Baseball was Very, Very Good to Me

RIP to DJ. Dennis Johnson was one of the first basketball players I liked. I grew up in the 80's with the Celtics on TV all the time. Of course we all liked Bird and McHale, the Chief and scrappy Danny Ainge, but DJ was that strange freckled black guy. Something as a white southerner I found weird. I figured he really might have been a Celtic.

I'm ready for baseball to get started. I was thinking back to my baseball playing days as one of the only things from childhood I miss. I don't miss school (except for college), I don't miss watching a 13'' television in my 8X9 room. I really don't miss having $15 and thinking I was rich. I don't miss Nintendo, or Sega Genesis...I could care less if I ever played a video game again. I miss, very very deeply playing baseball. I was good. Really good and got a thrill out of going out there and truly showing off. There were certainly times that weren't easy, but things tended to come naturaly on the field for me. I remember each time I moved up an age group I struggled hitting and usually didn't have a lot of confidence, but it seemed those were the teams I pitched really well for or somehow came up with memorable defensive plays.

Yeah I miss baseball and hanging out at my neighborhood pool in the summers. That's about it. I swear I'd give your left nut to sit in the dugout with my buddies getting ready for a game. Or practicing under the lights on a humid night. I miss it dearly.

I'm currently between jobs, and as soon as I start working again I'm either going to find a team to help coach, or learn to umpire or something. It's been in my blood and its been too long since I've used what skills I might have left. Spring does this to me every year. It starts warming up, the days get longer, and you see spring training...it gives me that itch.