RHome410: Bigger Boy Baseball

Tuesday, October 7, 2014

Bigger Boy Baseball

Prince Go-for-It so wanted to play on the high school team, but firmly believed he'd have no chance against those playing on year-around club teams. This resulted in his begging to be able to try out for select teams, too, in order to adequately prepare.

Here, I could rant on and on about how I feel about what's happened to kids' sports, and how unfair it is that a kid can't hope to play on his school team (supposedly an affordable opportunity open to all), unless he's played years on an expensive and prestigious select team first. We avoided that merry-go-round for years with the older kids, and even had a firm rule against select sports. Unfortunately, it became time to flex for the times, and the needs of the particular kid.

Yes, it was expensive...the team fees, gas for two or three weekly practices -year around- @ 20 miles away, additional food expenses in extra meals for the player, and more costly convenience meals for the family, the equipment, and the travel. It was also a bit annoying to have all of the requirements set by the team, with seemingly little regard for family schedules, church (I'm not a fan of Sunday practices), and family finances. I feel that they forget that since we pay the fees, they work for us.

But, basically, we sign up and pay them to help improve our kids as baseball players and give them special opportunities to play, and to be seen by college scouts, etc., so they set the priorities for all in doing so. --It's time to look at the good of the experience.

His dedication had him spending
hours in our garage hitting into the net.

Prince Go-for-It had several good friends on this team, he loved playing, and improved a lot. He did make the high school team, playing right field for the C and JV teams. He intended to play right field for his club team, too, but usually was in center, where with his fast moves and accurate judgement of the ball, he could cover a lot of ground for them. He also pitched, although not his favorite spot. I wish that Prince CuddleBunny's pure joy at playing could've transferred to his brother. The older prince wasn't as quite ready to yell, "Awesome," after a loss.

This group played more games than any other select team in the area, and we had some 'forced vacations' out of it. Out of necessity, we took trips requiring hotel stays out of town. It would be nice to be able to choose our own destinations when we're spending the money, but left to our own devices, we wouldn't have gone anywhere.