There is no 'I' in Coach

Last week, Hunter's coach went out of town, so that left me holding the reigns to coach his team. We had a game Thursday night and we got killed 16-6. Our team got three hits and we just could not play defense - the kids did not know where to throw the ball or what base to cover. So, on Friday night I held a practice in which we broke the team into two groups - one group went in the outfield and one of dads throw pitches at them all night - the other group came to the infield and I hit balls at them all night and worked with them on who covers what bases, etc. After practice, I knew that I would need a pitcher for the game on Saturday, and two of our pitchers were out of town, and the other pitcher pitched on Thursday. So, I had all the kids go to the pitcher's mound to see who could pitch. One kid, Cameron, didn't throw very hard but he was accurate, so I decided to have him pitch on Saturday. After practice, I had several parents come up to me and tell me that was the best practice we had all year. Saturday's game came and sure enough, I had Cameron pitch. We had a rough first inning were the kids were making great plays on defense, but then they would throw the ball around like a circus and the other team would score. The other team ended up scoring 5 runs that inning. I pulled the kids aside and told them to quit doing that, but to just make one play. We went out the next inning and held the team scoreless. The following inning the other team scored one run. Cameron pitched threw innings and threw more strikes then any of our other pitchers did for the whole season! He was great! Our team also belted out 16 hits, which is by far the most we have had in any other game - our previous high was 7 hits. We scored 8 runs in one inning which is the max that you can score before the inning is considered over. Then, I brought our 'best' pitcher in to close the game and he gave up 4 runs before we got three outs. But we won the game 14 - 10!! Our first win of the season (record 1 - 7) ! I was not sure who was more excited to win - the parents or the kids. In the last inning, the parents were on their feet screaming and yelling with each out - holding thier breath with each hit ball. Man, it was a great feeling to win and quite a few parents congratulated me after the game. But the kids really came together and put on a good game. We beat a team that had 5 wins for the season, so they were a good team. It feels even better to wind since the head coach thinks he is such a fantastic coach and the reason we aren't winning is because of the kids on the team. I DON'T THINK SO...

Hunter went 2 for 3 with 3 RBIs and played catcher the whole game. He loves being catcher!!