Pitchers and Catchers Report, Will Dads? Part II

Pastor of Preaching and Vision
Ashland Avenue Baptist Church

Baseball is a sport of fathers and sons. When Willie Mays speaks of his dad teaching him how to walk when he was six-months old by enticing him with a rolling baseball he is telling the story of baseball. It is not uncommon for friends to ask me how I can continue to love the game in light of exorbitant salaries and the shame of the steroids era. My passion and love for the game did not begin in multi-million dollar parks with 40,000 seats and it cannot be taken away by what happens there. It began with my dad rolling a baseball to me at six months of age and grew with countless times of catch, ground balls, and batting practice with my father. 

The soil of little Joe Marshall Field in Montgomery, AL will always be more scared to me than Fenway or any other big league park. As we picked up balls after another round of hitting those conversations between father and son helped usher me form boyhood to manhood. My dad taught me important lessons like the vileness of the DH in baseball and many things far more important. I cannot separate those lessons from the game that provided a glorious context to learn them, nor would I want to. There is nothing free agency, steroids, or Major League scandals can do to take that away from me. Similar stories could be told by almost every true baseball fan. There is a reason grown men often cry when Field of Dreams ends with Ray playing catch with his dad.

I am excited about the start of another Major League Baseball season as our family follows the fortunes our beloved Atlanta Braves each day. But the start of the Major League season signals something far greater for me; Little League baseball games that will take play in every nook and cranny across the nation where someone can stick a baseball diamond. Those games will represent countless games of catch in the backyard between fathers and sons. It takes time, effort, diligence and never ending conversations to pass the game of baseball from one generation to the next. I fear that the diminishing popularity of baseball in recent years has less to do with the sport and more to do with the diminishing popularity of intentional fatherhood in our culture.

As a Christian father I try to remember to pray every time I drive past a little league baseball park. I thank God for fathers who are intentionally investing time in their sons and I pray that the game of baseball would remind Christian fathers that calling the next generation to hope in God (Psalm 78:5-7) works in a similar way. It takes time, effort, diligence and never ending conversations about God and His grace (Deuteronomy 6:4-9). My three sons have already developed a love for the game of baseball and can tell you why the DH is a perversion of the great game.

But I pray one day my sons will say they learned far more important lessons about the mystery of the gospel while we picked up balls, played catch, and watched every baseball game we could find. In fact, I hope they will say, "I cannot separate those eternally important lessons from the game that provided a glorious context to learn them, nor would I want to." Perhaps it is not so inexplicable why knowing pitchers and catchers report to Spring Training does something good for my soul.

(David Prince is a former high school baseball and football coach)