Dear Baseball Parents

Dear Parents,


As our season winds down, we should all appreciate the improvement in the team. All of the ballplayers, from the first-timers to the grizzled six year old veterans, have improved tremendously. If we look at the wrong time, we may have seen an easy or routine ground ball going right under the shortstops legs. We may have noticed some swings that still need a little “refinement,” and that’s okay.


It’s time to appreciate the boys for the athletes they are today, and the athletes they are becoming. They are works in progress, and it’s an upward trend. As much as we may hope or daydream, there is little chance that any of our little Brian McCanns will ever make a living playing ball. Judging from the conversations I overheard, we are more likely raising rocket scientists, or at least science fiction authors. When the coaches would yell, “Baseball ready,” sometimes the team looked ready, like the ’27 Yankees. Sometimes, the team was scanning the horizon for a possible Deathstar or Millennium Falcon. Let’s keep both memories. If any of our boys don’t go into the aerospace industry, horticulture is a safe bet.

As a coach and dad, I will keep every memory. I will remember proudly the swings that were once tomahawk chops, the dashes down the first base line that were like a sailor wandering back to the ship, the dives for balls way out of reach, and the pop-ups that were caught later in the season, rather than ignored just a couple months ago.

Sometimes a coach can’t see all the camaraderie these boys building, but it could always be heard. It will probably be August (and the start of another baseball season) before the coaches stop hearing the echoes of “Come on baby, Burn it up” from the dugout.

Up and down the line-up, there is improvement in every boy. It’s obvious in the way they ran and played, in the way they became listeners, and in the way they became friends.

Congratulations parents and thanks for sharing.