stevis

I tell the teenagers I train for Little League--your first game will come at you quickly. It'll seem like it's so much. But your second, and your fifth, games will go even better. Your fifteenth will go even better than that. (At some point they're not going to go better unless you keep putting the work in, but I digress.) As others have said, you'll be raw because you are raw. Nothing wrong with that! You got this brother. If 13 year olds I struggle to keep on task can go out, not get hurt, and do a decent job for the level, I'm sure an airline pilot can. Do you have a pump-up jam? I first saw Hamilton right before my first state tournament; ever since I've adopted "My Shot" as my get-ready music. Gets me in the "I belong here, and I'm about to show it" head space. Find some little pump-up and or comfort ritual that works for you. And report back! We're pulling for you.

My least favorite instantiation of this is LL All-Stars, and ace pitchers messing around with the #8-10 hitters. Save that curve, and those pitches, to upset the timing of the top five hitters who can take you deep! This kid has just shown he can't catch your heat. [Mortal Kombat Voice]Finish him![/Mortal Kombat Voice]

I used to play "modified fast-pitch" that worked like his, where you couldn't take the full windup. It was a base/work league, nobody taking anything too seriously but decades before somebody must have decided they weren't going full beer league slow pitch and it stuck. Never climbed a fence but I did get my pant leg caught in one chasing down an errant throw.

If the penalty is a fine, it means it's only illegal for poor people.

Whiskey Tangos? (As in, Whiskey-Tango-Foxtrot...)

Weather Underground for general, My Lightning Tracker for thunderstorm monitoring

As a cyborg pancreas haver (insulin pump + continuous glucose monitoring) I can only say: welcome to the ranks. Your biological and technological distinctiveness will be added to our own.

double post sorry

I fear you're right...but the other day, LL shared on Facebook a video of one of the kids hitting a HR, stopping three feet from the plate, turning his back on his gathered teammates (behind the plate), and miming taking a selfie. (Then proceeding to complete his award, natch.) Hoping someone at least sees that fun and sportsmanship don't have to be at cross-purposes all the time; at least someone on the social media team does.

LL has taught that HR mechanic yes. I don't love it either, but when I'm doing a tournament game where somebody whose opinion of me means something for me is watching...

No such specific rule. Now that it made notice I'll bet there's an extra-unworkable, stick-up-rear-end rule for us to deal with next year. That's my district--not sure I worked a game with that team though. I don't recall seeing it then.

I do occasionally to get the pellets off our plate on our one turf field, but yeah, it's more a bit of habit than anything else. Especially in the top of the 1st, it's just part of what I'm expecting to do to get going and it would "feel" wrong not to.

Was at U1 yesterday the VA LL Intermediate States...kid was going for a triple and I'm rotating, while in my mind thinking "sendhimsendhimSENDHIM." It was not to be.

"But I didn't now you were called Dennis until just now."