The Combine

Here at the South end of Utah County, they take their baseball seriously. Oh, sure, kindergarten through second grade you sign up, everybody plays and hits and gets a chance to field, but once you hit the third grade, play time is over. They get serious in the third grade and I had the opportunity to experience that last night. There were well over 200 kids at the combine last night. They checked in, were all given numbers, then they had the opportunity to sit and wait for their turn. When their batch of kids came up (they ran 12 at a time) they would first throw back and forth to each other while the coaches evaluated their skill and whether they could throw straight and catch the ball. Then they lined up at one end of the gym and raced to the other in the 40-yard-dash equivalent. At the other side of the gym, they all grabbed a ball and one at a time, threw it to the other side to show their arm strength. Then they all had 5 attempts to hit the ball from the pitching machine. All the while, there are coaches sitting in the stands scouting these kids and the guy in charge is calling out names and numbers over the speaker system in the place. It was truly an amazing sight! All these 9-year-olds doing their best to make a good impression in the 10 minutes they had to show off their skill. Well, my boy made it through the combine and we're looking for the call tonight as to what team he's on.