Personal Narrative: Spring Training

I’m sure you’ve been told persistence is key, and believe that you can do something, not that you can’t. Well I’m not going to show it to you, or tell you, I’m going to prove it to you. The summer after 4th grade year, our baseball team had the greatest summer ever. At the beginning of the season since their was so many kids at our age group that wanted to play, the adults in charge had to split it up into 3 teams. All 3 teams had fair or average seasons. My team had the best of the 3, but it wasn’t quite good enough. We had had, just enough success, not as much as we would have liked. We found ourselves barely sneaking into the tournament as the worst out of 8 seeded teams. We had to play against the undefeated Watertown team in the first round. We were told we had no chance to win, and we believed that too. The most I’ve ever been wrong in my life was saying, “we have no chance to beat them.”

I was dropped off the travel baseball team? “How could this be” I asked my dad, he replied “I don’t know Josh you didn’t put that much effort into your last game and you don’t try in practice”. The travel baseball team is the most prestigious youth baseball team when I found out I had been dropped I was heartbroken I wanted to crawl into a hole and cry. My dad tried to talk me into trying to try out for different team I just turned around and didn’t say a word. I ran outside, grabbed my baseball glove and threw it in the pool I never wanted to see a baseball glove or bat again.

“Next up the right fielder Auuuuusstin Meeeehhhhrrrr” belows out of the speakers at full blast as I approach the plate. Feeling loose I ease into the batter's box sinking my cleats deep into the soft dirt where I can get a solid stance. Stretching my bat across the plate showing the pitcher how much reach I have tempting him to throw one in the zone. Weight is on my back leg as I slowly bounce the bat in my hands anticipating the first pitch. The pitcher begins his windup and I stop moving the bat and focus on the ball.

So what made baseball be the event that made me who I am today. Well I’m about to tell you. First it was the very first baseball game I played, then it was the first game I won, after that it was the first tournament I won, last it was the first World Series I won.

My palms were sweaty, knees weak, arms were heavy, as my dad tried to make awkward conversation with me as he drove. We were on our way to the Kettler Capitals Iceplex, the very new looking arena where the Washington Capitals practiced. The rink is far to begin with, down in Arlington Virginia, and the fact it was a dark and rainy Tuesday night did us no favors. The grueling stop and go traffic extended our ride to over an hour, good thing we left much earlier than we had to. The ice slot was set for 7:30, so I wanted to be there a little before 7 in order to have plenty of time to get dressed and get through my pre-game/practice rituals with ease. At 7:30 I would be on the ice trying out for my first AAA hockey team, The Washington Little Caps, the best team in the DMV.

It was the last games of the baseball season. We had are worse pitcher pitching for our team. And they had an ok pitcher pitching. We got to the semi finals and our coach was going nuts. I was in the locker room getting ready for the game and my teammates Austin and Tevan were right next to me also getting ready they were one of the best players on the team.

At the beginning of the Softball season, I had a horrible pitch, now after a ton of practice, I can finally get a perfect pitch. I always wanted to be a pitcher because there were only two pitchers on my team. But it was me against my coach and my team. Would the coach approve my pitch? Would the team accept me as a pitcher? Read my story to find out.

did things people asked me to, but nothing more than what was expected. I faced very few setbacks. School was great and I put little effort into it, and still earned decent grades. Within softball I was working at an acceptable pace. Every now and then I wondered what I could achieve with a little effort. I had a pretty good attitude towards life and was proud of who I was. I lived up until 7th grade with thinking I was doing fine. It became an issue when I would want to be better at things, but I did not want to try hard.

“Hoh! Hah!” The umpire shouts after my third strike, hencing that the batter has struck out. I jog to the dugout, put on my helmet and batting gloves, and as I walk out to the on deck circle, my coach, Nick, said, “You had a good inning, but you’ve gotta back up home if there is a runner on third and a ball hit to the outfield. Luckily, we have Sousa at centerfield. Stay hot.” Coach Nick is a short, strong twenty-seven year old who played in the Minor Leagues until he got hurt. He is patient and forgiving, but he does not care about winning as much as he should. Sousa, our fastest player and our third hardest hitter, hits a line drive to left center field and gets to first base. His first name is Alex, but my team calls him “Sousa,”

When I started to play baseball I was nervous because I saw how fast they were pitching so I thought i couldn't hit the ball. When I was up to bat I was sitting there waiting for the pitch and there it was the pitch. I heard strike one then… strike two, i was nervous because the whole team was watching me. and then the third pitch came and with a crack of the bat it was soaring over the fence into the tree line. Then all i could here was the whole team cheering. And i know why they were cheering, it was because i just hit my first home run!!!! The next week the first game was against derby. We won the game 12 to 10. It was fun.

My profession as a baseball player has been all about development since I was a little kid. After reading the article and chapters from the book I can see where Strengths Based Leadership has been used on me to promote growth at certain times in my career.

My two closest friends in the baseball community have known about a struggle I've had for some time now. I've been wondering for sometime now, what would life be like without baseball. So, baseball and I are ending our 25 year relationship so I can spend more time with my daughter and traveling a lot more. I was blessed to coach Chris Tomkins, Mitchell David Crimmins, Brady Breitbach, John Thill, Jeremy Vaassen, Brett Bortscheller, Dan Millius, and Nickolas Kutsch for their entire high school career and wanted to go along an incredible ride with them. When they were sophomores we set a goal to make it to the state tournament when they played varsity. Not only did we make it to state, but we started off the season 19-0, ranked number 1 the

We had just started the last summer break before our first year of high school starts before Michael started interfering with our relationship. Bradley is a lover of baseball and has baseball games every weekend, but I, Kelsey had either basketball or volleyball practice or a game every day of the week day. Considering we were both busy at different times it made it hard for us to see each other. We tried to go to each other's games as much as possible, but one baseball game changed it all.

I have played the game of baseball since i was at a young age and loved it as soon as i stepped on the diamond. My dad knew i would love it because it involves getting dirty and he's right. This year would be the 12th year straight that i have played baseball and i wouldn't trade any of the time i played for anything. This year has been by far the best year of baseball i have ever been a part of. I made lifetime lasting friends and grew closer to some kids i thought i never would. My team was overall 17-5 on the whole season. My team played very well together and i felt a connection every time we stepped on the field. My team also ended a 8 year long drought for the tri valley league championship. We took on susquenita high school on a new

The day I heard about baseball i really wanted to play it. If i picked a position it would be first baseman because of the get to touch the ball a lot. i've hit a homerun before. the ball went so high in the air the sun made it look like it disappeared. The next day my mom went to sign up for the babe ruth league for newton. i played short stop. at the end of the season i had 13 home runs. me and my father and mother were both surprised at how many runs i had, i had 21 runs and 13 of those were home runs. then the next year i signed up again and this time i was my favorite position, first baseman. when the season was over i had 42 runs and 15 of those were home runs. Then my dad said i should play football so now i was laying baseball