Coaching Beau's Baseball Team

With youth sports, not everybody jumps out of their seat to coach. People are busy, and it’s a little bit of work to manage group texts, run practices, and show up on games days to delivery a great experience for the kids.

Well, this year was my turn to coach. And can you guess what sport it was? Baseball. The sport I know nothing about. I’ve never even been to a professional baseball game once. Which is ironic, because my 5-year-old son Beau happens to be obsessed with baseball. Beau and I constantly lug our baseball gear out to the park and practice ground balls, catching and throwing, and batting. It’s been a really fun thing to do any day of the week together.

This year is coach's pitch. So a step up from t-ball. The rules are still pretty loose, as you want the kids to build confidence and have fun, but be prepared for next year, when more rules are introduced.

Beau happens to have a good group of friends that now play football, basketball, and soccer together. We’ve gotten to know all the parents through where we live. The boys get along great, and it creates a really fun environment where more people want to be on the team than there is room for. And the boys are quite good and somewhat pretty competitive. It’s a blast watching them play.

For Beau’s fifth birthday this year, we got him a new baseball bag and some gear before the season started. He also had a birthday party where we took 25 5-year-olds to a matinee movie. Most of his friends play sports with him.

(Expand on how the season has gone and my perspectives on youth sports and baseball in particular.)