Baseball and being a kid ....

[SF11704]

Just rambling a little since I have some open time now .... Trying to compare my 'feeling' of baseball now (67) to when I was a kid (10-12ish) and it's really difficult to explain. Now I follow baseball and the Giants pretty closely. I'm in tune to the 'cost' of baseball and it's various players. I like reading these boards and the sharing of various opinions. I like the idea of 'playing' GM and at times manager. I like baseball and the enjoyment it brings to my life. But, I can at times remember being a kid and how baseball was different. I LOVED baseball. I can remember the summer months and me just about living in the park playing ball. Baseball, stickball, softball any kind of ball. I didn't know about salaries and I didn't play GM or even manager and I didn't care to. I couldn't wait till the game came on the TV. It was truly 'my team'. I lived and died with each win and loss. I can still remember the first time I got to wear a baseball uniform for one of the local teams. It was AMAZING. First time I laced up a pair of spikes and walked on to a field that had grass on it. The smell of summer itself was different back then. I guess the biggest change for me is really a simple one. When I was a kid these baseball players were really heroes to me. Willie Mays was about as close to God as one could get when I was 11! Springtime for an 11 year old was almost magical. End of ramble ...

 

[SFAnthem]

grew up in a concrete jungle and we made do with a newspaper stuffed whiffle ball bat and a tennis ball, and instead of grass, we had painted bases on cement playgrounds. But baseball is baseball and nothing was betteras a kid than playing afterschool until it got too dark to play.

 

[SF11704]

grew up in a concrete jungle and we made do with a newspaper stuffed whiffle ball bat and a tennis ball, and instead of grass, we had painted bases on cement playgrounds. But baseball is baseball and nothing was betteras a kid than playing afterschool until it got too dark to play.

Hear Ya Anthem .... I was raised in Queens, NY. Almost everythin we did was on concrete. The grass fields were rare and only seemed to be available to 'organizations. Little League, CYO and Youth Babseball had access to them. Our 'pick-up games were always played inon cement fields that were usually attached to the elementary grade schools. That brings back another flood of memories. I can remember playing stickball and softwall on cememt fields and dealing with what we used to call 'eggos'. These were balls that seemed to take a oval shape when they were hit and seemed to be spinning about 1,000 MPH. Almost impossible to catch. If and when they hit the ground they bouce in bizarre directions. We also played softball with rubber coated balls on these cement fields as well. I can still remember what we used to call the 'second' bounce. It was usually very low to the gound and also at 1,000 MPH. The first bounce was always normal. The 2nd one seemed to flatten out and speed up dramatically. Wow - almost forgort about all the cement fields we played on as kids ...