My Love of Baseball

Happy Father’s Day!! I have been so excited to write this blog post for multiple reasons: 
#1 – Who doesn’t love talking about their dads?!
#2 – A lot of my stories with my dad revolves around baseball; and I am DESPERATELY missing baseball this summer
#3 – I love sharing my stories (hence, my blog) and I love hearing other people’s stories SO please feel free to contact me and tell me some stories you have with your dad!

Anyway, back to the story. There are so many things that I love about my dad and there’s so many things that he has taught me over the course of my life. The biggest and most important thing he taught me was that the most important thing I can do with my life is to love Jesus with my whole heart. But I would say the second biggest thing that he has taught me and that we have bonded the most over is BASEBALL. 

My dad grew up going to baseball games and baseball has seemingly always been a passion for him. He learned the ins and outs of the game at a young age from his uncle, and has never ceased from learning all he can about the game since then. After moving to Chicago from Cleveland, he made the Cubs and the Sox his home teams. He came to the conclusion that if he wasn’t originally from Chicago, he didn’t have to pick a specific home team out of the two. Also, why would he limit himself to just one team when he can have double the baseball and double the excitement with two teams in the same city?! (So, yes, we are BOTH Cubs and Sox fans. I know, many of you are judging us right now but we stick with our decision.) My dad has even been to every stadium in the country, except for one, and has begun to return to ones that have been built since he’s been there. As you can probably guess, I then grew up going to baseball games and my dad was determined to have me love the game just as much as him. 

One day, when I was about 10 or 11 years old, my dad and I were at a game, and I turned to him and said, “You know dad, this is kind of boring.” Right when I said that, he seemed to deflate a little. That was one of the worst things that I could have said to my dad who loved  baseball so much. He kindly responded, “Have I ever taught you how to score?” And THAT’S where my love for baseball began. 

Every game after that for about a year, he would buy me a scorecard and inevitably have to re-teach me how to score each game, and just by scoring each game, I learned so much about the sport. My dad soon taught me all of the ins and outs of the game, showing me things to look out for, teaching me the strategy, familiarizing me with the players, describing how hard the game actually is, and making me realize that almost every game there’s something new that happens. 

Since that time, I have multiple scorebooks filled with every game that I have been to and I have fallen in love with the game of baseball. I see the beauty of the sport, the tact and skill of it all, and love to talk about it all day long. There’s no better summer activity than sitting in the fresh air and watching baseball. My dad and I love baseball so much so that when we go to the stadium, we easily spend 6-7 hours there. We go right when the gates open and usually stay until they kick us out. We don’t like to be rushed in our baseball experience or enjoyment of the game. Now, I am even trying to go to every stadium in the country just like him. The past 4 or 5 summers have been dedicated to baseball road trips in order to achieve this. I am currently at 20 out of the 30, so I don’t have too many more to go. 

All this to say, I appreciate my dad so much for sticking it out and taking the time to teach me not only to score, but all about the game of baseball. He knew how much I would enjoy baseball if I simply was educated on it. So, from the moment I said it was “boring”, he knew he just needed to work harder, and it was so worth it! I honestly couldn’t imagine life without baseball. I wouldn’t have all the wonderful memories of traveling from stadium to stadium with my dad. I wouldn’t have been able to travel as much as I do to enjoy all the stadiums. I wouldn’t be able to enjoy something he loves a lot in life with him. And I wouldn’t have all the life lessons that come from baseball. 

My lack of education on baseball made it seem boring, yet when I became educated on it, I was proven wrong and ended up loving it more than I could’ve imagined. It irks me when people say that the game is slow and boring because that usually just means they have no idea what’s happening and are not paying attention. I think this is true about a lot of things in life as well. Education can change people’s viewpoints and get rid of misconceptions making people not only smarter, but also more compassionate and caring. This starts with simply paying attention and being attentive to what’s happening in the game to know what areas you need to learn about. 

As I said, there are so many life lessons that come from baseball and I hope to share them with you in my next few blog posts! 

Thank you, Dad, for all you’ve done in my life, and especially for teaching me to love baseball. Love you!

With Love, 
Hannah