Little League

Recently, my little brother Jacob finished up the season for his Prep League team, which had me reflecting back on his baseball career.

Jacob has played baseball for several years now, playing on his middle school team, as well as several years in Little League in addition to his latest season in Prep League.

He even has his own baseball card.

He's not the greatest player to ever step onto the field, but he can (and has) played every position and plays just as well as the rest of the team. But more importantly, he gets along great with the other players and actually seems to have fun at the games, even when they lose by 20 runs. So, for the most part, I actually enjoy watching him play. I don't even care if the team wins or loses, so long as Jacob is having fun. And that's the way it should be.

One thing I've observed over the years is that the parents seem to take things a lot more seriously than the kids. The kids are goofing off in the dugout, rolling around in the grass, and just enjoying themselves, whereas the parents are sitting in the stands and shouting at the kids, at the coaches, at the umpires, at pretty much anyone.

That is, when they're actually paying attention.

It's as if the parents are a bunch of retired baseball coaches and umpires. Whenever the coach makes a change on the field:

• "Why are you putting that kid in? He's terrible!"
• "Why are they taking him out? He's on fire!"
• "Why is he on first? He can't catch!"

Whenever the umpire calls a pitch or a play:

• "That was a pretty pitch!"
• "That was low!"
• "He was safe!"
• "Safe? He was out!"

You don't even need to be able to see it to know it was a bad call.

I can understand that every parent wants their kid to do their best, to play the longest, to win the game. But it isn't a team of Willie Mays and Babe Ruths. Sometimes you just expect too much.

That isn't to say that there aren't some injustices though. The umpires do make mistakes. The coaches do sometimes make some bad choices. And, yes, there's even a bit of politics and favoritism. A kid whose dad owns the team or coaches for it is more likely to get play time. Same for a kid whose parent has some influence in the community or is just good friends with the coach. Heck, Jacob's team this year kept two players on the bench for the entire first game of the tournament in favor of a couple kids who didn't even come to half the games. Why? No clue. The boys they put in didn't perform any more spectacular than the two who didn't even get to participate. And the team was finishing up a losing season where everyone who showed up got to play every game previously, so it wasn't as if winning was a major goal, nor was there precedence on benching players. Sure we ended up winning that game, but that doesn't matter for the two kids who didn't get to contribute.

I get that not every player gets to play every game in professional baseball. But when the point of the game is to mold these kids into ball players, not giving them a chance to learn, grow, and improve is just counter productive. And putting more pressure on the kids for the outcome of a game that in the grand scheme of things doesn't really matter, isn't really fair. The kids are going to have their whole lives to learn life isn't fair. Do we really have to start this young?

Though I suspect some of the parents start younger.