My first USSSA baseball tournament

I have a feeling a lot of you will be able to relate to this posting.

We concluded our run in the USSSA Tee Ball World Series last night at 10:30pm, yes 10:30pm...

Stepping back a few days, I received a call from Don Mason at Crystal Carolina Sports last week. He said, "Tripp, I need some help. I have a tee ball team coming down from Pennsylvania for the World Series and we don't have anyone for them to play."

Don knew I had a tee ball all-star team full of kids between the ages of 4 and 5 years old. We had tried to play some other teams earlier this summer, but they were all 6 and 7 years old. Needless to say, those games were not pretty.

Don told me the team from PA was mostly 5 and 6 year olds and asked me for a favor. So I gathered 10 of my kids and we showed up at Olde Providence on Tuesday. A team from Thomasville, NC had joined the affair as well. They were loaded with older kids including a couple that were clearly a little to old to be qualified for the event (that's another story for another day)

Our group of determined little boys and one girl took the field twice on Tuesday and another two times on Thursday. We were outmanned for sure, but our kids played hard, showed great sportsmanship and became better with each inning. By the final game, we took the World Series winner, Thomasville, to the final inning in a very close game.

I was so proud of all my kids. Their tanks were on empty as the tournament times were not conducive to 4,5 and 6 year old kids, but they tried their best every play. The experience is something everyone will remember and as I told each of the parents, "your children learned more in these 4 games than they did in the entire regular season."

I had a ball coaching the kids, it was mentally draining for sure, but I will always remember it.

The kids each received a great trophy and that made it all worthwhile to see their smiles at 10:30 at night.


Side note -- We can always tell people we finished third in the Tee Ball World Series!!!!! We don't have to tell anyone that there were only 3 teams playing!