My Summers Playing Softball

For many years, I was an avid player of City League softball. Now, don’t get “avid” confused with being good. The truth is that my playing was at the upper end of mediocre.

I could catch the ball (most of the time), run the bases (not fast), get on base (occasionally) and on a good day pitch. I usually played first base, second base, catcher, or pitched.

Sadly, I wasn’t good enough to be a regular shortstop or third-baseman. The ball comes at you extremely fast, and my reflexes were not up to those two positions. The only time I played either of those positions would be when my reflexes were better than the other nine players on the team. Giving you an idea of the kind of teams I played on. It is hard to play when you stand sideways in order not to be hit by a ball!

About 16 years ago, I finally had to give it up. I just couldn’t run the bases like in the past or especially bend over to pick up a ball without throwing my back out of joint. To give it up was one of the hardest things I have ever done. It was the fear of getting hurt that helped me make that decision.

At about that time, one of my younger friends was chasing a fly ball in deep left field when it bounced off the fence and hit him between the eyes. He ended up in the emergency room, followed by a couple of days in the hospital and three different surgeries. He missed work and spent several months recovering from the accident. That is a lot of misery and lost income for an extracurricular activity.

Over the years, there were many incidents, but nothing on that scale, thankfully. Once while playing second base, a hard grounder was hit straight at me. Charging forward to catch the ball when it hit a rock, went just above my glove, and nailed me in the shin.

In a matter of seconds, a knot half the size of a tennis ball developed on my shin. It even had the seams from the ball embedded in what became a really bad bruise.

I could feel the weight of the bruise filling with blood. However, like a real trooper, I “walked it off” and played the rest of the game.

That night, I put ice on it to keep the swelling down. The next day, I was sitting in my wholesale store when a customer walked in and saw me with an ice pack on my leg.

By then it was black and blue and the size of half a grapefruit, the customer asked me what had happened.

“My brother had a bruise like that; a blood clot broke loose, went to his heart, and he died,” the customer told me.

Needless to say, that caught my attention. I slipped lower down on the mediocre scale after realizing I needed to be a lot more careful about charging a ball.

In another instance, I got hit on the head with a cleat. Instead of sliding into second base as normal players would do, this guy decided to jump over me. He almost made it, except for the top of my head, which he grazed with his foot.

He also missed the bag. I tagged him out as he landed five feet past the base. It was lucky I didn’t end up with a concussion; however, he did knock my cap off and left a smidgen of dirt on my head.

Once, during a very competitive game against one of our rivals, I was playing catcher. We had a player with an exceptional arm who caught a fly in deep center field. The third-base runner tagged up and headed home.

The centerfielder threw the ball to me. I could tell it was going to be a close call and knelt down on one knee to catch the ball about three feet in front of home plate just outside of the baseline. My plan had been to catch the ball, then tag the runner out as he slid past me.

At the last moment, I realized the ball was going to be late. So, with my free hand, I grabbed his ankle as he slid by, stopping his slide. He stopped about four inches short of the base, which allowed me to tag him out.

I released him as soon as he stopped. The whole motion took less than a second. The umpire did not see me grab his leg, but the opposing team could see it from the dugout.

Needless to say, the dugout emptied with his teammates yelling they saw me grab his ankle. I missed being in a riot that day. That play became a legend and is still talked about thirty years later (mostly by me).

From my own experiences, my friend who ended up in the hospital and old age, I decided it was time to step away from my favorite hobby.

I have truly missed playing ball. My glove now belongs to our granddaughter. I still have a couple of the bats because they’re not legal anymore, and I keep one behind the seat in my truck just in case.

Those lazy summer afternoons playing ball were a part of my life from about seven years old until I finally gave it up at 56. When meeting my friends from those days our conversations always drift back to those times on the ball field.

We all have our stories. Some have been embellished over the years, but that is a good thing. To a person, though, we all miss those days, even the guy I stopped from sliding into home.