Summer Lessons from First Base o_O

I'm genuinely sorry things on this blog were dry this past summer, but work and extra curricular things got in the way of writing on here. One of those extra-curricular things was another season of baseball (slo-pitch) in my hometown ^_^

During the spring, more than a few of my friends talked me out of retirement to play one more year in a coed slo-pitch league. I thought my knees couldn't take the strain, after what happened to them last year, yet reluctantly I decided to give it one more go. As the season progressed, I decided to ditch the knee pads, and I was in much better shape over the course of the summer than I was last year. My arm, however, had other ideas o_O

Bill Buckner: Pressure and Forgiveness

One night after practice, our team decided to meet at a Vietnamese restaurant ^_^ I remember that trip, not because the moment we all entered "Pho Mi 99" a thunderstorm erupted outside casting billions of raindrops and knocking the power out in the restaurant, but my elbow seized up on the drive. I told my teammate Brendan, who was with me in the car, and he said "Uh oh". Quick note: If you tell a baseball dude that you feel the muscles in your elbow are tightening or you feel it's in pain, and he responds with "Uh oh", that's not good o_O Up until that point, I returned to form as a stalwart left-fielder (What's wrong with stalwart? Nathan, stop laughing), but I was throwing a lot more than I did last year. So our team captain Tony switched me to first base.

I played first base twice before in the last four years, but there is a lot resting on your shoulders. I remember my first game as a starter at first base, o_O and yes, I did make that face. The fortunes of the infielders, the team, and even the season hinge on one's performance; the ability to make your teammates all-stars and give them big time assists on plays, which come from nothing, and then simply catch the ball when it's thrown is quite a burden to bear o_O Our record was 1-5 up until that point in the season, so there was little room for error with only six games left to play. When our team takes the field, to relax and support the infielders, I went to each one and touched gloves. It's a trick I picked up from my days at shortstop, and knowing "the gun wasn't at our heads" I did it to calm down, and not think about...you know o_O Shockingly, the first ball hit came off the end of the bat right to me! The ball surprised me as it skipped along, so I chose to knock it down and keep it front of me. A second later, I picked up the dead ball and stepped on first for the out ^_^ Phew!

The second batter hit a grounder to our third baseman (Hi Marcus...Ivan...and Brendan LOL). The joke was use in practice is "Six foot four", which is my height; it's also a hint to our fielders about throws in the dirt. Unfortunately, when Marcus threw to me, I was still nervous o_O and it skipped past and hit the fence behind me O_O As the batter rounded first, I ran to the ball which was closer than I thought it was, so when I turned to throw to second the runner wasn't even halfway! A rundown ensued, and we tagged the runner out for out #2 ^_^

Buckner, from his Cubs days

A couple more pitches later, I caught a pop fly for out number three, and that was that ^_^ We escaped with our first three up, three down (-ish) inning in recent memory, and that started us off on our run to the championship game. In our next eight games, we only dropped one, and we became "a team of destiny" ^_^ I was never on a "team of destiny" before, so I didn't know quite how to react o_O All I could think about was Bill Buckner.

There are majestic names in baseball like Babe Ruth, heroic names like Jackie Robinson, and even some scumbag names like Barry Bonds. As in every avenue of life, unfortunately, there are tragic names like Bill Buckner. Part of my fear about playing first base was thinking about not being "the goat" or "that dude that cost us the game" or "the reason we sit at the runner's up table and not at the champion's table". It was wrong to envision me not playing like someone because of an unfortunate incident, which never should have happened to begin with (Neyer, Rob. "John McNamara Falls Asleep" in Big Book of Baseball Blunders, P.226-229).

The first baseman I should admire and wish to play like is Bill Buckner: 2715 hits (more than Hall of Famers Ted Williams (2654), and Ernie Banks (2583)), NL batting title winner in 1980 with the Cubs (BA .324), 1981 All-Star, and part of two league pennant winners (1974 Dodgers, 1986 Red Sox). Forget baseball, save for a moment, but if we approached baseball and life like Bill Buckner, with the forgiveness, grace, and humility that he gave us after what happened that night at Shea Stadium, in New York in 1986, I think we would all be better people.

In the meantime, my arm is a little better. I don't plan on wearing a giant pad over it when I play next year (Yes, my friends, I'm playing next year. Kevin, stop clicking on the like button so much LOL).