I have had the opportunity to attend a couple of baseball
clinics for coaches the past few weeks.
The attendance of both was amazing.
This time of year is exciting as both high school and collegiate coaches
get ready for their upcoming baseball seasons with the mix of enthusiasm and
worry. The excitement of working with
young athletes who want to get better is the driving force of most
coaches. The worry is keeping everyone
healthy, keeping everyone enthused about the game and making sure everyone
realizes it is a team sport. One needs
to remember that this great game has been going on for over 150 years and it is
up to us to keep it going for another 150.
I recently attended a high school baseball ‘show case’. It was very well run and did some things that
are not the ‘usual’ type of drills that one normally sees at those camps. I thought the different drills were great. Besides the normal 60-yard dash and throwing
velocity checks, the camp did home to first times, pro-agility and other
movement timing along with standing broad jump and med-ball throws. What they were trying to emphasize is that
baseball is requiring players to be better all-around athletes. Kudos to the camp director.
The camp director did provide a profile of each
participant in attendance. I gleaned
through the booklet page by page to view grade point averages, high school they
are attending and what positions each one prefers. Being at this a while, I recognized several
campers from viewing them previously. It
was clear that the information on those profiles had been given by each high
school participant. However, one did
catch my attention of which had been obviously written by a parent. When I got to this person’s (a senior in high
school) position(s), it said besides pitcher: “prefers right field, but will
play left and center as well”. I started
to smile a bit and then read: “…it is imperative that he get in front of major
league scouts to see if he can be drafted out of high school. More than anything, he wants to play in the
majors.” How sad is that? Detect a little pressure here?? Yes, that is the aspirations of everyone
there. Hopefully his (or his parent’s)
dreams will be fulfilled. I hope that
family realizes that baseball is JUST A GAME and everyone needs to play the
great game of LIFE as well. It is a
small wonder that the average age of retirement from baseball is 13 years
old. Please keep things in
perspective.
Coach Sonka
Coach Sonka
