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grandson and baseball

Matthew D. Hoedeman

My grandson has been playing baseball for many years, he started in the U8 league.  He is currently in U14, so, 6 years I guess.

3 or 4 years ago he was struggling just a little bit with hitting, so I told him I would give him $100 if he hit a home run, as an incentive to get him to buckle down a little bit.

Last week when I was on vacation, I finally had to pay up, he hit an in-the-park home run, ball went all the way to the fence almost dead-center center field.  He almost ran over the guy who was on 1st when he hit the ball as he ran across home plate.  Yeah, he's fast!

I think he thought the $100 was for an out-of-the-park home run as he just celebrated with the team in the dug out.  I stood up and gave him 2 thumbs up, he gave them back, and continued to celebrate.  Then I held up five $20 bills.  Little bugger ran out of the dugout and over faster than he ran the bases!!!!!

Last night he hit 2 more in-the-park home runs, but this was at an away game and the field didn't have any fences, but no more cash, he had been informed that it was only for the 1st home run when he collected the money for the first home run last week.

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  • in reply to Marken199

    he's a damn good player in the U leagues.  Generally if he gets on first, either with a hit or a walk, he is only on the bases for about a minute as he is like Willie Mays Hayes from the movie Major League, as soon as the first pitch is made to the next batter, he is on 2nd.  Then he is on 3rd with the second pitch and this pretty much flusters the pitcher & catcher (he is like greased lightening!), so for the next 2 or 3 pitches, 1 of them is almost a guaranteed wild or pass ball pitch and he steals home.  Of course, if anyone else is on base when he gets to first, this generally won't happen as they block his path to home since none of the other kids on his team are any where near as fast or baseball-smart as he is.  This year, his coach is the best coach he has ever had, and this coach knows the abilities of all his kids very well, and 95% of the time, he doesn't even coach Keegen when he is on the bases as he KNOWS Keegen knows what to do and when to do it.  They play on U12 sized fields, so it is 70 feet between bases, not 90 and the fences are likewise 'closer' than they would be for high school/college/pro ball.  Next year he should be playing on Varsity high school, he got screwed this year for Freshman ball as they had tryouts for 4 days and he was home sick with a 101+ temps for the first 2 days of tryout, not to mention the school he attends is 'inbred' to the extreme, all the U coaches are buddy-buddy with the school coaches, and he didn't play on those teams, he plays in the district he started in all those years ago before they moved 2 years ago, so the 'good old boys' network was against him with him being out sick for 2 days.

    This Friday he is one of 12 hand-picked players that will be playing the inaugural game of STRIKEOUT BASEBALL in Lansing, something that John Smoltz is setting up to get local kids interested in playing ball.  Kind of a screwy thing, but I've been told all 3 local TV stations will have cameras out there as well as ESPN (not sure I believe that).  Only 3 years later than they wanted it to open.

    www.fox47news.com/.../john-smoltz-strikeout-baseball-stadium-coming-to-ferris-park-in-lansing

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