Baseball, Hotdogs, and Apple Pie

Editor’s note: As the author notes, high school baseball is here and the Grady Knights are off to an 8-2 start heading into Monday’s 5:30 p.m. home game against North Springs. Also Monday, the Grady Athletic Booster Club will hold a "Listening Session" to hear from the community about current athletic issues to share with the candidates for the position of Grady's athletic director. Coaching/personnel issues and concerns are excluded from this 7 p.m. session at the school cafeteria. Please contact Lisa Seiler at laseiler2@aol.com for more information.

PLAY BALL...High school baseball season is here! You can feel it in the air! The pitcher's wind-up, the crack of the bat, and parents sweating in bleachers as they once again ponder the age-old question: Why does my son's coach insist on wearing baseball pants?

Since 1957, when Rule 1.11(a) was added to the official rule book of major league baseball, managers and coaches have been required to wear uniforms that are identical to those worn by the players. High school coaches are bound by this mandate as well, so even though he'd be better off sporting a navy blue polo shirt tucked into a smart pair of khaki shorts, I have to give my son's varsity coach a free pass for parading around the diamond in (shudder)...baseball pants.  

If you ask me, 1.11(a) is a ridiculous rule. Regardless of how handsome, well preserved, and strappingly well built he may be, at a certain age a gentleman simply does not belong in baseball pants. Period. End of discussion. I mean, seriously, once his playing days are over, no guy in his right mind wants to squeeze himself into a pair of unforgiving, polyester baseball pants, right? WRONG!

While youth baseball coaches are exempt from this silly rule, it never fails. Every summer there always is that smattering of fellows who persist in adorning themselves in full player regalia, from caps to cleats, right down to the piping on their skin-tight trousers and the six-inch numbers emblazoned across the backs of their jerseys. 

Imagine this. Some poor innocent kid’s dad volunteers to coach his team. Come game day, having poured himself into what looks like a one-size-fits-all coaches' uniform, he exits the dugout, calls time and stomps fiercely out to the mound to make a pitching change. Collective groans emerge from the bleachers…Why, we all wonder, but not why the pitching change. WHY THE PANTS? 

I know I should simply look away, but I confess I cannot. Though I make futile attempts, I am like a moth drawn to a flame. No matter how hard I try, I find it nearly impossible to cease gaping at these portly men with their love handles and spare-tires, pinched into baseball pants.

Once I finally manage to quit gawking, it's too late. I blink and it's as if I've been gazing at the sun too long; bulging, bright, red-orange silhouettes float along the undersides of my eyelids ingraining themselves in my memory forever...and ever (or at least until next season).    

So, coaches, if sprinting on and off the field is invigorating, by all means, wear your cleats. Go ahead and keep your caps and even your team jerseys, but for the love of Pete, tuck them into a well-fitting, age appropriate pair of pants. Try some Dockers on for size, or better yet, a loose-fitting pair of knee-length athletic shorts.

Whatever you do, just please LOSE THE BASEBALL PANTS because regardless of how handsome, well preserved, and strappingly well built you (believe) you are, you must remember this. At a certain age gentlemen simply do not belong in baseball pants. Period. End of discussion.

Antoinette Datoc is a freelance writer. If you find her particular brand of humor amusing she'd love to know. Please leave a comment or email her at justanotherordinaryday.datoc@gmail.com.