It’s Just a Game

Baseball is the great American pastime, requiring skill and the kind of good hand-eye coordination I never got from drama and dance classes. My youngest son loves it. For me, listening to the crack of the bat and kids cheering on their teammates is just about as good a gig as you can find on a Saturday afternoon.

Which is why I’m suddenly surprised.

Head Coach is screaming at his players, nine and ten-year old boys.

“Lazy. You’re being lazy!”

“Are you a spectator or a ball player?”

“Dive for the ball!”

“Can any of you catch?”

Assistant Coach yells, too.

“What’s wrong with you?”

“I’ll pay you five dollars if you catch the next two balls.”

“This is ridiculous! You are pathetic players!”

They laugh and high-five each other.

When his son gets back up to pitch, Coach Watkins sneers.

“Can you do it right this time?” he asks.

His son looks at him and mouths the words, “Shut up, dad.”

“I’m not going to shut up,” he taunts. “I’m going to be in your ear every minute of every game so get used to it.”

Parents scream, too. One mother in particular yells at her son, who sometimes makes mistakes.

“You’re letting your whole team down,” Mom chides from the stands. “When I get you home, I’m going to kill you! You’re an embarrassment!”

I look at the field and count five crying kids.

The rest of the team frowns and looks genuinely miserable. Including my son.

“Isn’t this supposed to be fun?” I ask.

We’re all used to seeing parents behave badly at the ballpark. Dads with beer bellies as big as their egos, trying hard to recapture the glory of their youth as it slips further away, are a common sight.

This is their life, all wrapped up in confronting umpires, screaming at kids, and starting fights with fellow coaches. For two or three hours every Saturday, they want to remember what it was like when they were kids, back when they had their whole lives ahead of them. Now their best days are gone and their sons, goddamn it, are going to help them get those feelings back.

Parents like Mom simply hate to lose. They glare at the All-Stars and criticize those parents who don’t seem to care as much, yet easily breed champions. It isn’t fair. Several parents complain, but when I suggest action, they walk away mumbling, “I hate confrontation.”

I hate it, too. But I won’t stand by while adults emotionally abuse their children.

This past Saturday, Mom screamed at her son to get out from behind the plate.

“Are you lazy or tired?! Tell the coach to pull you out.”

Head Coach removed her son from the game. The boy took off his equipment, sobbing. I’d seen enough. I walked up to the stands and stood staring at the four or five crazy parents who were ruining the game for everyone.

“What you all are doing to your children is insane,” I told them.

“Shut up!” Mrs. Lazzara yelled at me. “Get out of here if you don’t like it!”

Her son proceeded to the dugout where he hyperventilated. Mom took him aside and tried to get him to drink some water. Finally, after attracting more than a few concerned onlookers, the poor kid had to be taken home. Mom insisted, as she escorted him, hysterical, to the parking lot, that he was simply “dehydrated.”

The coaches scolded players who were spitting on each other and calling players “idiots” when they missed a ball.

“These kids are modeling the behavior they see in you,” I told them.

But neither coach engaged with me. I guess they prefer to fight with children, who aren’t as quick to talk back.

It isn’t okay to mimic and make fun of crying children. It isn’t okay to threaten them with physical violence if they don’t do well on the field. It isn’t okay to berate them for missing a ball.

This weekend, after a rousing post-game talk where Head Coach told the kids he was embarrassed for them and Assistant Coach called them “girl scouts,” my husband and I walked our youngest son to the parking lot.

“Are you okay after games like today?” I asked.

“Yeah,” he said. “I’m glad I have parents like you instead of them.”

I guess not all lessons on the ball field require good hand-eye coordination.

Bio: Catherine Durkin Robinson gave up her career in Boston as a corporate trainer, political activist and rabble-rouser to return to Tampa to stay at home with identical twin sons. Trapped in the suburbs, surrounded by Weber grills and confederate flags, she decided to launch her freelance writing career and explore all that is fun and frustrating about progressive parenting. Not easily defined, she’s a feminist who’s had cosmetic surgery, a wife who has never been domestically inclined, and a mommy who doesn’t particularly like kids. In her spare time, she investigates missing socks.

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