The way I see it...

Sweet Season

Baseball season at West Marshall is officially over. With that means the end of a chapter of our lives at the Burdorf house. I’m sure everybody knows, but just in case you missed it my husband was the head baseball coach for the Trojans the past six years. Because of our family situation with Blake and having four kids instead of two and also because he wants to finish his Master’s degree (that got put on hold for the summer), he decided to step down. Aaron has always said that family has to come first and it was just the time to step away.

Decisions like that are never easy. Since the time we learned of Blake and dialysis and transplant stuff, we had been discussing it. I love, love, love baseball! I think probably as much as Aaron, if you can believe that. It was so hard, but like we said, it doesn’t mean he’s never ever going to get to coach again.

Anybody that’s coached or been around someone who has, knows it’s a tough job. You don’t do it for the pay check, you literally do it for love of the game and the players. My dad, who was a head softball coach for 25 years always says, “If you want everybody to like you, don’t be a coach.”

My dad is pretty smart like that. There will always be kids that get more playing time than others. There will always be parents that are on your case about their kid not playing enough. I have learned, growing up with two parents as head coaches and now being married to one, that parents have blinders on when it comes to their children. We’ve all seen that crazy parent who thinks their kid is an all-star and should have a starting position, but they’re just not. To me, that’s difficult. You’re going to upset someone. That’s just a nature of varsity athletics.

What I personally will miss is the players. What a great group of guys that always seemed to be out. I may even miss those nail-biter games! Games where my stomach was in knots and I was pacing like a crazy coach’s wife down the third baseline hoping that they could pull out the win.

With my dad coaching softball, my mom playing college softball, my family always likes to say we have “summer blood” running through our veins. We LOVE baseball and softball.

I grew up on softball and didn’t know how I would adjust to baseball games. Now, I can’t imagine NOT being at the field for every game. I consider baseball an “acquired” taste. Some people find it slow. Some people find it boring. I personally could sit and watch it for hours. I realize it’s something you have to get into to really appreciate.

The skill sets for baseball players are so, I don’t know, different than any other sport. The hand-eye coordination you need is unbelievable. It’s pretty brave to have a pop-fly coming at you, confidently putting your glove up to catch and having enough hand-eye coordination that the ball actually goes in your glove and not on your eye or over your head. I’ve also heard that hitting a baseball is one of the hardest things to do in sports and I believe it.

So, another chapter has closed in our life and another one begins. Thank you so much to all the boys and their parents for this past season. Thanks for checking in to see how Blake and Bowen were doing. Thanks for holding a baby when I needed help. Thanks for letting Brody help you rake the field after a ballgame. Thanks for making this season so fun and so memorable, our family will miss it next year, but that’s just the way I see it.