The change of american adolescents into adulthood
Growing up in Springfield, in a athletic family of six, I had lived sports my whole life. I have been playing baseball since I was six, starting with the classic tee-ball. From there I played just about every single season and fall ball season there was to play. I Competed in several all-star tournaments and won my fair share of championships. As a kid I also played basketball and football, but baseball was my sport of choice. Coming into high school I quit both basketball and football to concentrate all my attention on baseball. I spent the first two years of my high school career starting for the Junior Varsity team. A respectable position being only one out of three freshman to start for the team. Those two years were two of my favorite seasons spent in all my years of baseball. I played for a 26 year-old guy fresh out of the pros named John Fulcher. He was relatively close to our age so he knew how to interact well with us as teenagers. Practices were made fun and the team just had a really good time all together in general. Our team was successful both years on JV with Fulcher, with a combined record of 29-5. My junior year was a completely different story. New coach, new team, and definitely a new atmosphere. Practices were extremely hard consisting of sprints, polls, and a coach with an attitude at the other side of the spectrum compared to my JV coach. Coach Munoz was a 32 year old 5'8 man with a napolean complex. He never made it to the pro's but he sure thought he should have. There were days where you couldn't understand why the man put himself through coaching a high school team, days where he would just be in terrible moods and take it out on us. One peticular time that comes to mind was a time when one of our players misjudged a ball to the outfield. Coach found it necessary to run all the way out to the outfield to scold the kid for a good five minutes. There were many instances like these that just left me baffled. The year started out in the same manner that my freshman year started off; me starting at second base. I was content with the playing situation, just not the coaching situation.