West Carleton mites go 2-2 at OASA qualifier, featuring an example of good coaching

This past weekend, the West Carleton mite boys team (U10) went two and two at the Eastern qualifier in Stirling. This was an Ontario Amateur Softball Association tournament to determine seeding for the provincials in August.

The Caveman was part of this team, along with five other sons of GOFL players. Given this was our first ever OASA event, the first time a West Carleton team had played at this level since the 90s, I thought it went very well.

In the final game of the event late Sunday afternoon, it was approximately 32C. The Caveman had the ball for West Carleton and Rivor Taylor was pitching for Curve Lake Trappers. It was quite a game, going the full seven innings, which is very rare given the 90 minute time limit in mites softball. Final score was a very low 5-3. It was a pitching duel, with the Curve Lake chucker tossing 18 Ks and allowing only two hits, and the Caveman getting 17 Ks and giving up five hits. It was quite a remarkable display by both pitchers.

About the sixth inning, the Caveman was hot, tired and getting cranky. But he was still pitching very well. After a Trappers player hit a nice one to the outfield, the Curve Lake bench started, for the first time in the game, to start with some "songs". If you are involved with youth softball, you may have heard this before, especially in girls' softball. The kids have these rhyming chants about getting hits, having a good eye, etc. It was all positive cheering, nothing against our team or pitcher.

However, the Caveman was NOT pleased. When he was young, long time blog readers may recall he could sometimes get into a rage when frustrated and revert to "Caveman-mode", hence his nickname. It doesn't happen much anymore, but when it does......

Anyway, when the songs started, he looked to me at the third base bench with an exasperated look. Tears started leaking, he started muttering under his breath, paced around the circle a couple of times, stopped his feet, threw a couple of pitches up the screen, then called time and waved me out. At the best of times, he finds the singing bothersome, but given the four game weekend in which he pitched almost all of it, the heat, the stress, he wasn't too happy.

"I NEED TO CONCENTRATE, I CAN'T STAND THIS SINGING!" he raged to me. It was a close game, and he was pitching well, but he was losing focus. I told him just to block it out and do his best, but I was worried that what had been a great game so far by both teams would not end well.

As I walked back to our bench, the Curve Lake third base coach called time himself, and walked over to his kids on the first base side.  After a quick chat with his team, the singing and chanting stopped, and never started again.

The Caveman wiped away his tears and started chucking strikes again.

After the game was over, and we had lost, the Caveman was not pleased because he desperately wanted to win the game to earn the second place spot. But he did make a point of going over to the Curve Lake coach and said "thanks".

I think we all know there are coaches out there who in a tight game would have done nothing. Or worse, gone over and encouraged their team to continue with the singing and chanting.

But it was nice to see that the Curve Lake coach embraced the spirit of minor sports and helped out in that way. So, next time I hear some horror story of some wacko youth coach, I'm going to think of this guy. Sorry I don't know his name, but to the head coach of the Curve Lake U10 boys, thanks.