Tell us about your worst personal "sports moment."

[driver8]

Those of us who have played sports have certain games or plays that we will always remember because of something good that we did -- diving catch, game winning goal, home run, etc...

However, who here has games or incidents that they would like to forget?

For me, the game I would like to forget happened when I was 11 years old and pitching a Little League game...

The first batter of the game steps up to the plate, I threw him a fastball and he hit that first pitch over the center field fence. To make things worse, he came up again in the same inning and hit another homer off of me. He wasn't finished, however. He hit another homer off of me a few innings later.

The kid hit 3 homers that year -- all off of me and all in the same game!!

[idgiehkt]

1. that is awful

:hug:

Mine would be just hitting a pop fly which was the 3rd out of the last inning and having my sister inform me that "you just lost the game for us". She was an ace at softball and I completely sucked. I got to play right field when there was no risk I could do any serious damage.

:hi:

[Oeditpus Rex]

2. If she was an 'ace' at softball

she should've known that no one player ever loses a game.

Either way, that was a shitty thing to say.

[idgiehkt]

5. thanks

I think she kind of knew I was a softball 'poseur', I just wanted to play because she did. Wow, when I look back now, I can't even believe they let me play...I sucked soooooo bad. I was the worst player on the team, every year, by far.

:rofl:

It's kind of funny now that I think about it, it must have caused her some degree of embarassment, which I never appreciated (I could have basked in that, dammit). Because everyone else on the team really could actually play, I was just kind of her 'tag-along', lol.

:hi:

[driver8]

3. Yeah -- it sucked.

I think we were down 8 or 9 runs by the end of the first inning!! :hi:

[Truthiness Inspector]

4. This should make you feel better...

I actually struck out at a T-ball game, yes T-BALL(!), in front of hundreds of people! It was my first game in front of so many people and I choked even though the ball was sitting right there on the T.

The good news is that besides that experience that still makes my face red to this day, all went well sportswise after that for the most part.

I got lucky that I was so little that peope thought it was "cute" but oh man...how lame can you get???

[Heidi]

13. You're not the only one.

I saw that happen to my little brother more than once. Also, I saw the ball roll right between his legs a few times when he was playing T-ball. He was very small for his age and getting the team's "Sportsmanship" trophy at the end of the season didn't make him feel a lot better. :hug:

[Oeditpus Rex]

6. Two come to mind

The first was when I, like you, was 11 and pitching a Little League game. I didn't have any stuff, but I had control — but in this game, for some reason, I couldn't get the fucking ball over the plate. The result was I walked a lotta guys and threw a wild pitch that let a runner score from third, and ended up giving up eight runs in the first and three more in the second. It got to the point that our catcher, a pretty hard-nosed guy (like you want catchers to be), was glaring at me and steaming the ball back to me.

The other was the year before that. I was in center field, and we were playing the Elks, who were the "big guys" that year. One of 'em hit a major league-quality fly ball to me — I mean this sucker was UP there. Well, in practice a couple of weeks earlier, we'd all watched as a fly ball went through our left fielder's glove and smacked him full-on in the face. I guess I was thinking about that while camped under this monster fly, and I intentionally let it land behind me and a couple of runs came in.

The worst part was, my dad was our coach that year. He never said anything about it, but I always felt like I'd let him down.

[Heidi]

11. .

Your dad was a class act for letting that incident pass without mention. :hug:

[Oeditpus Rex]

16. He was a pretty class act, period

The year he was coach, he did the "Every kid gets to play" thing long before it was a rule, but he did it in a way that helped the ball club. Rather than just sticking a lame kid in right field or up to bat when it couldn't hurt us, he'd start guys like me (hey, it was my first year; I hit .143) about every other game, but strategically spot us in the batting order.

We had this one real spaz, Gerald. He was in my class, and he stuttered and had the coordination of Gervaise Brook-Hampster, the 127th annual Upperclass Twit of the Year. But my dad noticed that when he batted in practice, he hardly swung at anything. (When he did swing, it looked like he was trying to close a garden gate in slow motion with a stick.) Now, in Little League, most pitchers can't get it over the plate very often, so dad would start Gerald, bat him leadoff — and sure enough, most times he walked and we had a runner on first with nobody out and our bigger guns comin' up. :D

[Heidi]

22. My dad was the same kind of coach.

His "everyone plays and the parents can behave themselves or leave" approach worked pretty well for stuff like T-ball and soccer, but it made him a little unpopular in his real job at that time: coaching our school's junior high football and high school basketball teams, where parental abuse of the players and their opponents was typical.

There was one boy on my brother's little league team who was just a powerhouse at everything he did; at one ballgame, however, he was having an "off day" and his dad called him over to the fence, grabbed him through the chainlink and kicked his son in the shin. My dad stopped everything, walked over to the fence, and told the kid to get back in the game, and said to the dad, "Am I gonna need to call the law, or are you gonna take a seat and let the kids play?"

I hope Gerald's still out there somewhere, thinking fondly of Coach Oedi's Dad. :hug:

[Oeditpus Rex]

25. I think Gerald probably owns Yahoo or something

Ain't that always how it works out? :D

Okay — I've been sayin' this for years, and I've gotten some funny looks for it, but I think Little League needs to be abolished. It was a nice idea in 1939, but it was still a grownup's idea, and grownups have fucked it all up.

The original idea was to give kids a chance to play ball with some kind of organization, but it's been "organized" to the point that it isn't so much about the kids anymore. (Will someone please tell me why kids need a board of directors to play ball?)

When I'm elected Dog, the second thing I'll do is abolish Little League in its present form, then allocate $27 brazillion for ball yards and basic equipment (NO fucking aluminum bats!) Then I'll put full-page ads in all the papers where the yards are inviting all kids to come and play ball WITHOUT GROWNUPS! NO GROWNUPS ALLOWED WITHIN 100 YARDS OF ANY BALL YARD!!

That way, the kids can just play ball.

:patriot:

[Heidi]

27. You've got my vote.

:thumbsup:

[Heidi]

7. Summer before eighth grade, playing wiffle ball in the school gym.

I walk behind the batter, a big, mean older kid, who simultaneously takes a swing with a _real_ baseball bat instead of a wiffle ball bat, and smacks me right in the head. World's biggest goose-egg above my right eye, bruise all over the right side of my face. :grr:

[driver8]

8. I used to play third base when I wasn't pitching. One day at practice our infield

was "throwing it around the horn". I was standing there talking to our coach when our shortstop turned and gunned the ball to me -- it hit me right above my left eye and dropped me like a brick. I had a HUGE shiner and had to go to the hospital because they thought I had a concussion.

[Heidi]

9. You know what was worse than being batted in the head?

The afternoon after I got beaned and was home nursing my bruises and goose egg, the boy of my dreams called me up and invited to one of his baseball games. Oh, the irony. Of course, I didn't go, because I looked like I'd been hit by a bus. :cry:

Sometimes, I truly relish the relatively risk-free ways of middle age. :rofl:

[Oeditpus Rex]

12. Wha...?

I didn't even know you then. :shrug:

[Heidi]

14. Ha!

Probably best not to speculate about what might have been. :evilgrin:

[Oeditpus Rex]

17. Yeah

I kinda like that doofus you wound up marrying. :D

[Heidi]

20. CMW is lucky to have

us. :rofl: :spray:

[Oeditpus Rex]

24. Yup

Because o' me, he's got somebody to roll her eyes at him when he tries to explain the sociological importance of the Upperclass Twit of the Year Show. :D



And because o' you, he's got...









Well, that's none o' our bidness. :)

[SeattleGirl]

10. Taking a line drive in the shin while playing 3rd base. Should have

been an easy catch, but I flubbed it. :blush:

It was a game in college between some students and professors (we also liked to play flag football in the fall). We bent the rules somewhat, when it was my turn to bat. My shin hurt like hell, but I didn't want to leave the game. I couldn't run, but I was a pretty decent hitter, so when my turn at bat came, I wielded the bat, and I had a "designated runner" who stood even with home plate, and then took off running when I hit a double to center. :rofl:

[Oeditpus Rex]

18. Okay, but

who won? :shrug:

[SeattleGirl]

19. The students, of course!

We also won the flag football game a few months later (and btw, the "flag" football game turned into a rather muddy game of touch-and-tackle! :rofl:

[Oeditpus Rex]

21. That's how it's sposta go

Ain't many things more fun than a Mud Bowl. SPLAT! :bounce:



Oh — did your double figure in the scoring?









I'm getting totally hot thinking of you as a jockette.

[SeattleGirl]

23. It was the professors who got the mud fest bowl going.

But I must admit, I loved it! :evilgrin: I mean, how many students get to tackle their profs and rub their faces in the mud? :rofl:

And let's see, I think I scored 3 TD's.

This sports jockette RWAKS!!! :woohoo: :woohoo: :woohoo: :woohoo:

(Need a napkin for that drool?)

[Oeditpus Rex]

26. Nah

I'm wearin' shorts. :evilgrin:

[SeattleGirl]

28. Must. not. go. there.

:evilgrin:

[Oeditpus Rex]

29. Y'gotta understand

I've almost never worn shorts, other than when playing basketball, since I was 10 and Eric Schmidt (no, not the Google dude) told me I had skinny legs. But now they don't look like white paper straws anymore, thanks to tan-in-a-tube, and I'm finally startin' to be okay with 'em.

[SeattleGirl]

31. For me, it was my maternal grandmother saying I had "fat" calfs.

My grandmother wasn't a mean woman overall, but it did hurt when she said that. I was a teenager, and I'm softs and curves, not lines and angles (as personified by Twiggy -- THE fashion model of the day). My grandfather told her that that was a mean thing to say, and she apologized, but after that, I was very self-conscious about my legs (even though, on the other hand, I think they are my best feature, because they are loooooooong). I was self-conscious, too, about my entire body (still am). Still stuck on the lines and angles "ideal", rather than the curves and smoothes that I am.

So, yeah, I get what you're saying. (And I love tan-in-a-tube!).

[Oeditpus Rex]

34. I've seen your legs

Let me express how I feel about them.

[SeattleGirl]

35. .......

:blush: :blush: :blush: :blush: :blush:

Thank you, darlin'. :hug:

[Robeson]

15. I was in minor league football...

...it was supposed to be for 5th and 6th graders only. I played offensive tackle. Anyway, we played a game in which the guy opposing me was about a foot and half taller. He was built like a body builder. He knocked my ass around the entire game, and I was the biggest guy on our team.

Came to find out, he was in the 9th grade, and his coach would illegally bring him into games. What was worse, is we found out our own coach knew this, and did nothing about it.

[Connonym]

30. Doing my uneven bars routine in front of the entire gym class

I, err, loudly passed gas. Unfortunately, it wasn't just a bad dream :(

[SeattleGirl]

33. Oooh, you poor thing.

:hug:

[Wetzelbill]

32. I was upset in the state semifinals my senior year

I had to sit and watch a guy who I beat before win a state title. I was undefeated, a returning state finalist, had been chosen to wrestle in Bulgaria the summer before, it was my title to win and I flat out choked. I have never fully gotten over it, over 13 years later. That pain has always driven me to be great at the other things I do.

on edit:

Oh yeah, one time a bull almost killed me at a rodeo. I got bucked off at the whistle, one judge marked me and the other didn't which still pisses me off, but I was kicked in the chest and it bruised my heart and lung. I had to spend a night in the hospital. Another time a bull stepped on my knee and blew everything out, I eventually had to have it reconstructed. But still, the wrestling story hurt the most, physical pain is nothing compared to the mental anguish that put me through.

[Oeditpus Rex]

36. What weight did you wrestle?

I went to three state (Kollyforniya) championships as a sportswriter, and I've rarely felt that kind of intensity in one place.

I learned a lot of respect for wrestlers by covering a couple of high schools where it was almost as big as football. No athlete is more committed to their sport than a championship-caliber wrestler.

[Wetzelbill]

37. in high school

I wrestled from 98-112, it just depended sometimes. For my junior and senior years at state I cut down to 98, which was probably too far for me to go. In freestyle I wrestled 105.5 my freshman sophomore and junior years and 114.5 my senior year. Last weight I wrestled was in freestyle in 1995 and that was 125.5. My freestyle state titles were at 114.5 and 125.5 respectively.

Oh yeah, I was pretty committed, I used to run through snowdrifts in the winter carrying wooden fenceposts etc. I did stuff like Rocky Balboa did in Rocky 4 in Russia, haha. I wouldn't touch a soda or eat candy for months. To be good you need to be dedicated, unless you are exceptionally gifted.

[Oeditpus Rex]

38. You wrestled collegiate *and* freestyle?

Wow! :patriot:

[Wetzelbill]

39. yeah, I know some greco too

Picked up on some judo and submission stuff. I'm foolishly coming out of retirement to do some submission wrestling. I would like to win a national title, so we'll see how that goes. I think I'm good enough, it's just a matter of preparation, I know what has to be done, but I'm not sure if I can take the brutal training at my age. I'm 32, but in some ways healthier than ever since I had my knee and shoulder reconstructed. The body doesn't recover like it used to though, haha. :)

[YankeyMCC]

40. Gym Hockey in elementary school

It must've been 4th or 5th grade I was playing in the school gym hockey league.

I got the puck, weaved around, avoided the opponents, it was a thing of beauty, made my way toward the net, gave the puck just the right amount of speed at just the right angle, the goalie tried in vain to stop the puck, I raised my arms in triumph and noticed everyone staring at me. My own teammates looked angry, the other team was laughing.

I scored on my own net.

[cobalt1999]

41. While in New Zealand, I was invited to play rugby.

I got a brief overview of the rules and my role in the game and was doing fairly well...until the second or third scrum.

For those of you who don't know what a scrum is, it's when the two teams interlock and someone rolls the ball into the middle. The two teams push and try to kick the ball out of the mass toward their team's side. I knew we needed the ball back and it was so close to me, I thought "why doesn't someone just reach in and push it out"...so I tried. The experience of half a dozen legs kicking me in the head, arms, and back went on seemingly forever because once you start getting kicked and realize what an incredibly stupid idea that was was, you can't get back up.

I was sore for over a week and had the guys laughing about the crazy Yank for much longer.