By Rich Herrera – @RBIRich

The story about Mitch “Wild Thing” Williams has many people shocked across the country with his antics. Why I ask you are you shocked? He allegedly cussed out an umpire, called kids on the other team names, and had a pitcher on his team intentionally hit a player on the other team with a pitch. If you are shocked you have not been to a youth baseball game lately.

Youth baseball is out of control with half the parents trying to relive their glory days on the backs of their 9 year olds and the other half are parents that are trying to help their kids gain a better life through sports. It used be parents of kids from the inner city dreamed of a scholarship as a way to escape poverty. Today that mind-set of using sports as a springboard to a better life has moved to the suburbs. Now you add parents with money and time on their hands, bad things are going to happen. Youth baseball has become very elite and expensive. Kids play on summer travel teams that have better gear than minor league professional players. They have custom shoes to go with their home and road uniforms that they keep in their monogramed travel bags. Parents spend thousands on private pitching and hitting coaches each year. They spend even more on travel and the best equipment money can buy. If your kid doesn’t have a 500 dollar pair of team colored sunglasses like the rest of the kids on this team, sorry he can’t play with us. This is the first generation of Americans that feels that their kids won’t have a better life than they will. If my kids don’t have the same chances to advance then I am going to do what ever it takes and will spend what ever I need to in order to make OUR dreams come true.

When parents invest that much time and cash in their kids playing career as 10U team member (10U means a 10 and under team in travel league vocabulary) they expect and demand a return on their investment. They spent their money, and darn it, it better worth their time, their effort and their cash. If their kid isn’t hitting, someone has to pay because their child cannot be striking out. How can he look at a called third strike, I just spent 75 dollars an hour for a private hitting coach. If their kid can’t throw a strike it can’t be the his fault because he has had pitching lessons for the last 4 years from a former big leaguer. It has to be that idiot umpire who can’t call balls and strikes. In fact, because we spent so much money and time taking him to his pitching lessons, I now have the right to yell and scream at the umpire. You know what, my son has been on a travel team since he was 6 and that means something. I have every right to tell that stupid umpire what is on my mind. I can j tell he is an evil person because he caused our team to walk the bases loaded, and it’s all his fault. After all, we made an investment in this kid and that guy is robbing him of his chance to get to the big leagues because he has it out for us and our kids. He is such a lousy umpire I need to make sure he knows how bad he sucks, and when he doesn’t drop down on his knees to say he is sorry for getting in the way of our goals, that umpire really does deserve a punch in the mouth.

Coaches can also be the culprit in this mess of youth baseball. I see coaches in youth baseball I wouldn’t let watch a pack of feral cats that are coaching 10-year-old kids. I see coaches that are there not so much for the kids but for their own ego. They yell and scream at their players, because everyone knows the best way to get through to kids is yelling at them, isn’t it? I was at a travel league game a few years ago. I walked by a coach with a group of 11 and 12 year olds. He was cussing them out because they didn’t understand what he was trying to teach them. I walked by and said instead of cussing at them why not show them an example of how to hold the glove up to bill of their baseball caps and use it to shade the sun from their eyes so they can see the fly ball they are trying to catch. He told me where I could go. I walked by them again and he was holding the glove up near his eye level and shading his eyes from the sun showing them how to catch a fly ball. Wow I’d be so happy to be a parent on that team who writes that “COACH” a check for a couple of thousands of dollars a few times a summer. I ran into another coach that was “scouting” kids to look for talent for his travel team. He walked up and asked me about a kid playing on my son’s team and asked for his name and address while he took notes on a clipboard and worked his stop watch. The kid he was asking about was barely ten years old. If he had walked up and asked the same questions about that kid anywhere else I would have called the police. Do any of these adults have concern for the kids and their well-being or is all about winning the 10U World Series. I had a parent walk up to me after a little league game our kids had won and he was so excited because they had just beat their bitter rival. He said I am so excited when we kick their butts I love it when we beat the Sand Gnats, I looked at him and said I feel the same way when the Tampa Bay Rays beat the New York Yankees. How many 10 year olds have bitter rivals. Adults have rivals, kids will be mad at you one minute and want to be your best buddy the next.

Now I will admit I have taken my son to the batting cages and he has worked with former big leaguers that I paid to work with him and instruct him. Why did I do it? I had a hard time teaching him being his father. I had a hard time be patient with him when trying to explain how to get ready to hit. I know there are lot of parents that feel that way. What I did learn is that if he can’t pick it up right away and he pouts or gets mad, you know what, it is not on me. It has very little to do with me. He isn’t telling me I am a bad coach. What he is doing is being a kid that is trying and failing to grasp the game right away. What he is doing is failing and trying again, and isn’t that why we are all out there, to learn life lessons? I am probably not that different than you. I grew frustrated, instead of taking a moment and letting him learn to work out what we were trying to work on, I would get mad at him for being frustrated. Bad move on my part. If anything, he felt too much pressure thinking he was letting me down for not picking it up right way, when that was nothing further from the truth. How did we find this out? By talking to each other rather than me yelling at him.

Have you gone to purchase some equipment for your kids to play baseball lately. I admit my son has great gear, some was given to us from friends in the game, some I bought second-hand, and other I picked up at the Rawlings outlet in Orlando. The most expensive thing he has gear wise is his bat, that costs several hundred dollars. Sticker shock? Yes it hit me too when he showed me what he wanted and how much it cost. But you know what every other kid on his team had one too. I made him earn money and save up to buy the bat on his own. Think of it, he has a bat that costs more than the first car your dad had. No wonder parents go crazy when their kids strike out with a 300 dollar bat. It can’t be that my kid swung at pitches in the dirt it has to be that bat isn’t working. Let’s run to the store and get you a 500 dollar bat son that will help you become an All Star next season.

The best thing about youth baseball is the kids, the worst is the adults that poison a kids game with adults trying to live their lives through the kids who would be just as happy if some played catch with them in the front yard.

What is the answer? Number one, every parent, coach and team official needs to ask themselves one question why are you there? If your answer is anything other than I want my child to have fun and enjoy the game and learn life lessons, you are part of the problem. If you answer has anything to do with winning, competition, or has anything to do about the next level you want to your child to play, you are there for the wrong reason. You are there for your benefit not your kids.

I am not one that thinks all kids have to have trophies and we don’t need to keep score. The kids need to know what it is like to work hard and win. They also need to learn how to lose and deal with defeat. Dealing with failure is part of the game and it helps teach life lessons that all kids need to learn. When those lessons are replaced with win at all costs, or it is not my fault I struck out it is the stupid umpire or my 300 dollar bat is worthless, we have lost our bearings when it comes to what makes baseball so special.