Little League ~ Softball ~ Baseball

I'll go in reverse order of the title of today's blog.  Baseball - America's pass time or past time.  Never really got into it because it drives me crazy that on what should be the third out someone can keep hitting foul balls - for a very long time.  Anyway....Mom and Dad are Chicago Cub fans.  When Mom was a young girl/teenager she was so into baseball she wanted to be a professional ball player - that always blows me away to think my mom wanted to play baseball.  Mike and I say the three greatest aka funniest moments in baseball history are:

1. George Brett's pine tar bat issue and how he could get from his dug out to home plate in two giant, Mother-may-I steps.
2. One of Nolan Ryan's last baseball games he pitched he accidently hit the young whipper-snapper batter.  The young whipper-snapper actually had the gaul to not charge the mound but head toward Nolan - big mistake.  Nolan calmly stepped off the mound, walked toward the batter, grabbed him in a head lock and thumped the poop out of his head.  Nobody messes with Nolan Ryan.
3. Dusty Baker's little boy was with him in the dugout several years ago in a playoff game when the other team was at bat.  All of a sudden the little 2-3 year old was out on the field by home plate and almost got trampled by the opposing team member crossing home plate.  Luckily the opposing team member grabbed the little guy on the fly (by his shirt) to save his life because another team member was right behind him to score.  The next camera shot was of Dusty's face and the commentator saying something like, "I wouldn't want to be in Dusty's shoes when he gets home tonight".

Softball - after golf, that was Mike's sport.  Actually before me, in his younger days I think he played fast pitch?  Whatever he played he screwed up both his rotator cuffs and never had them fixed - so he could never raise his arms above his shoulders - but he continued to play.  A few seasons he was on a mens' team and a mixed team - and both were good teams - and I was the score keeper.  I not only had to keep track of the score, but the strikes and balls, errors, and where the opposing team would hit each time they came to bat so I could tell our team captain where that person had hit last time.  And when Mike slid - he slid head first because he wasn't going to mess up his ankles he told me.  I remember one game in Urbandale he started his slide into home a little early and dug himself into the baseline and stopped short of home plate.  He had to reach up and over to touch home - it was a riot.  Mike was mainly a catcher, but in our early years he played short and one time he jumped so high to catch a ball that both teams were impressed.  In the last years he played ball - on the WDM police team - he was their pitcher - but his true love was catching and owning the plate.

In July and August on Sunday nights my church has had friendly softball between our small groups - with bring your own dinner before.  I went a couple of weeks ago when the weather was decent and when they asked if any of the ladies would keep score I volunteered and had a ball.  I actually started to track the balls and strikes and then told myself this was not competitive softball.  Tonight's the last night and they are playing right now.  I didn't go - yesterday while at the grocery store and bending over to get something I did something to my back.  It wasn't much and the sore place on my back wasn't big - but it was enough to be very uncomfortable if I didn't watch how I walked and sat.  I spent most of last night propped on the bed with the heating pad - and it still hurt this morning when I woke up so I've been babying myself most of the day.

Little League - different times this past week I'd see the Little League World Series would be on tv but didn't watch until this afternoon when the championship game was on between the West (California) and Japan.  Mike and I used to watch these games because these boys were amazing.  Some of the shortest could hit the ball the furthest.  It was fun to see the Midwest "farm boys" aka bigger boys against boys from New York.  And we'd always cheer for the team from Curacao - an island in the Caribbean we had traded our timeshare many years ago.  One year the team from Bloomfield, IA was the Midwest team - where Mom and Dad are from - that was awesome!  So I watched California and Japan play all six innings with California taking the title back from Japan.  One neat thing was seeing the Japanese manager smile and have a fun time - which funneled down to his team.  Normally the Japanese are very serious but these boys were having a great time - up until they lost the game.

But one thing that will always bug me and the California team did it - the bills on their ball caps were straight as could be.  Ball cap bills are suppose to be curved - not straight - I learned that from Mike.  Now.....in an earlier game the kid pitching from California did have his face saved from a horrible accident when the batter smacked the ball right back to him and it hit the straight bill of his cap - straight on - I saw the replay several times and it was amazing.  But I'm old school and will continue to bend the bills of my caps like Mike taught me.  I still remember the guys on the WDM PD reserve unit just staring at me when we got our reserve ball caps and the first thing I did was bend the bill of my cap.  I think they were shocked a female knew to do this and how to do this :)