Lessons Learned, by a Dad, from "Little- League" Baseball.

After Twenty Years of Coaching From Tee-ball through the Junior/Senior Little Leagues......and 15 years of life beyond the white lines of the baseball diamonds

By Doc Marraccino

On the “Field of Dreams”

Preface:....“Baseball reminds us of all that once was and what?

?????????could be again…..”

Baseball is described as the game that captures the imagination and spirit of the United States in the last century; I really think it is more than a game; it is a metaphor for American life from its inception to present. The most, which I ever learned about baseball was taught to me by the children who played the game.?I will share this story with you.?

But first, let me add the greater context before a submissive nostalgia envelopes you;?Baseball and sport is the story of democracy and its survival of both; it is in our trust in the youthful enthusiasm, innovation and optimism to endure as a nation.

This endeavor, baseball,?might seem trivial, but if there ever were someone to convince you that it?is not; it is David Zirin, who wrote: “The Kaepernick Effect: How a Knee Inspired a Generational Revolt”. David so eloquently brought to light the significance of sport to our American democracy.?Sport is the “true meritocracy” of the American ideal since the nineteenth century; yet at the same time, marginalized our most talented athletes along the lines of a eugenic stereotypes and gender bias.?Sport really became the “myth of inclusion and the reality of exclusion” embroiled in a “fight for access by marginalized peoples”. ?To find the true spirit of American, we must look through the experiences of?our young Athletes who have an unadulterated and transformational?belief?that “in the impossible, the incredible will happen”.?Unshackled to the Grecian, alabaster veneer, young athletes trust that greatness can be achieved from the forces from within. The history of sport is the history of?Americans becoming a better self and a better country which is built upon a belief that we are a new Colossus (Emma Lazarus) to“keep, (away )ancient lands, your storied pomp!”, and class warfare.?

What are not just sports’ stories but American stories; we learn that the character of great Americans and athletes?are transformational in igniting a" generational revolt", leading to the dignity of productive work and self-actualization. ?As Zirin points out,?sports reveal the great divide between "transformational and transactional" people -transactional people are in it for themselves; whereas, transformational people lead change, empathetically recognizes the humanism in all, and build the skills to recognize that within us. Transformational people are the athletes, coaches and teachers who are the’ helpers" that Mr. Roger's mom?encouraged all to seek out. The true transformational ones take the risks to use their talents to inspire. This schism between transformational and transactional is the last civil war in this democracy, and let us all give thanks today that the transformational people are committed to build -back - better a transformational democracy in the true spirit of the “Kaepernick Effect” .

The meaning of Baseball in 200-words or less:

?( or what you can write without a Number :“2”-pencil):

“If you build it, he will come”....a whisper from the corn field in a Field of Dreams, and this whisper describes how a baseball player learns the game.?The baseball player is built one strike at a time, one missed fly ball over an outreached glove, or?one errant throw in a meandering direction.?At times, the mastery of this game seems impossible.?From the whisper also comes the secret that keeps a little child trying despite repeated failure.?This realization is: if you “believe in the impossible, the incredible can come true”.?So wait, ...and he will learn the skills that are necessary to become a baseball

player.?Most importantly, parental patience will nurture an ability to dream of the

impossible in any endeavor.?The lessons learned from baseball will take you through life and parenting; as Jim Bouton wrote in the final lines in "Ball Four"; “You spend a lot of your life gripping a baseball, but you find out all along that it was the other way around,” ....so true ...so true!?

In 1997, I was reminded of this “dream” world of baseball during the first game of the AAA season.?Up until that year as a manager, I could cross the white lines anytime during the game. As I began to step across the white lines to talk to the pitcher, the umpire, John Hartnagle, yelled: “ You can’t do that!” “ You cannot step across the lines.”?At that moment, I felt like Doc. Graham in the movie: the Field of Dreams.?Doc. Graham was an old man with one regret in his life: his baseball career was shorten.?As Doc. crossed the white lines of a baseball field in the movie, he was magically transformed from an old man to a youth in his beloved game, Then I realized that the world within the white lines should be left to the imagination and childhood, and regrets, which we accumulate from weathered experience, should remain outside of the white lines.

?Baseball is also a democratic game that allows for all imperfections.?There are?professional players of every proportion because every position requires unique skills.?However, the game can be won or lost at any position.?Encourage children to find a?position which matches their talents and imagination, and refrain from unrealistic?expectations by choosing the position first.?

In the middle of a maelstrom of a baseball game, quite moments of personal reflection may be the most memorable.?If you were to ask any baseball player, except a pitcher,?about the most important, personal memory of the game, he/she would tell you how their?most incredible effort benefited the team.?As an outfielder tumbling end-over-end?into the soft grass, I still can still see the quite smile upon my centerfielder’s face?(upside down, of course) after my glove carried me into the air to make the game-winning catch.?Years ago, I remember a player, Chris Capelluto.?As routine put-out:1-to-3 was made to end a tense inning, Chris, the pitcher, said, “I waited for this play for my entire life.”?Up until then, Chris waited seven long,.....long years ago.?As a travel-team player, Chris promises me to make three great plays a game, and he does!

?

Finally, baseball is undeniably a team sport.?No one can win a baseball game alone, and, by the age of thirteen, your son will learn this aspect about the game.?Baseball?players are all virtuosos working for the team.?No team can win without individuals who are dedicated to do their best to play.?“The sum of the parts is truly greater than the?whole.” At the beginning of past few seasons, I gave each of my team members a golden dollar coin, and told them to spent this coin during?the final championship.?I cautioned them:?

“If they want to spend that dollar when they are wearing a uniform and playing in the last game, they better understand the meaning of the inscription on the back of all American coins: E. Pluribus Unum.”- from the many comes one (team).?I hope that the team understands that they have to work together as a team if they expect to win.?Alternatively, they can chant Latin phrases during the game, and attain a psychological advantage over the opposing team.

Through the years, one small step in the sand………one giant leap from childhood.

Every year, you learn something new about this childlike world.?I learned that thesix-to-eight-year-old kids just love the game, the uniform, and the dirt.?

??????????????????????

??????????????????????Oh the dusty days of Tee-Ball!

?I notice that baseball to is still part of a great sandbox. Children love to play?with everyone in the sandbox.?The cherished toy in the sandbox is the ball.?At first,hordes of kids descend upon the ball when they see it coming.?Your baseball teamresembles a soccer team.?With patience, the manager teaches his kids that the closestmember to the ball can play with it.?By the end of year, you can say set-and-ready, and all the kids assume a position that, at least, makes them look like a baseball team.?

In the?A-Division, children become so self-conscious that girls exclude

?themselves, and boys are willing to assist.?Now, the sandbox is divided, but there is room for everyone.?By the end of the years of A-Division, the children learn respect for each team member, discipline, and rules.?However they still have fun in the sand.?I just wish that the girls stayed, and they just stop putting over-sized softballs in their hands; throwing just becomes so much difficult.

In AA-Division, the Ego of a nine-year-old is bound to the imagination, and that is wonderful!?At the age of nine, children have grandiose dreams that foster?unlimited potential.?The nine-year-old boy cannot understand why professional scouts are not signing him to a Major-League contract.?However, the fall from Olympus is swift and steep, and, in a moment, the fearless baseball player can become emotional child.?A strikeout with loaded bases can act like a picador prodding tears.?

As Twain said, “Baseball is the very symbol of our outward and visible expression of

?drive and push and rush and struggle and raging fears....”.?There are two types of baseball players at this age; those children who listen to their mentors …………and soccer or lacrosse players.?

In AAA-Division and throughout the Major Leagues, the players utilized theskills that they labored to learn in the past.??Now the manager should keep his eye off?the ball, and develop the strategy which is needed to play the game.?Stealing bases?becomes a potent weapon for a manager, and your catcher is an invaluable asset.?These?years are also the first time to cultivate the neglected outfield.?Outfielders should learn the techniques of backing-up plays,?cross stepping, and?crow hopping.?Every outfield?probably does not take a step with the “throwing-hand” foot, because no one taught him.?The outfield should be moving on every hit to a strategic position.??Yogi once noted that DiMaggio never made a great play because he was always there.?This center fielder was always there because he knew in his head where the ball was going to be before it got there.?However, his speed helped too!?Moreover, kids just love to learn the rules of the game because they know to use the rules to their advantage.?Finally, base runners should learn the discipline of base running which is guided by coaches on first and third.?

For a coach or parent who watched kids struggled since Tee-Ball, the best experience is to see the emergence of the passion, the excitement of achievement, and confidence in every child.?Confidence is shallow without the effort, and passion is meaningless with a goal. During the last season of the Majors Division, children successfully ties these pursuits, passion and confidence together.?You may see a thrown helmet after a strike-out, or an?argument with an umpire’s call, or a reckless run around the bases without looking at the coaches.?These missteps are signs that players are engaged in the game with part of themselves.?Now,?it becomes the responsibility of the coach to channel those unwanted behaviors into productive efforts.?

Through the Major Division, the art of coaching is to encourage the players?to strive harder during the disciplined game of baseball, and to reinforce the fundamental skills and body mechanics which young players learned.

At the Junior/ Senior level, it is a joy to be part of the team: E Pluribus unum.?The coach becomes a facilitator because the older, fifteen year-old players actually teach the young players. As a coach, you can sit back and do all things which you dreamed of doing.?A coach can discuss the finer points of an esoteric rule, and?remind players of how to reclaim the skills that they already possess.?We are back in the sandbox: learning, laughing, and playing, playing and playing.?With every strike out, there?is a resolution to be better next time, and with every hit arises the confidence that another hit will come again. Baseball has built a child into a teenager, the young dignified man.?During this year, I told the President of the League that we have a championship team even though we had a loosing record at the time. I recognized in this team that they had love and respect for themselves so they were already champions in life before they ever participated in the subsequent baseball games.?My only regrets this year is that this season will be over at the end of June- but there is always next year!?

Comparison to other sports, baseball is a “boring” sport:

Baseball is the only game where 90% of the things that are happening you cannot see .?This curious observation got Yogi Berra to say. “90% of the game is half mental.”?After mastery of the basic skills of baseball, the challenge for your children will be to “think-baseball”.?Questions like: “Where should I be throwing the ball after I get it,”--will occupy his mind instead of the sand castle that he is building near third base.?Then he will begin to move with the pitch, and glide with the ball as it comes off the bat. The world outside of the white lines will disappear.?So baseball can never be a boring game because every moment engages the intellect with the endless possibilities of?probabilities.

To the spectator, who has not played the game, baseball may appear boring.?However, appearances are deceiving.?According to my favorite sportswriter, Frank DeFord, we live in a world of the“Highlights” so everything pales in comparison.?People say that the “sport” of?wrestling in exciting except this “sport” is a series of staged highlights.?So events, which appear?exciting from the perspective of a spectator, are fleeting and histrionic.?I think that spectators should never discourage a player with their opinions, and realize that their opinions are just highlights of their life.

Baseball can be compared to football.?Baseball is a game where everyone actsindividually for the benefit of the team.?Whereas, every football players acts only in

?I?think that George Carlin (died, June, 2008) had the best comparison:

“Baseball is a nineteenth-century pastoral game

Football is a twentieth century technological struggle.

Baseball is played on a diamond, in a park!.......The baseball park!

Football is played on a gridiron, in a stadium, sometimes called Soldier?

Field or the War Memorial Stadium.

Baseball begins in the Spring, the season of life.

Football begins in the Fall, .....when everything is dying.

In football, you wear a helmet.

In baseball, you wear a cap.

Football is concerned with downs. “ What down is it?”

Baseball is concerned with ..... “ups”. Who’s up!?Are you up? I’m not up.?He’s up.

In football, you receive a penalty.

In baseball,?you make an error.?“Whoops!”

In football, the specialist comes in to kick.

In baseball, the specialist come in to relieve somebody.

Football has hitting, clipping, spearing, piling on, personal fouls, late hitting,?

unnecessary roughness.

Baseball has the.........sacrifice.

Football is played in any kind of weather: Rain, snow, sleet, hail, fog......can’t see game,?

don’t know if there is a game going on; mud on the field, cannot read the uniforms, can’t?

read the yard markers, the struggle to continue!?

In baseball, if it rains, we don’t go out to play.?“ I can’t go out!?It’s raining out!”

Baseball has the seventh -inning stretch.

Football has the two-minute warning

Baseball has no time limit.... “We don’t know when it is going to end!”

Football is rigidly timed, and it will end,?.......” even if we have to go to sudden death.”

In baseball during the game, in the stand, there’s a king of picnic feeling.?Emotions

?may run high or low, but there’s not that much unpleasantness.

In football, during the game, in the stands, you can be sure that at least twenty-seven

?times you were perfectly?capable of taking the life of a fellow human being.

And finally, the objectives of the two games are completely different.?In football, the?

Object is for the quarterback, otherwise known as the field general, to be on?

target with his aerial assault, riddling the defense by hitting his receivers with deadly?

accuracy, in spite of the blitz, even if he has to use the shotgun.?With short?

bullet passes and long bombs,?he marches his troops into enemy territory, balancing

?the aerial assault with a sustained ground attack which punches holes in the?

enemy’s defensive line.?

In baseball, ..................the object of the game is to go home!?And to be safe!?

?“ I hope you will be safe at home!”............”

Since I am a spectator in other sports, I will refrain from further comment,?and giving you my opinion.?However, I know that baseball is not boring, and?that is not an opinion.

From the Director’s perspective.

When I am not in the dugout, I a wear in a blue shirt and blue hat, lettered in?golden thread: “Little League of the Three Villages Director.”?Resembling Smurfswhen wearing an all-blue attire, twenty-six people are entrusted with directing Leagueoperations.?Administering ~$100,0000 is a year-long activity since the money iscollected from registrations of eight hundred kids, fund-raising, and the refreshment?stand revenues.?Every activity such as: umpiring, landscaping, fence repairs, trophies,?equipment expenditures, and capital improvements, has approximately a fifteen-thousand,?dollar cost.?If you correctly multiply : 6X $15,000, it will be equal to $90,000, and a?correct subtraction from gross receipts leaves $10,000 deposited in the bank for next?season.?This is the C.P.A.’s accounting report (Concerned Parent Accountant) for the?Little League of the Three Villages. We lease the fields from the School Board, but the SchoolBoard does not maintain the fields or facilities or improves the facilities.

Directors also have to choose managers and coaches at the beginning of the season.?When I called sixty parents who did not sign-up for the upcoming Spring?Season, I learned from my conversations that children are not coming back to this?

League for the following reasons: they

• “were not having fun,
• were not instructed how to play,?
• did not get opportunities to play,?
• were not rotated players from an outfield and infield positions,
• could not compete for a pitching position because the coaches’ kids pitched, lost

????interest and playing soccer or lacrosse,

• recruited by another League’s travel team and forbidden to play in this League.”

If you attended the coaches' clinic and listened, Al Desiderio , who has donned a baseball cap for 55 seasons as a coach and organizer of baseball clinics, instructed all coaches to be mindful of all the concerns which are listed above.

In order to assure that children have a better experience each year, I use the

?following criteria to choose a manager.?

?A manager and/or camp counselor must:

1) teach the fundamentals of baseball, and encourage all children

2) have an insightful baseball "eye" which can spot the underachiever?

????????and make him into a baseball player.?

3) be concerned about League operations and responsive to the parents.

4) be a calm thinker who knows the rules of the game?(source of all my problems

?????????during the season when people do not follow this guideline)

I decide upon policy based upon this succinct mission statement for my Division:

This Division is?part of an instructional baseball league associated and governed bythe national organization, Little League. The coaches of this Division strive to?develop the skills of all players, so they are prepared for National competition, and?to teach all, 700, children to love the game of baseball.?We are not a Travel Leaguewhich has a narrow focus on twelve or so, very?talented youngsters.

Finally after twenty-five years in 2003, politics has enter the game.?If you remember that westarted conversation with words: “build it and he will come”; however, reality begins where fiction ends.

In our Little- League- of –the- Three-Villages world, the ending to this saga is: “ build it and he will come to take it away” . The Board is embroiled in a suit with the Board of Education of the Three Villages

?to extend an abruptly terminated lease.?Although the Little League of the Three Villages spends over $100,000 for the maintenance of the field, school board members want to expel the kids from their field of dreams, and illegally seize all property and batting-cage facilities that were build and maintained?by the community volunteers. Motivation for this abrupt act is unknown, but a few board members are?aligned with a competing baseball club which benefit from an estimated, annual budget of $300, 000with the demise of the Little League of the Three Villages.? The baseball club for the last twenty-five?years made no capital improvements to the community fields and utilize all of the town’s resources to?groom the fields unlike Little League of the Three Villages.?Moreover, this baseball club is not affiliated with a national organization, and no one has oversight of a small executive board that governs this club.?

Advice to future coaches: (including parents) :?

Baseball has so much jargon that you have to teach the kids the language?of the game. Baseball phrases always describe what will happen, and not what is occurring at the moment.?Moreover, every word which is spoken by the coach is taken literally.?So here are eleven things to keep in mind when you instruct your kids.

*First, there is no one to tag when “tagging up; there is nothing to take when you are “stealing;?

there is nothing to do when you are “taking” (the strike); there is something that you missed?

when you “strike-out”, and “turning two involves throwing the ball among three.

*Secondly, you need to be careful when you are shouting: “Play second!”?because you will

?find your player on the second base or bag.?Rather you should realize this phrase implies?

playing the position of the second base person between first and second base.

?

*Thirdly, avoid yelling to a T-ball player to: “Go home!”?because the kid may run to his

??mom.?

*Fourth, in the early years, try to be gender neutral because “the man” on first base might?

?be a girl.?

?

*Fifth. Call: “I got it!”, and alert the others players that you are going to get the ball.?

?This phrase caused the most problems so I ask a kid why doesn’t he ever say this phrase:

?“I got it.”?He answered,“ .uh....because we did not get it yet.”--so simple!?

*Sixth, “Heads-up!” is counter intuitive to children; it makes no sense for them to look

?up at a ball careening towards their face.?I think that the phrase: “Duck-and -cover”?

makes more sense to them, and besides only those who grew up in the late 50’s and 60’s

?(the A- bomb generation) really have any anxiety about this phrase.?

?

*Seventh, my seven-year-old son, Jonathan, came up with insightful baseball jargon that?

should be adopted: the catcher should be known as the bender, the head coach should be

?referred to as the Brain coach (his mom worked in the Neurology Department), and?

maybe the concession stand should be a “confession” stand.

?

*Eighth, a coach should never say: “Hit the ball”, “Catch the ball”, or “Run to first”, without

?spending countless hours teaching the kids how to do all these complicated moves.?

Repeating these phrases is only frustrating to the kids.?

*Ninth, some phrases have double meaning.?I remember shouting to an outfielder to:

?“Remember to Backup”.?The outfield was moving back as I was waving to him to?

move towards the second base person.?Then I realized that “backing-up” the play is?

different from “Backing- up; the former means moving towards another player to?

assist him and the latter means moving away from home plate. Be careful when you

?tell your kids in?the outfield to use their gloves to shade their eyes from the sun;?midway

?through the inning I?looked out, and all the kids were saluting.?Apparently, the kids

?remained saluting for fifteen minutes, and I almost lost the whole outfield to muscle

?cramps.?

Tenth, keep the seventh-inning stretch a secret until you are at the first professional game?

with your kid- it builds excitement on that long afternoon in Yankee stadium.?Coaches savor

?the day when you coached so long that you get to see the “Infield-fly” Rule called by the?

umpire.

Eleventh, never tell your player to hit the ball where he lives because most players live at home,?

and a ball travels a very short distance from home to the infield.

?

Twelve, coaches always encourage their batters with the expression: “Good eye!”

Remember, you need two eyes opened for a “good-eye”

Thirteen, good wood on the ball means good titanium alloy-oh has things change!

Sometimes, it is not what?the coach, said, but?the tone and how the coach said it.?A coach sometimes seem to be always yelling at a team or umpire because the coaches are?letting the distance regulate the volume of their voice.?Some kids think that they are doing?something wrong all the time.?So take the time, ask for help, and get closer to the children?and umpire when you are talking to them.?The coach is very influential and communication?between the parents and kids is the key to a successful, winning, and enjoyable season.??I remember watching a father scream at the kid to move over.?The immovable kid answered?smugly, “ The coach told me to stand here.”?This example illustrates the affect of a coach,?so use your influence wisely.?However, this influence wanes dramatically when you are

?managing your own kid.

To the parents.........

As Yogi Berra once said, “Little League baseball is a good thing because it?keeps the parents off the streets and the kids out of the house.”?A parent’s interest in the?progression of the children is an important component of the game and?their constant support?helps make it an enjoyable experience for all kids including the biggest kids....your coaches.?Take note that baseball is the only game where the managers are still wearing uniforms of the team.?I make the parents on my team promise to do one thing: “stay away from behind the backstop!”?????????????????????????

The field of “Dreams” are for the dreamers who are playing the game, and not for the parents.?I was reminded of this in a conversation with my friend, Ken Popko.?Ken?was watching the try-outs for the twelve-year-old, National team, and walked across the field?to see our try-outs for the younger kids.?Ken noticed that every, twelve-year-old child?wanted to be there.?Parents’ expectations and derisions could only be heard-- to?borrow a line from Thayer’s Casey at the Bat-- “from a stern and distant shore” on Carney?and Locke fields where the younger kids were playing.?Parents of the younger kids were using?their oppressive stares to track their son’s every movement on the field. Parents were yelling from the sidelines.?Ken commented that these parents of these younger children may?be the parents attending Lacrosse and soccer games in the future. Ken die before that following?

Spring before he could see his observations become reality.?I feel that parents should think:?children are not mirrors, and are not reflections of the parents; rather children are sculptures formed by the impressions of parental words and actions.

Final words to the kids:

1)Remember Yogi’s words:

?

????????“Never give up, because it ain’t over ‘til it’s over!”

2)Find a coach who encourages: “Keep away from people who try to belittle your ambition,?

small people always do that, but the really great (coach) make you feel that you can do

?anything,” remarked Twain.?The best coach?motivates, and is a teacher and listener.

3)Have fun, fun, fun!?Before you tell your parents who won the game ,tell them about the

???best play of the game even if it does not involve you, and describe the moments which?

???made you smile.

4)Believe in yourself and have confidence in your abilities because none else will. So?

become?the Little Train which could!

5)Have a game plan. Remember “if you are not going anywhere you can afford to

?take any road?to get there.?If you want to go somewhere then choose a road and

stay on it.” (Quote by Walt “Clyde” Frazier’s mom), and practice, practice, and practice.?

?Make a decision and?take responsibilities for your actions by improving yourself rather

?than blaming others.?

Final thought: ;)

After 60 years in baseball, Casey Stengel said,?“There comes a time in every man’slife at least once, and I’ve had plenty on them.” -for me, this is especially true for Little?

League Baseball at the Three Villages.?My hope is that you have the same wonderful, baseball adventure as I did!?I would love to hear your favorite, baseball story .

If I cannot hear from you, there is always a little boy/girl playing baseball who can.?Remember to tell the kids: “Heads-up”, conduct yourself with dignity and grace, and smile!?

Now here is the “head-fake”: you can substitute the word camp counselor or professor for manager?

all of the above as Dr. Randy Pausch did in the “Last Lecture”.

Bob Marraccino

In the End,?I guess it comes to these rules never written plainly?in the Official Little League Rule as such:

I am a KID

It's just a GAME

My Coach is VOLUNTEER

The officials are HUMANS

NO COLLEGE SCHOLARSHIPS will be handed out today

Thank you and have fun...Pleasanton Little League

??????Bob Marraccino, free-lance writer, microbiologist, educator, Career and Technical Education Reformer.

Chapter II: Back to Good Wood and old ways!

??In 2009, Martin, my six year-old expressed an interest to play baseball. So like Michael inthe Godfather: just when I thought that I was out, they pulled me back in….. Like the basketball team, no one showed up to coach the 6-8 year-old kids.?When it was time to step forward at themeeting, I was the only one standing in the line and so the saga began. On a cold February night under a harden field and desolate field ( a field by April will be filled with sweet smell of shaven grass and glove oil and a kaleidoscope of Gatoraid, baseball) will begin again.