The Dugout(3)

“Google Maps says we’re going to get there a minute early, so we better book it,” Jerry says. “Do your best work, Shane.”

Two hands on the steering wheel and a determined look in his eyes, Shane revs the engine to his sensible sedan and says, “Don’t worry, I’ll get us to the church on time.”





Five minutes late doesn’t look good to parents who are trusting three college students to coach their eight-year-olds.

Shane blamed it on the red lights, but Jerry and I know the truth; he drives like an old man who’s lost his glasses. Head perched forward, chin nearly kissing the steering wheel, and hands constantly on ten and two, he drove the streets like the wheels were trying to trudge through quicksand.

It will be the last time we let Shane be in charge of driving.

“Hustle up,” Jerry calls out as the kids run from foul pole to foul pole and then back to home plate.

Turning to my co-coaches, I say, “So I’m working with the boys on the tee. Shane, you’re doing soft toss into the net; Jerry, you’re pitching from behind the screen.”

Jerry stretches his arm over his head. “Yup, I’m ready to strike some suckers out.” A former pitcher in high school, Jerry has a hard time toning it down sometimes when pitching to the kids. He calls it his turbo arm, but I call it his death arm.

Reinstating the rules, I place my hand on his shoulder and say, “Remember, they are eight, so turbo arm needs to stay on lockdown. We don’t need parents coming at us with a lawsuit because you can’t control yourself.”

“I dare them to sue me. I’ll flash them my student loan debt and say good luck.”

Sighing, I reply, “Please take it easy on them. We need to instill confidence in these kids, not break them down into emotional messes.”

“Breaking them down is how you build them back up.” Jerry winks at me.

“I’m serious.”

He rolls his eyes. “I know. Don’t worry, I won’t mow them down with my pitches, but I’m also not going to lob them in. These kids need to learn how to hit.”

Shane pats Jerry on the back. “That’s why we recruited Milly. If she can’t get these kids to hit, no one can.”

We break into our different sections, and I wait over by the tee with a bucket of balls and my practice bat so I can demonstrate techniques while teaching the kids at the same time. Finishing up their laps, I take in the bright blue sky and the cool breeze that picks up the freshly cut grass scent around us. Baseball season, my favorite season of all.

Growing up with three older brothers and a dad obsessed with baseball, I had no choice in the matter of what sport I liked to watch. They started me at a young age, taking me to every Chicago Bobcat game my parents could afford, decking me out in Bobcat gear, and sticking me in front of the TV whenever the game was on, listening to them analyze every swing, every pitch, and every catch.

I became addicted.

I spent my weekends driving from ballpark to ballpark with my parents, watching my brothers play, offering them my advice and encouragement. I soon became my brothers’ good luck charm and they started to fight over whose game I attended during the season. My parents got so sick of the bickering they finally wrote out a schedule of what games I attended based on importance.

I have what seems like hundreds of scorebooks stacked in my parents’ attic from watching my brothers play. Scrapbooks full of newspaper clippings, of pictures of them on the field, of their stats that I would print out and share with them. I was their own personal historian and coach when it came to their baseball careers. They all went to college on full-ride scholarships for baseball, but only one attended Brentwood, my oldest brother, Cory. He plays for the Baltimore Storm now, six years deep in a contract, playing first base, and absolutely killing it this season so far.

Rian and Sean, my other brothers, own a Division One training facility outside Chicago where they train athletes looking to move on to Division One programs. They focus on agility and power, working in heavy weightlifting and quick cardiovascular spurts to drive up the heart rate. Last year, they were named the best gym in the area and are now expanding to a second location. I couldn’t be prouder, and I also like to think I had a little piece in their success. Being hardcore baseball fans has benefitted all of us in some way over the years.

“Coach Milly, do I have to wear my batting gloves?” Dennis, the runt of the team, asks as he stumbles over to me, pants too big, and helmet covering his eyes.

I catch him right before he faceplants into the grass and squat to his level so I can help him with his helmet and pants.

“You don’t have to wear them if you don’t want to, Dennis.”

He holds up a hand where one of the gloves is on backward. The fingers are barely filled by his small hands, and the fingertips of the glove look like deflated balloons.

Oh Dennis.

“Were these your brother’s gloves?” He nods. “Well, they seem a little big, and they might get in the way rather than help you.”

“I thought so.” He takes the glove off and then smiles a toothless grin at me. “I can put them in my back pocket like the big leaguers. Like an asessory.”

“Do you mean accessory?”

“Yeah, like my mom has necklaces. I have batting gloves.” He turns around in a short circle for a moment, trying to reach his back pocket and when he does, he shoves the gloves inside, making his little butt very large on one side. “There. How do I look, Coach?”