Striking out

The postings for cuts for the three baseball teams went up outside the basement office of the athletic director on the morning following the last day of tryouts.  More correctly, the rosters for the teams were tacked to the bulletin board, and if your name was on one of the lists, you were on a team.  My name was not on the Varsity roster, strike one.  Nor was it on the JV roster, strike two.  Finally, I swung at the Freshman roster and, strike three...yer out.  And there I stood at the plate glass window that covered the bulletin board, and stared in disbelief.

I was young and naive and at first could not understand why I did not even get a chance to show what my best baseball talent was, namely, pitching.  My first youthful reaction was to feel that it was just not fair.  Naturally, it was not my fault that I had not made the team, it was the head coach's fault.  I hit every pitch thrown at me.  I fielded balls in the outfield, and actually made a throw to second base that caught a greedy base runner.  I shagged balls in batting practice.  But that damned head coach never let me pitch, and that is the reason, I concluded, why my name was not on any roster.  It was not fair.

The truth of the matter is that I was young and naive to think I had chance to make any of the teams.  I was a 'walk-on' candidate, trying to roster on what turned out to be a state champion baseball team.  The machine that made that team successful had begun several years before on the baseball fields all across our city and beyond.  Baseball was serious business for the coaches of this team. They coached in the senior and junior Babe Ruth leagues, held camps for Little League players to help develop their talents, and even worked with area college baseball teams to help develop their players talents and abilities.

I had no knowledge of all of these camps.  I had stopped playing Little League years before, and never even tried out for Babe Ruth ball.  No, the reason that I did not make the baseball team had nothing to do with the coach's unfairness to me.  The reason that I did not make the team is that most of the guys that did make the team had been working at baseball for years and had earned their spots on the roster.   The coaches knew these kids and had seen them play, and could fit them into their scheme.  Of course, I did not realize any of this then. 

Part of the beauty of being young and naive though is that you can shrug off adversity and move on to the next challenge.  Next to the bulletin board where my name was most unfairly not listed was a sign up sheet for another varsity sport tryout that was to happen in a couple of days.  I wrote my name down and headed off to science class.  Baseball be damned.  I may have struck out on this sport,  but now I was going to strike out on a new adventure.  I had a new pitch to throw.