Being 42 in an Over-30 Baseball League

First off I guess I should start at the beginning.  I remember when my mom brought me to my first little league baseball practice and one of my “friends” called my name.  Being conditioned at that age of 8, I looked over to who was calling.  Unfortunately, that person had thrown a baseball at my head before actually calling so I turned to look and got hit right in the eye.  Ok—I really am not going to go through my uneventful baseball career from a young age- I just wanted to bring up how things really all started.  I seem to remember only striking out pretty much every time and looking at my shadow in the grass a lot playing left field waiting until I got my snow cone…sounds like a Brian Regan skit, eh?

Let’s fast forward 34 years—mainly because nothing all that spectacular has happened baseball-wise up until now.  Don’t get me wrong- I have always loved baseball—been a Yankees fan as long as I can remember…coming home from school to watch whoever was playing back when Yankee baseball on TV was good—WPIX Channel 11 with the Scooter- Phil Rizzuto.  Loved The Natural, and Field of Dreams, and Bull Durham, and Major League….and on and on and on.  But for some reason, for the past 11 years I could’ve been playing Over-30 baseball and yet I didn’t. 

So I come off the stage from playing drums at church to my wife talking with our friends Tim and Heather Parks.  Tim has been playing over-30 baseball for a few years, and since I came into the conversation late- I still have no real idea how baseball came up as my wife only talks baseball to humor me.  But the suggestion for me to join Tim’s team came up…and I laughed at first…well—I am 42, remember?  And was also at 238 pounds…so nowhere even remotely close to being a fast runner…or even really a runner at all.  But I have always liked the idea of playing and when I played in my teens and 20’s for fun, I always hit well.  So I thought- what the hell?  I have summers off as a teacher and it would be something fun to do and maybe I’d even get some exercise.

So I looked into it—the league was called Saratoga Roy Hobbs League…hmmm….cool Natural reference there.  Heck—maybe this is destiny.  Roy Hobbs was in his 40s when he came back to baseball in the movie (Turns out after I looked it up that he came back at 34, but Robert Redford looked like he was in his 40s!). At the time, the movie about Jackie Robinson- 42- was also starting to get publicity.  All these “signs”…how could I not join up?  I had visions of coming up to the plate at my first at bat and hitting one into the lights…more on that later.

So I ended up talking with the coach trying to convince him that I was a good prospect- even at 42…someone the minor leagues might have “overlooked” since I never actually played on a college team.  He seemed unconvinced over the phone and gave me the speech I was warned about by Tim in regards to being “committed” to the team.  I assured him that I was ready to go and a good bet as well since I have summers off—and my kids are old enough that they wouldn’t be hindering anything. I immediately set up time to throw and hit batting practice with Tim—and we spent a few hours at the local sports complex…didn’t do too bad…ready to go.

The first few practices went OK—although my reflexes were noticeably slower than I remembered while fooling around with some infield play…but once I got into the outfield and had a few more seconds to react, I looked a bit rosier.  Besides—they couldn’t hear me struggling for oxygen way out there.  There were a lot of us there—almost 20…and while I didn’t appear to be the oldest there, I sure felt it.  My teammates seemed pretty cool- but they’d known each other for a while and so didn’t talk to much to us “rookies”.  Thank God I had Tim to talk to!

Then it came time to request numbers for our jerseys…I rather smugly requested #9 after Roy Hobbs himself…my own little inside joke.  Coach thought for a second and said he thought #9 might be taken- so what else did I want?  What?  Someone else had the superior intellect to take my well thought-out number?  I hadn’t prepared to have to come up with another number…so I came up with 42- not a bad back up in three ways—it was my age, it was Jackie Robinson’s number, and it is also the number of my favorite Yankee, Mariano Rivera.

Turns out my worries were unwarranted…#9 was mine…all mine!  Later, the Saratoga Roy Hobbs league also changed names—apparently something came up between the affiliation and Saratoga…so we now became the Saratoga Men’s Senior Baseball League.  Who’s a senior?  Ha!!!

OK—so my first at-bat in a game- was it a home run?  Errr….no.  It was a line drive to the shortstop.  Instead of going through a game by game rundown of my first season though (let’s face it—I am not Derek Jeter—and you are probably only reading this because you know me- not because you are awed by my baseball not-so-greatness…).  So how’d I do?  Here’s a rundown…

In the regular season—

I went 12 for 33—averaging .364- which isn’t bad in typical baseball speak.

3 RBIs (Runs Batted In)

2 Runs—(I wish I had the video for you of my first one at Shuttleworth Park in Amsterdam—I tripped over my feet and ended up trying to slide into home and instead did a crazy fat guy sort of somersault onto home plate—would’ve gone viral on YouTube easily!)

1 Sacrifice Bunt—it really was the first bunt of my life and a beauty—Tim was on first and was able to get to third base on it)

6 Put-Outs (catches) playing right field…and more regrettably—three catching errors (sorry Tim and Joe!)

LOST:  18 pounds…so I am a still somewhat hefty 220…

Injuries Inventory:

(1)   Smashed Left Pointer Finger—happened while trying to hit at Greenfield—got hit with a nasty knuckleball

(1)   Pulled Left Hamstring—happened during that crazy first run at Shuttleworth—felt something pop rounding second base

(1) Pulled Left Quad Muscle—Happened ten days after my pulled hamstring—pretty much took away any speed I had for the rest of the season much to the ridicule of my teammates…

In the playoffs—1 for 3 (.333) with 1 RBI

Total batting average for the entire season—.361

So—will I play again next year??  Abso-frickin-lutely.  I really did enjoy playing again—and ended up with a pretty good hitting streak in the end there at 5 games.  I really felt at the end that I didn’t want it to end-  I got to know my teammates well enough to kid around with them…but definitely not so that we are all that chummy- but that’s all good.  I want to drop more weight next year—maybe get down to around 190—(going to need to find someone willing to train with as I am no good on my own).  I also want to work on strengthening my legs so I am not so prone to injury- and so I can hopefully get some speed back and maybe run out that sac bunt next time!  Who knows…maybe the Yankees might be in the need of a 43 year old, slightly overweight right fielder next year—I promise I won’t ask for as much as the other guys my age on the Yankees who aren’t hitting well!