Tom Hanks said it in that movie, and every Dad has told his ball playing son that a million times.
Play hard. Play Hurt. Play your guts out. Most of all, Play ball. Play ball until you can’t play it anymore.
Base Ball, people will most definitely come, point to the fence, don’t step on the chalk , bring it, take two, lets play two, infield fly rule, pickle, resin bag, pine tar, and even the most feared piece of gear known to sportdom, the jockstrap.
For three years solid the Howard Huskies ball team has occupied a high priority in these young men and their parents. For some of us, the ties that bind take us back to when our boys were 7-8 years old, playing recreational ball. We have seen each others boys grow into fine young men and they have become our other surrogate children in the process—OUR boys.
For three years us Parents had quite the time of it, cheering, jeering, using our “bad words” from time to time, loving “blue”, hating “blue”, wanting to burn “blue” in effigy, driving all over the state, dining on concession stand fare, even second, third and fourth guessing the Coach—but ever supporting our boys. We rocked with Mr. Finklesteins’ between inning and walk out music, and heard Kerrell Goolsbys’ colorful play by play commentary….
Our Boys… Stewart “Stewie” Bowers, Brandon “B-leigh” Leigh, Matthew “Fitzy” Fitzgibbons, Kyle “KK” Kelley, Mike “Big Mike” Atkinson, and my one and only Joe “Joefish” Fisher.
And so it came to pass on that wonderful spring night at the Huskies “home field” (one day maybe), our boys--- the six seniors of the original Howard Huskies—played their last baseball game together.
We lost two out of three. And it still sucks to lose.
It matters not. They had played their guts out and that’s what matters. They were a unified group of kids that had a common goal, and that’s what matters. They backed each other up, cheered each other on, and took it like men when the end came.
But there’s no crying in baseball.
And we never saw it coming.
Perhaps it was the Coaches post game huddle. Perhaps it was Fitzy who started it all. Then Stewart. Then Joe. Followed quickly by Mike and B-Leigh-- Kyle would be next. However or whoever, it doesn’t matter. It snuck up on everyone. It was the bottom of the ninth for High school Baseball for the Original Huskies.
Our boys.
They remained on the field. The field where they spent the last three years playing together. Now they hugged and cried together.
They were having their senior moment. The entire team huddled on the field. The Seniors gave their parting guidance to the underclassmen, had some more laughs, tears, and hugs, all the while remaining on the field. Coach came out and said “The Seniors are having a moment with the rest of the team; they’ll be through in a few minutes.” That was ok by me—if they wanted to stay all night I was fine with it. At that moment I would have taken every one of em for a beer.
On the other side of the fence, the Parents saw this and spoke in whispers in much the same manner as when we go to funerals to mourn the death of someone.
Reverence.
Some of us Dads went to the dugout gate to receive our boys. One by one they came out and the same thing that happened on the field happened in the arms of Dads and Moms.
Then we had our Senior moment. I broke the rules. I cried in Baseball. That makes me a hypocrite. I’m not the only one, thank goodness.
It was the end of an era. A turning point for all of us. A bittersweet night as these fine young men realize the end of what has been a part of their life for a decade and a half.
For us Dads, we were losing our youth for the second time. We had been reliving it thru our boys all these years. Not only were our sons baseball days were coming to an end but the sobering realization that there wasn’t a damn thing we could do about it. It hurt. It hurt a lot. It still hurts. It hurts too much to cuss and I’m too old to cry.
But then again, there’s no crying in baseball.
