Of Softball and God Damn Meddling Parents
People bug me. Really they do. Actually, it's not people. It's PARENTS! Softball parents to be precise.
My dad finally got to be a coach this year. HORRAY! He's awesome at it. He knows how to get the girls to understand what he wants them to do, know their strengths and weaknesses, and knows how to get them to win as a team and still have fun out there. If they lose, it's no big deal. We'll just get them next time. I've seen most of those girls he coaches every spring for years now thanks to going to Kit's games. They've smiled on the field and in the dugout more often this year than any other. I know, several factors could fit into this, but just let me rant.
So if the girls are happy, and love playing, and don't mind not being favoritized, then why the hell do the parents have to get in my Dad's face about it? Better yet, why do they have to try to stab him in the back?!!
The coach of the other team in town kept trying to get Dad to start fights over little things in the rule book. Dad's read that thing frontwards and backwards. He was an official Umpire for I don't know how many years. He's been to these softball games since I was nine years old. He knows how to argue the truth and when to stop yelling when it comes time to. "Look, who cares? It's not like this is the AllStars anyway. Lets just let the girls play."
But now it IS the All Stars. So who is everyone pretty well certain will be the head coach? The other guy, right? WRONG. HE suggests that my Dad be head coach. Quite an honor, really. Dad's first year of coaching and he gets to be head coach for All Stars! Not as awesome as it sounds. The other coach started telling the girls on his team things like where practice was supposed to be, except he told them the wrong field, even after Dad and the other subliminal coaches decided where it should be! If practice was at the HighSchool, he told them Fair Grounds. Then Dad, trying to be a non-confrontational guy, says "fine, we'll have it at the Fair Grounds." Every time this happened, it made Dad look like he didn't know what he was doing. SOMEONE (*coughOTHER COACHcough*) is trying to get Dad to look bad so he won't coach again. God Damn politics. Ruining my favorite sport. Grrrrr..... That's my beef with this other coach.
Then there's tonights All Star game. First one of the season. If the girls win, they play Saturday, and every single parent and coach has one single idea of how to win - make my daughter play WHERE she wants to the ENTIRE game. NOT going to happen! There's 14 girls, 9 positions. So many girls because a lot are going on vacation, one already is. NOT every girl can start. But what do they care?
- Mr. Attitude keeps threatening to take his daugther home if she's not put into the game by the second inning. He's already ticked that she's not starting. Fine. Take her home. Make her miss out on the sport she loves. She's going to miss the next two weeks anyway since you're going to Europe.
- Mrs. Bigmouth keeps complaining about how her daughter is in Right Field when she SHOULD be in the Infield. "The outfield is for the players with little talent! My daughter HAS talent!" Yes, she does. She has speed, a good glove, and a powerful arm. With how fast our pitchers can throw the ball, MOST of the hits will be toward your daughter. She will then have to be very fast to catch them and use her arm to throw the ball back to the infield - perhaps even to third or home - and Dad knows she's the best person for the job. Hell, your daughter even agreed when Dad told her all this! So why the hell are you still BITCHING about it in the fourth inning?!!
- Mr. Jackass keeps bitching about how HIS daugther isn't the starting catcher. Well you know what? The other catcher works better with our starting pitcher, and YOURS works better with our relief pitcher for the game! She'll get to play, if you would keep your fat mouth shut! And I don't much appreciate your comments about my father, thank you very much.
Mr. Jackass to Mr. Other Coach's wife: "(My Dad)'s got no class and no brains. If he did, we'd be winning."
Effe you. If I could draw the motion, I'd do it, but I'm not that cool with computers yet. But still, effe you jackass. What the hell do YOU know about my dad?! You're just mad because he didn't want you to help coach. He wanted a representative from BOTH teams! That's Mr. Other Coach from the team your daugther was on, and one of the coaches from his team. DEAL WITH IT! And stop trying to knock the Coach from His Team out of the coaching ranks! You have NOTHING on her! At least she knows how to support the girls without cutting anyone else down! Oh, and about the "no class" thing, I wouldn't be talking if I were you. If you had any class you wouldn't be saying something like that in the first place, yet alone in the proximity of my mom and me. And lets not forget that phone conversation we had a few weeks ago. You insulted me by calling me the lazy child of the family, you insulted my father and his work habits, AND you insulted my sister and her intelligence. Quite contrary to what you probably believed, you were NOT "joking around" and definitely NOT funny in any way. And you say my Dad has no class....
So what happens during the game? Yes, our team falls behind 4-0 within three innings, so of COURSE the parents are in an uproar! "Should have started her!" / "She should be at third base!" / "When's my kid going to play, buddy? Now she has to pull us out of this mess!" / "Where the hell is your brain, coach?!"
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
YOUR KIDS ARE NOT GOD! STOP TREATING THEM LIKE THEY ARE!!!!!!!
Mr. Attitude doesn't pull his kid out of the game and she went in the Third Inning. Mrs. Bigmouth's daughter stayed in Right Field the ENTIRE game. ALL game. Every inning! And she STILL bitched. As for Mr. Jackass' daughter, she got to go in and catch in the Fourth Inning when our relief pitcher...well.... relieved our starter. Oh, and get this, his daughter even TOLD us she started being able to hit better once her mom kicked her dad out of the fairgrounds and told him to go home. HA!
EVERY girl got to play at least an inning. EVERY girl cheered on the team. EVERY GIRL had fun! And we rallied in the seventh to come back and win 5-4, with a spectacular hit deep into left field. "Who Let the Dogs Out"?! What do they have to say about my Dad's coaching now? I don't care. And I'm glad I didn't stick around to hear any of it, cause I know Mr. Attitude was rambling with Mrs. Bigmouth about something as we left, and I don't think I could have taken any more without wanting to hit either one of them with a bat.
Sorry. Needed to rant. If you read it, thank you for putting up with it. I'll catch you when I'm in a better mood.
THREE MORE DAYS!!!!
My dad finally got to be a coach this year. HORRAY! He's awesome at it. He knows how to get the girls to understand what he wants them to do, know their strengths and weaknesses, and knows how to get them to win as a team and still have fun out there. If they lose, it's no big deal. We'll just get them next time. I've seen most of those girls he coaches every spring for years now thanks to going to Kit's games. They've smiled on the field and in the dugout more often this year than any other. I know, several factors could fit into this, but just let me rant.
So if the girls are happy, and love playing, and don't mind not being favoritized, then why the hell do the parents have to get in my Dad's face about it? Better yet, why do they have to try to stab him in the back?!!
The coach of the other team in town kept trying to get Dad to start fights over little things in the rule book. Dad's read that thing frontwards and backwards. He was an official Umpire for I don't know how many years. He's been to these softball games since I was nine years old. He knows how to argue the truth and when to stop yelling when it comes time to. "Look, who cares? It's not like this is the AllStars anyway. Lets just let the girls play."
But now it IS the All Stars. So who is everyone pretty well certain will be the head coach? The other guy, right? WRONG. HE suggests that my Dad be head coach. Quite an honor, really. Dad's first year of coaching and he gets to be head coach for All Stars! Not as awesome as it sounds. The other coach started telling the girls on his team things like where practice was supposed to be, except he told them the wrong field, even after Dad and the other subliminal coaches decided where it should be! If practice was at the HighSchool, he told them Fair Grounds. Then Dad, trying to be a non-confrontational guy, says "fine, we'll have it at the Fair Grounds." Every time this happened, it made Dad look like he didn't know what he was doing. SOMEONE (*coughOTHER COACHcough*) is trying to get Dad to look bad so he won't coach again. God Damn politics. Ruining my favorite sport. Grrrrr..... That's my beef with this other coach.
Then there's tonights All Star game. First one of the season. If the girls win, they play Saturday, and every single parent and coach has one single idea of how to win - make my daughter play WHERE she wants to the ENTIRE game. NOT going to happen! There's 14 girls, 9 positions. So many girls because a lot are going on vacation, one already is. NOT every girl can start. But what do they care?
- Mr. Attitude keeps threatening to take his daugther home if she's not put into the game by the second inning. He's already ticked that she's not starting. Fine. Take her home. Make her miss out on the sport she loves. She's going to miss the next two weeks anyway since you're going to Europe.
- Mrs. Bigmouth keeps complaining about how her daughter is in Right Field when she SHOULD be in the Infield. "The outfield is for the players with little talent! My daughter HAS talent!" Yes, she does. She has speed, a good glove, and a powerful arm. With how fast our pitchers can throw the ball, MOST of the hits will be toward your daughter. She will then have to be very fast to catch them and use her arm to throw the ball back to the infield - perhaps even to third or home - and Dad knows she's the best person for the job. Hell, your daughter even agreed when Dad told her all this! So why the hell are you still BITCHING about it in the fourth inning?!!
- Mr. Jackass keeps bitching about how HIS daugther isn't the starting catcher. Well you know what? The other catcher works better with our starting pitcher, and YOURS works better with our relief pitcher for the game! She'll get to play, if you would keep your fat mouth shut! And I don't much appreciate your comments about my father, thank you very much.
Mr. Jackass to Mr. Other Coach's wife: "(My Dad)'s got no class and no brains. If he did, we'd be winning."
Effe you. If I could draw the motion, I'd do it, but I'm not that cool with computers yet. But still, effe you jackass. What the hell do YOU know about my dad?! You're just mad because he didn't want you to help coach. He wanted a representative from BOTH teams! That's Mr. Other Coach from the team your daugther was on, and one of the coaches from his team. DEAL WITH IT! And stop trying to knock the Coach from His Team out of the coaching ranks! You have NOTHING on her! At least she knows how to support the girls without cutting anyone else down! Oh, and about the "no class" thing, I wouldn't be talking if I were you. If you had any class you wouldn't be saying something like that in the first place, yet alone in the proximity of my mom and me. And lets not forget that phone conversation we had a few weeks ago. You insulted me by calling me the lazy child of the family, you insulted my father and his work habits, AND you insulted my sister and her intelligence. Quite contrary to what you probably believed, you were NOT "joking around" and definitely NOT funny in any way. And you say my Dad has no class....
So what happens during the game? Yes, our team falls behind 4-0 within three innings, so of COURSE the parents are in an uproar! "Should have started her!" / "She should be at third base!" / "When's my kid going to play, buddy? Now she has to pull us out of this mess!" / "Where the hell is your brain, coach?!"
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
YOUR KIDS ARE NOT GOD! STOP TREATING THEM LIKE THEY ARE!!!!!!!
Mr. Attitude doesn't pull his kid out of the game and she went in the Third Inning. Mrs. Bigmouth's daughter stayed in Right Field the ENTIRE game. ALL game. Every inning! And she STILL bitched. As for Mr. Jackass' daughter, she got to go in and catch in the Fourth Inning when our relief pitcher...well.... relieved our starter. Oh, and get this, his daughter even TOLD us she started being able to hit better once her mom kicked her dad out of the fairgrounds and told him to go home. HA!
EVERY girl got to play at least an inning. EVERY girl cheered on the team. EVERY GIRL had fun! And we rallied in the seventh to come back and win 5-4, with a spectacular hit deep into left field. "Who Let the Dogs Out"?! What do they have to say about my Dad's coaching now? I don't care. And I'm glad I didn't stick around to hear any of it, cause I know Mr. Attitude was rambling with Mrs. Bigmouth about something as we left, and I don't think I could have taken any more without wanting to hit either one of them with a bat.
Sorry. Needed to rant. If you read it, thank you for putting up with it. I'll catch you when I'm in a better mood.
THREE MORE DAYS!!!!