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MARTIN CUNNINGHAM is a year-old boy with a lot on his mind. He lives with his dad who is gone most of the time driving across the nation in an wheeler.
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A runner going to first base can't turn "the wrong way. He can turn to the left and, if he does, he can't be tagged out for turning "the wrong way. That's plain and simple, yet Coaches and umpires don't know those rules.

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One might say they are "technical," but they really aren't. But even more basic is the rule on an overthrow, again misinterpreted by coaches and umpires alike in one game. And, there are more, but Fourth, there should be no stealing, maybe not until years old. I know I've beat this horse for more than 25 years, to no avail. The reasons for it are ridiculous. The reasons against it are, frankly, reasonable.

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Ironically, the coach of our opponents the last game, had he agreed to no stealing before the game, would have won the game, but didn't and didn't! Fifth, a random picking of players should be done. This "draft" doesn't seem to work. Why are there, every single year, teams far superior to others? Players picked randomly wouldn't always result in teams that win or lose by 20 runs every game. If it's a "house league," how do 6 or 7 of the so-called "travel" players end up on the same team? I suppose one might argue, "Well, some of the coaches come prepared to the draft!

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No doubt, like everything else, my ideas are "lonely. Nobody will ask me questions about them. Everybody knows everything. They all watch ballgames on television. I loved the sound of the bat connecting with the ball, the smell of the freshly cut grass, and the feel of lathering up a new baseball and getting ready to throw a pitch. At my elementary school graduation, we were told to write down what we aspired to be when we got older. Most boys my age said an athlete. I tried to hide my desire and said pediatrician, but who was I kidding?

I, too, wanted to be an athlete. I wanted to hear my name announced as I walked to the plate in front of a sold-out stadium. I wanted to connect on a fastball and line it into the gap, taking a wide turn around first and sliding into second, popping up to see the umpire signal me safe. I wanted to hit a towering home run and be greeted by my teammates at home plate to celebrate a walk-off victory.

Growing up, we all had these dreams of one day having that chance to play in the big leagues. A study by the New Jersey Institute of Technology reported that for every , males in the world, one will successfully play baseball professionally. In comparison, a person has , odds of being struck by lightning in his or her lifetime.

Who knew, though, that my call would come more than five years after I hung up my spikes and sold all of my gear away — literally. In April, while searching for a summer internship, I came across the Cheyenne Grizzlies, a team that played in a summer collegiate baseball league across southern Wyoming and northern Colorado. With a major interest in media and writing, and still holding on to my love for baseball, it seemed like the perfect fit.

I would get real world experience in my desired field while still being part of the game I loved. I was talking with owner Ron Kailey and was ready to accept the position when he threw a curveball at me. I think it would be a fun story for you to write about the tryout process.

I almost dropped the phone in shock. I assume Ron must have thought he was getting a bad signal because I fell silent. Finally, I told him what an opportunity that was and that I was in.

But once final exams were complete and summer break was officially under way, I got my priorities straight. Throw the books out the window — I had to get ready for my professional tryout. I was getting the opportunity to do something that so many men dream of, but so few get to actually experience. As Grizzlies outfielder K.

So since the opportunity arose for me, I was going to take full advantage of it. Grab the bull by it's horns? Forget the story I was instructed to write — I was determined to try out and make the squad.

A little girl reaches out to a lonely young boy

So I called up my old baseball coach and mentor, Leighton Thorne. Even my mom laughed at me every time I talked about the tryout. But Leighton was kind enough not to let it show. He also kindly agreed to work with me on my swing to get it back to where it was during my prime. You know, when I was 15 years old. I showed up for my first hitting lesson on May He greeted me and told me to grab my bat and follow him over to a screen where we were going to do some soft toss drills.

He took one look at my bat and looked at me peculiarly. Leighton went back into his garage and brought out a couple adult-sized Akadema wood bats. He had me swing a few and see which one felt best. I found one I liked and tossed my inch Louisville Slugger youth bat to the curb. The first detour was solved, at least the bat part of it I still needed the rest of my gear , and I was ready to start swinging. That lasted about three swings before Leighton told me to sit down with him, and we spent the next half hour or so talking about the basic fundamentals of hitting.

He reminded me of things once engraved in my memory. Things like the positioning of my feet and the movement of my hands during my load. He reminded me to swing through the ball and keep my swing short. With each hitting lesson, things started coming back to me, and my swing became more and more comfortable. By my final lesson, I was even hitting line drives back to the L-screen on occasion rather than being laughed at by the year-old kid who had a lesson after me. I owe a lot of my baseball success, both during my playing days and leading up to my tryout, to Leighton.

He is an incredible coach, but also has been influential in my life. I mentioned above that Leighton let me use his bat two, actually; he jammed me and I cracked the first one. But, I still needed the rest of the gear that I had gotten rid of after my playing days were finished or so I thought.


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Sure, they were his football cleats, but they were cleats nonetheless. After my first hitting lesson, I went to Sports Authority and got myself a pair of batting gloves.

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I picked up a couple wood bats as backups in case my other bat broke during the tryout. I purchased a pair of baseball socks so I could wear them like stirrups as players used to do. I even had to pick up a new protective cup, for goodness sake. I had all my gear and was set for the tryout.

I began playing T-ball at the ripe age of six and played for more than a decade before throwing in the towel my sophomore year of high school. During my career, I played competitive baseball at the highest level possible all throughout Little League. One year, I was the No. I played at a school that has won four consecutive Colorado high school state championships and have batted alongside players who now play ball at schools like Southern California, Stanford, Nebraska, and Kentucky.