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Little League Opening day by Mikekoz13 on 21 Apr, 2008 05:30
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It was a HUGE success for our League. I got to the park about 7 AM just to saok it all in before the day started. The weather was amazing.... low 80's and bright sun all day. The Parade was great as usual and we had great opening ceremonies. With all 21 teams lined up on the infield dirt we had an Opening Prayer, and four girls from the elemwntary school sang the Star Spangled banner (they were amazing!). Then a child from each of the 5 Divisions threw out a first pitch.
We had a special first pitch for the local guy that owns the little market in town where I live. He's a retired guy and he cuts all the grass on our fields and fertilizes them whenever they need it. He does all this at no cost and the fields look amazing. We asked him to throw out the first pitch this year..... his wife told my wife that she hadn't seen him that excited in years. At 9:15 when he was suppoesed to come out on the field nobody could find him. My wife ran down to his house about three blocks away and there he was warming up in his driveway. The President of our League presented him with a beautiful plaque and then he threw a perfect strike! Awesome!!
Then we picniced for about 2 hours and the games began at 12:00PM. Ten games in all for the day.
One of the new Coaches works at the local ski resort and brought a Rock Climbing Wall and donated the use of it for the day. It was a couple bucks to try it out and he donated all proceeds back to the Little League!
My 5-8 year old team lost 8-5. I have a bunch of new very tiny kids this year on this team and we won't win much but we WILL have fun.
I really thought my 9-10 year old team was going to have a tough day. I have three nine year olds that have never played ball before. Plus I take all the kids none of the other teams want.... the "fat" kids, the learning disabled kids, etc.. (I still don't understand some guys)
Anyway we won 11-3. My starting pitcher, one of those "fat" kids, was my project last year. He couldn't throw a ball over the plate last year but man he's got potential. He's my friends son and all week i was pumping him up..... Telling him that the way he threw in practice nobody would be able to hit him. At our last practice he struck out all my other kids.... I patted him on the back after that practice and said "Do you know what ball players call it when a pitcher pitches like you just did?" He shook his head no. I said, "that's called bringing the cheese!".
Man did he laugh! Before he went to the mound Saturday he looked at me and said, "Coach, don't worry, I brought the CHEEEESSSEEE!".
A great day!!!
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#1 by SLYinKC on 21 Apr, 2008 06:05
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Hey, Mike. Glad to hear you're enjoying baseball season with your son. Both of my son's have their first games this Thursday night. Usually they're on the weekends. So from here on out, our life will be lived at the "3&2 Baseball" complex. I can hardly wait.
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#2 by Mikekoz13 on 21 Apr, 2008 06:18
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Hey, Mike. Glad to hear you're enjoying baseball season with your son. Both of my son's have their first games this Thursday night. Usually they're on the weekends. So from here on out, our life will be lived at the "3&2 Baseball" complex. I can hardly wait.
SLY-
You know if your kids are involved.... there's just nothing like it. I coach basketball too and love it.... but it's just not the same as baseball.
Good luck on Thursday..... and if you want to read a great story, check out my second entry about Opening Day. -
#3 by JDog on 21 Apr, 2008 06:36
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Great story Mike, That is awesome. What an amazing day. The day you just described very closely resembled our Opening day growing up.
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#4 by warhawk on 22 Apr, 2008 04:33
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koz: that's a gr8 story! sounds like U immensely enjoy coaching little league.
WARHAWK