By the time you read this, I will have completed my first season as president of a minor sports organization.
To say that I bit off a lot more than I could chew would be an understatement.
Without getting too much into things, I took on the lead role of a minor softball organization when it became apparent that nobody else would do so following the 2022 season.
Over the winter, I was able to recruit a few more volunteers to help run the organization, which last season consisted of four teams. Our goal: to grow the organization, to show that not only it could be done, but to prove to our hockey counterparts that amalgamation is not the solution to low enrolment issues.
It turns out, a little bit of elbow grease can do wonders.
By the time registration closed, we had enough players for seven teams, including one in U13 – something our organization has not had in a decade.
After a steep learning curve – finding uniforms and equipment for all of these teams, fighting with other baseball organizations to get decent diamond times, and learning that umpires make damn good money for a couple hours of work – our teams hit the field for the season.
Our teams captured their fair share of hardware at the year-end tournaments as well, with a U11 B Championship, silver in U9 Mixed and U15, and bronze in U7. The future of softball looks bright in our organization.
However, like all minor sports, there were moments of frustration and several headaches as well.
There were nights of parents emailing or texting to complain about coaches or a kid’s perceived lack of playing; frustrations with the municipality on what is, in the grand scheme of things, a relatively unimportant issue; or parents complaining about how the organization is operated without ever offering to be part of the solution.
It got to a point where I asked myself – and mentioned this to my co-workers – “Why the hell am I doing this?”
The past two weekends of year-end ball tournaments answered that question for me.
In addition to being president of our organization, I was also the coach of one of our two U9 teams (something which has been highlighted in this space before). Our team was fortunate to have a great season on the field, finishing first overall in the regular season with a 13-1 record and losing in the A Championship to Puslinch in a really close game.
Following the game, the players were all presented with their silver medals. It didn’t matter that they had just lost a really close game, they had accomplished something with their teammates.
After they got their medals, the kids all wanted photos with their friends and their coaches. There were smiles everywhere. Then this happened.
“Hey Coach Mike, can we dump water on your head?”
This is something they have wanted to do all year come tournament time. It was a hot day, and I consider myself a good sport, so…
“Sure, let’s do it.”
The video of all the kids laughing while dumping water on my head was posted to pretty much every parent’s social media feed that night.
At the U13 tournament over the weekend, our team was ranked No. 1 in the B Division, and expectations were for a medal. While that didn’t come to fruition, there were other things that did:
– a kid who couldn’t hit a beach ball to save his life at the start of the season became one of the most reliable hitters during the tournament because he put in lots of practice during the summer to improve;
– a kid who, prior to this season, had never been part of a team played the game of his life and his teammates chanted, “MVP! MVP! MVP!” during the post-game celebration;
– several kids who, following a mistake in the field or at the plate, would persevere and go out the next inning to make a play that made up for whatever mistake they made the previous inning; and
– a group of kids who, prior to the season didn’t have much in common other than they registered to play ball, became a group of friends.
Sure, winning is great to see, but those memories are what kids are going to remember as they get older.
And are going to be the reason they want to continue to play minor sports.
In an age where the large majority of parents and organizations focus their efforts on how to be competitive, how to be bigger and how to produce “future stars,” we need to take a step back and remember what minor sports were intended to be in the first place: a place for kids to play, make friends and learn skills like being part of a team.
We need to stop trying to be “A” centres or select/rep teams, and focus on the kids.
Every statistic you can Google will tell you that the chances of a kid making it professionally in hockey, baseball, soccer, etc. is very, very low. Obscenely low. So let’s stop trying to make every kid the next Shohei Ohtani or Connor McDavid, and teach them to enjoy the game so our local ball diamonds, soccer fields and hockey rinks continue to thrive.
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Mike Wilson is the editor of Midwestern Newspapers. Comments and feedback are welcome at mwilson@midwesternnewspapers.com.
