These posts are intended to share interesting stories about our experiences with travel baseball, the origin of the Crusaders, and hopefully some valuable insights into what to do and not do with your son/daughter. At no point will I try to defame any coach/parent/player and I’ll do my best to protect your identity if something may seem like a negative.
Final Weekend at Grand Park
The last tournament EJ ever played in before the Crusaders were born, we were in Indianapolis for our last tournament of the year. EJ had moved on from the Flames and was playing with another Ohio based team. He was getting plenty of opportunities to play, moving between Catcher and OF.
EJ and I had made the trip over to Indianapolis on Friday to get some rest and be there for our games on Saturday morning. We’d gotten up around 8AM that morning, took a walk to stretch our legs and eat breakfast.
Gameday
The team was playing at Grand Park that day and they looked awful! Our hitters couldn’t hit, our pitchers couldn’t pitch, and our fielders couldn’t field. Not a great combination for a baseball team. We went 0-2 in pool play giving up 22 runs and finished seeded 23rd out of 24 teams. Which means we didn’t make bracket play and only received a consolation game on Sunday afternoon at 4PM!
Our two best players who were really, really good, looked sluggish, tired, and out of sorts. Unfortunately, there was good reason. On Saturday night after two of the worst games of the year the boys went out to bowl. EJ and I went along, and an assistant coach came to me and said, “did you hear what happened last night?”. My response was “No, EJ and I went to bed around 10PM and didn’t really see anyone until we arrived at the games that afternoon.”
24 Hours Earlier
The assistant coach continues to describe the activities from the previous night and how the head coach and a few of the other parents got pretty drunk and the head coach was actually doing cartwheels in the hotel lobby at 2AM!! Of course, the cops were called and that’s usually not a good thing for a 10U baseball team. On top of the coaches being a little unruly their sons were still up running around the hotel into the middle of the night, which explains the poor play on Saturday afternoon. Needless to say, Saturday was the last day EJ played for that team and the Crusaders were founded just a couple of weeks later.
Key Takeaways:
- Find a team that fits your family’s life style
- Stay away from drunken coaches and 2AM hotel cart wheels