Opening Day (Let's try this again!)

Apparently, what I wrote last weekend didn't appear.  So, here goes again.

The day was  beautiful and I noted that a good number of my neighbors were out working in their yards.  Not this guy......

Last Saturday the Pirates opened their season with a 14-9 win.  If I recall, it's only the second time Bopper has won his first game.  And, he played a bit of a role in the win, too.

The skies were sunny and blue, with temperatures in the 60s.  It was one of the first shirt-sleeve days.  Ah, a good day for baseball, esp after the lousy spring we've had so far.

14-9, yep.  But I think there were only about six or seven hits by both teams.  There had to have been close to 30 or more walks.  With the league mercy rule (There is a maximum of six runs in an inning, except for the last inning, a rule I don't at all like;it makes little sense to not include the mercy the last inning.  The argument that no-mercy in the last inning allows a team to win flies in the face of a team that could have won with no mercy in an earlier inning(s).), I think there were only eleven putouts by the Pirates and five by the Indians.  In more than two hours, only 3 1/2 innings were played.

We started late, due to previous games backlogging.  A field adjacent to ours opened up with no teams waiting to play on it.  I suggested using that one, to avoid a longer wait.  No, the umpires said; we coudn't do that.  We had to wait for the other teams on our field to finish.  After half an hour, the umpires decided we could use the other field after all.  So, it wasn't OK to use the field at 11:30, but it was OK at noon?  Hmmm......

I am not the head coach.  I don't want the job of making line-ups, calling parents, determining who brings what snacks on what days, etc.  And, I don't like the league's idea of a draft.  But I can still teach baseball and am given free rein.  The players still don't always listen--a couple do.  I pointed out how we took advantage of situations that I try to have our team prevent, but I'm not sure many of the players paid attention.  For instance, Michael was on third and the catcher threw a ball back to the pitcher wildly.  Bopper noted that and raced home.  I try to get our 2nd basemen and SSs to back up every throw from the catcher to the pitcher to prevent that, which had the other team backed up the throw, Michael woudln't have scored.  And, what do the 2nd basemen and SSs have to do between pitches, pick their noses?  Bopp, who plays 2B knows to do that, but other kids don't seem to want to do it.  It's not a big or a hard thing to do.  But it's real baseball and can make a difference if only a few times each season.  I really like one of the other assistant coach's work, esp with Bopper.  He's convinced him he can throw strikes and has been, so far, a decent pitcher.

Bopp had a walk and one of our three or four hits.  He was aggressive on the bases and scored two runs in two at-bats.  He came on to pitch in the 3rd, with two guys on and four runs in in that inning.  (How's that for using "in?").  He induced two ground balls, one for a putout and the other we made three errors on the same play, two by the same kid.  (We had 7 or 8 errors on the day--not good.)  Two runs scored, which meant a mercy, but all six runs were charged to the other guy.  Then, in the top of the 4th (the last inning), Bopp struck out the leadoff guy, threw an easy ground ball to first, and then struck out the final batter after going 3-1 on him.  Michael isn't a flame thrower, not by any means.  But has thrown strikes and, as noted, the other dad has him thinking he can actually pitch.  Good!  It was fun to watch.

I enjoy the drives home, talking over the games and just baseball in general with Michael.  Of course, now he thinks (after last Thur and Sat, equally good jobs) he's the second coming of Justin Verlander, which he's not.  But I still enjoy our chats.  And I tossed about half an hour of BP before the game.  Boy, my arm didn't hurt after about an hour of BP to Bopper on Fri, but my back did!  Can it be this guy is getting old?!?!?!

And, getting home after the game we had the family birthday party for Ashley, her 7th birthday.  She ordered "hock gawgs" (hot dogs) and potato chips for her birthday dinner.  Her choice......  Next week is her friends' party--about 11 kids over here.  Ugh!  Wow!  7 years old already. 

BTW, her tee ball team is called the Iron Pigs.  Yep, Iron Pigs.  I don't know where that one came from, but that's it.  I am helping to coach that team, too.  I had a riot with some of the kids last night.  I laughed a lot, not at them, but with them--well, OK it was at them a bit, too.  But I kept my snickers to myself.

Until the end of June, it's baseball Mon through Thur with often a double dose on Sats.  How lucky am I?!?!?!  I get to be with my grandkids all that time.