My Setback Research Paper

It was a normal spring night and my baseball game had just started. It was senior night and I was pitching, we had just finish the first half of the first inning. My teammate struck out, it was my turn to hit, I swung for the ball and my leg popped twice. I went down and didn't get back up, My leg was stuck to my chest and I couldn't move it. The visiting team's coach was an EMT he ran over and said ¨this is going to hurt¨ and pulled my leg straight. What had happened was when I swung the bat my leg didn't move and my kneecap dislocated and instead of my ligaments tearing, they stretched and broke my kneecap. This was a challenge for me because this was the first time I had never broken a bone in my life. I went to the doctor and he said nothing was wrong, so my

Throughout my life I have always said “I will be a Major League Baseball player.” I do not just say this, but I put in work every day to get better. Day-to-day I pray to my Lord and savior Jesus Christ to help me get there someday. Throughout high school I have been attending many college showcases to get my name out there, and get a shot to show scouts what I can do. A showcase consists of hitting, fielding, running, and scrimmages with those that also attended. Even though I get piled with school and a job, I still manage to have time doing what I love. Not only baseball but the gym to get stronger on

I went home full of excitement and quickly recounted to my mom the success I had that day at baseball. I went to bed that night with more confidence than I thought possible and looking forward to another day of baseball. Made my way through school that day visualizing my performance that afternoon for tryouts. With more excitement than nerve I began the second day of tryouts. Thursday we worked on throwing and catching skills, friday was batting. An area in which I struggled a little more than others but with confidence pouring out of me I stepped into the box. Even with the confidence boost working on my skill I struggled heavily and was not happy with my performance. So trying to keep my confidence up I tried to finish that day of tryouts but I could tell that the coaches were less pleased with my performance that day. There’s not a much faster way to be served a large slice of humble pie than to realize you may not be all that you once thought you were. So keeping that in mind I finished the day doing my best. When we gathered together to make final cuts I could feel my heart beating in

As soon as I made my very first varsity baseball appearance, I knew that I had to be the very best I could be or there was never going to be a chance of ever putting on that white and maroon crisp cleaned dri-fit Russel number 18 jersey. My heart was beating beyond faster than it should be at my first at bat because I had always heard “Just wait you haven't seen nothing yet, wait till you face them varsity pitchers.” Players older than me had constantly been saying that throughout my freshman season and it kept repeating over and over in my head like a broken record. Although I had studied the pitcher and had seen with my very own eyes, he wasn’t as good as everyone talked him up to be. I was still overawed and very nervous about messing up.

I remember the struggles I went through at the beginning of the season. I only had 4 hits in 10 games. I worked on my leg lift, my load, everything I could think of until something worked. Then, something clicked. I was reading a book on common problems hitters have and I realized I wasn’t seeing the ball. So, I went to the cage and just stood there for hours upon hours, observing baseball's go by, but not hitting them. Then, out of nowhere, I got two hits.

I felt completely alone and high school baseball was my opportunity to establish myself among my new peers confident from my previous experiences. I arrived at my new high school's baseball tryouts looking forward to success unbeknownst to me. I was hopeful too I'm prepared compared to the skills of the 60 dedicated Texas athletes enjoy his

Since I was five years old softball and sports have been a huge part of my life. In softball, specifically, there are many times of failure and success. High school sports, for me, has taken a lot of my time, effort, and commitment. From the first day I stepped onto the court and field to the last, I want to be able to say I did my best. It has been tough and frustrating at times. I experienced failure many times, even when I did not want to admit it. My moments of failure within high school sports have turned me into the character and person I am today. It has taught me how to take failure and turn it into success. Failure has made me realize that the only way for you to succeed is for you to fail first.

As I put off opportunities to improve my skills, and my character, the toll only became harsher and more difficult to overcome. In turn, my status among the other athletes began to deteriorate. Witnessing my peers expedite their game as I still struggled did not phase me so much at the time. In fact, I was sure that my role on the team would remain the same. This was obviously false, as within the matter of weeks I was pushed back further in the batting lineup, and committing more errors in the field than ever before. It was during our playoff run that I had realized the resulting detriment, when each player was counted on more than ever before. We ended up making it to the championship, only being one run short of winning. Although our team was able to accomplish that much, I felt short handed when it came to the successful

Heading into my freshman year of high school, I was excited to play varsity baseball. While I felt honored to make the team in my first year, I also noticed some problems early on. The upperclassmen did not take the team seriously,

High school baseball season does not start until the spring unlike middle school, so I had awhile to wait. I passed the time until the spring by playing football and basketball which I did very well in both, anyways spring baseball came and went and I started to put myself on the radar of the varsity baseball coaches, the next year I was one of two sophomores to play on the varsity baseball team. I really established myself as the future of our pitching staff and I had a very good year finishing with an earned run average per seven innings under

My most memorable baseball experience came not when I was eight, beating several of my friends on the opposing Little League team, not when I was 15, against our cross-town rivals pushing my school team into the JV playoffs, but just a couple weeks ago, marking the first win of the team that I helped to coach. It was just the second game of our season, and only an hour and a half long, but it was a representation of the backbreaking work applied by everyone involved. After my ninth grade year playing JV ball, I decided that I needed to focus on my school work, as it was tough to maintain my grades while juggling sports and other extracurricular activities. However, I continued to play club baseball, as my passion for the game never faltered. The trend continued in my junior year, as I needed to drop club baseball in order to keep up with the challenging courses I took. My coach, who I’ve been with since 6th grade, asked me to come back out whenever I was available so I could help prepare a team of the younger boys in the program for the upcoming season. One of my core beliefs is that it’s essential to give back to those who helped or supported you; the least I could do for all the years that my coach helped me, was

I started playing softball at the age of 5, as I grew up I continued playing, eventually getting to the highest competition for my age. I worked extremely hard. Softball was my whole life, my world revolved around it. I was a pitcher; I played for multiple different teams. I had a team Canada pitching coach, did personal training, every day I practiced or played ball. I didn’t have breaks and I didn’t want breaks. I worked hard to get where I got. At the age of 15, grade 10, I had developed nerve damage, I was in a walking boot or a cast for almost a year, nothing got better, we did cortisone injections into my foot hoping that would help, I got the injections then was put in a cast, I was scheduled for surgery but before the operation when

I really struggled with the transition from outfield to infield, and it showed. I constantly fumbled the ball and made wild throws. But I could only fix this by practicing extra, just like I had done before. So I continued to practice on my own time. At the time, I wanted to get better for my own personal benefit, but little did I know it actually benefitted my team more than anything. I continued to work and became a solid second baseman. I rarely made errors. I continued to play second base for the rest of middle school, and I enjoyed it very much. It became comfortable to

In 9th grade I joined softball as part of the school team. It was the first year I would be playing that sport, yet I immediately got placed to play Varsity as a 1st basemen. That whole season I played in the same position, until 10th grade. It was just a few weeks before our first official game, when our indicated and only pitcher became ineligible to play! Our games wouldn’t even begin without a pitcher, so I decided to make the most nerve wracking decision and step up. Practicing for such a little time made it worse, yet this was a whole team that relied on a pitcher. The first game finally came and the game didn’t go too well. I realized then that it would take more than physical practice to improve my pitching, because part of it was acquiring

The crowd was roaring like wild animals. Our teams had switched sides to start the second match and everything came into focus then. I could hear individual people cheering in the crowd, the student section was going nuts. The smell of the butter coming from the popcorn at the concession stands suddenly stood out to me. Most importantly, I could feel the yearning and the passion coming from my teammates. We wanted this win–bad. I was one of the leading hitters on the team and it was my job to produce the big hits for the team and motivate them to take everything the other team would hit at us. We started the second game and things were still going well for us! It wasn’t a fluke! We were playing well because we were working hard. If we didn’t hit hard they were going to pound it down, we couldn’t let up. So when our setter set me up and I saw out of the corner of my eye a triple block I knew I had to get it through their hands, but the ball was behind my head. In that split second I made a decision that changed my life forever. I swung away and I felt my shoulder pop and then the worst pain of my life went through my entire arm. I grabbed it right away knowing something was wrong. I’ve never felt pain like this in a game before. In that moment I knew that was the one. Every player knows what it’s like to get hurt. You get sprained ankles and sprained knees all the time, but this was the injury I knew had been coming to me. I looked up at my parents in the crowd and they knew too. Something was wrong.