excited.
Will I be really bad? Maybe. Do I care? No.
With one practice under my belt, I can proudly report, I don’t hurt as much as I expected to afterwards. (Turns out it makes sense to ease back into using muscles I haven’t touched in five years.)
P.S. Thank you, Blake, for squatting down and letting me pitch to him off the mound.
“When I opened this door, I was so happy to see you that my heart leapt. It leapt in my chest.” Kevin Costner - Billy Chapel. - For Love of the Game
P.P.S. “For Love of the Game” is one of my all-time favorite movies.
P.P.P.S. That same movie is also Tink Larson’s favorite movie.