Anyone who knows me very well knows that I collect baseball memories. I can remember vividly my father coming home from a business trip to Denver in 1962 and giving me my first real baseball glove. At age four it meant the world to me and I instantly fell in love with the game and wanted to be a professional baseball player, and still do.
Four years later my dad took me to baseball tryouts, and I took that glove with me. It was too big, and I had not broken it in correctly, which made it difficult to catch with. I looked more like a hockey goalie knocking the three balls down that were hit to me and throwing them back. I was put on the Barons recreation department team and was told I was a second baseman.
During games, I lived in fear that a ball would be hit to me. I just could not get the hang of catching a ball, and then it happened. A batter hit a high fly ball on the infield, right at me. It seemed to me that the ball was as high as the Empire State Building and was never going to come down, but it did, and to the surprise of everyone in park that day I caught it.
Tury Oman was the league manager and announcer that day and on the microphone, he said, “hey what a great catch,” and the crowd went wild. Coach Oman was a legend. He has an arena named after him and earned seven varsity letters in football, basketball and baseball from Wisconsin in 1931 before graduating in the top ten of his class. Years later coach asked me for a ride home and as we drove to his house he talked about the importance of Fellowship of Christian Athletes and to remember during sports and coaching the emotional development of young men and women was very important.
As we drove and talked, I remember him telling me things that were on his heart that day about doing things the right way. Being 16, I had taken a job as a coach in the same league, on the same ballfield where coach had earlier served as the league administrator. I had a good team and during the end of season tournament we were playing well. As with any team that age you have players of all abilities.
In the bottom of the last inning with two outs and the winning runs on base, one of our worst hitters was due up. The players in the dugout were moaning and so were the parents. It was definitely a defining moment in the life of a coach and player. The pitcher was throwing BB’s and filling the strike zone, and my player, to the best of my recollection, had not gotten a hit all season or been on base. As he walked to the plate, I knew he could hear the disappointment as only baseball players and parents can express during these moments. When he stepped into the batter’s box, he asked the umpire for time, and he walked toward me in the third base coaching box.
When he got there, he said “Coach, I am not the right person to be batting right now and I am ok if you take me out because we are going to lose if I bat.”
I took my lineup card out of my pocket and said, “It says here that it is your time to bat, I cannot think of anyone in the dugout or the stands that I would want batting for me right now.”
He asked if I was sure and I said yes, and he went back to the plate. Several pitches later he walked, and as he jumped for joy running to first base, the crowd erupted in a loud cheer. I don’t remember the result of the game or the tournament, but what I do remember is that during a ride home one day Coach Oman taught me that I could be a Christian outside of the church. He said life demanded it and if you led that way people would follow your example. As we go through this unprecedented time of not being able to formally worship together at Keith Church, I share this story to remind you to be a Christian outside of the walls of the church….life demands it now more than ever. Besides coach said so.
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