Toby Goodshank Original Art 2025

Life with Chicken and Broccoli

Category: baseball

  • The Fire Pit at the Residence Inn

    The Fire Pit at the Residence Inn

    Back to work and thinking about this weekend, what will I write about?

    Scoops and Tugs
    No hits before 10, 14U Rangers Black
    Who is going to pitch?
    Peer pressure and Bud Heavy, the Kevin W. Story
    Fire Side Chats with Prosecco-Fueled Moms
    Stephanie M. “America’s Sweetheart”
    Tim and James Go on a Date
    How Gay Is a Veggie Burger?
    Martine’s New Outfit
    “You Know Where I Stand”: Dan T. Hot Takes on Youth Baseball
    Why Did Tom H. Cross the Road?
    Steph Learns How to Pronounce Kara
    Coach Goodie’s Uncomfortable Pretzel Talk
    Willie McBride’s and His Toothless Bride
    Duke Cleans Off the Wine Flutes
    Rich M. Gets Fed on His Anniversary
    Gap to Gap Moms Are the Friendliest

    I was really hoping to write about how we persevered through two seasons and finally came through in season two with a big weekend tournament win. It was our last tournament of the summer 14U baseball season, and we were in upper New Jersey at Diamond Nation.

    We were a team still taking shape, but there were plenty of reasons to be hopeful. We had finally filled some of the spots that had been weak and always seemed just one step away from putting it all together. We are still a work in progress, but it will happen. I have it on good inside information.

    The weekends and trips have become just as much fun for the parents as they are for the kids. We are a stone-cold pack of weirdos, to paraphrase Bridesmaids, and that is how we like it.

    Thinking about all the funny little things that happened this weekend, none comes more quickly to mind than the female equivalent of Don Rickles, the uncompromising Steph M., rarely burdened by a kind word for anyone.

    Steph has always spoken her mind and given us such catchphrases as, “Throw strikes,” and, “Get it up, Joe!” This weekend, she let all the filters go. I can only imagine what instructions Rich receives behind closed bedroom doors.

    Still, it would not be the same without her. She is loved. I appreciate all the uniqueness of our very own America’s Sweetheart.

    The kids battled hard during our second game, but we ended up in the dreaded consolation circle. The final game still felt like our own championship, and we wanted the win. It was a good game, and we were all happy that they finished the weekend hitting and on a high note. That always makes the ride home more enjoyable.

    I am always surprised and thankful for the fun we have. Life takes you down all these winding roads, and somehow you end up at a Residence Inn fire pit with people who were once strangers. Somewhere along the way, a team becomes a family.

    We drank our drinks: seltzers, Prosecco, Bud Heavy, Truly, Michelob Ultra, IPAs, rosé, White Claws, and Sip of Sunshine.

    There were professionally prepared charcuterie boards from Jen, Amanda serving as the s’mores grill safety officer, and her Ranger’s chocolate-covered pretzel sticks.

    There were so many inside jokes and stupid stories as we sat around enjoying our time together. Most would make no sense to anyone who was not there, and some barely made sense to those of us who were.

    This was the last tournament of the summer, with an uncertain future as the boys grow and the team changes. Of course, we wanted the big win and the social media post.

    Instead, we left with a consolation win, a hundred new jokes, and another weekend together.

    Maybe that was enough.

    These seasons feel like they will last forever while we are living them. There is always another practice, another game, another long drive, and another hotel. Then suddenly the boys are taller, their voices are deeper, and you realize these weekends are not endless after all.

    One day, the bats will be put away, the uniforms will no longer fit, and the fire pits will be empty. We will miss the noise, the wet-towel snapping, the bad calls, the inside jokes, and even the games that did not go our way.

    The trophy would have been nice.

    But years from now, I do not think I will remember the score.

    I will remember the boys growing up together, the parents becoming friends, and all of us sitting around that fire, laughing and wondering who farted in that group photo.

  • Good Times

    Good Times

    We drove down to Rehoboth Beach for James’s baseball tournament, two cars, because that is just how we do it now. We had been to Rehoboth before, but I had apparently forgotten the whole place, including the long strip of stores, restaurants, hotels, and traffic that greets you on the way in. By the time we pulled into the Holiday Inn Express & Suites, a few of the baseball families were already camped out in the lobby. That lobby would become our unofficial clubhouse for the weekend.

    Thursday was our beach day, and after a week of forecasts threatening otherwise, we lucked into perfect weather. We arrived early and set up right in front until the lifeguards paid us two visits. First, they made us take down our tent. Then they confirmed that no, we could not fly a kite either. It was Stephanie’s birthday, though, and we were not about to let a few town ordinances ruin the day. We tried to leave enough room around us for the families who would arrive later. The strangers who set up camp around us did not get that memo.

    Then the tournament started.

    We won one game and lost one. The loss was a game we could have won, though I am fairly sure every baseball parent says that after every loss. A double play ended our comeback and took the wind out of us. Charging us $20 to park after we had already driven four hours felt like a personal insult, but that is travel baseball.

    Saturday was our day. We beat the top team in the tournament, then handled the next one easily, which moved us into fifth place and the winners’ bracket. At the time, every pitch felt important, every at-bat like it might decide the whole weekend. A few days later, I could barely remember most of it.

    What I remember now is everything that happened between the games. Families spread across the hotel lobby. The group growing as siblings and extended family arrived for the weekend. Parents trying, and mostly failing, to keep the boys from sprinting down the hallways. We lost a couple of kids at the beach and then found them again. Some boys overate, some got sunburned, and one or two took too many waves to the head and paid for it later. Mysterious feminine hygiene products surfaced from the sand. The bathrooms were too far away, so everyone made their way into the ocean and pretended it was only for a swim.

    There were nightly walks to Rita’s, where we learned Tim is a vanilla connoisseur. There was a fiercely competitive round of cornhole and the total dominance of Casey and James on the boards. There was a mysterious blue vase, so out of place in the hotel lobby that someone eventually removed it from the premises and gave it a loving new home in Connecticut. There was my service buddy Duke, a rescue dog and my new favorite beach friend. There was the Crooked Hammock Brewery, the humidity finally breaking, and a sunset appearing through the clouds at just the right time.

    And there were the moms who organized the entire weekend so the rest of us could show up, complain about parking, and enjoy ourselves. I am always grateful for that, even when I forget to say it.

    Not the counts. Not the innings. Not who was up with two outs.

    The lobby. The beach. The laughter. The nonsense.

    By Sunday morning, we were still alive in the winners’ bracket, ranked fifth and facing the sixth-ranked CNS All-Stars, a team that had scored more runs than anyone else in the tournament. Our pitching was great, but two balls found the third-base line. I did not get a clean look at the first one. The second was one of those line-hugging shots that curves away into no man’s land just when you think it is going foul. Those two plays cost us four runs.

    We rallied anyway, pulled within one, gave everyone one final dose of hope, and could not finish it. After all the pacing, anxiety, and hoping, we were sent packing around 10:30 Sunday morning. We later found out the team that beat us went on to win the whole tournament. I still cannot decide whether that is supposed to make it hurt less or more.

    That is the agony of being a baseball parent. Every missed chance feels enormous. Every mistake feels like a small tragedy because, for a few hours, their hopes become your hopes too.

    But they are still kids. Everyone needs to take a breath.

    They are caught somewhere between following instructions and disappearing into their own worlds, wanting their coaches’ approval, their teammates’ respect, and their parents’ pride. They almost certainly do not want their fathers talking baseball at them for four hours on the ride home.

    There is a line from The Office I have always loved: “I wish there was a way to know you’re in the good old days before you’ve actually left them.”

    I think about that line more than I would like to admit.

    The baseball will fade. I will forget the score, the missed chances, and probably even the names of the teams we played. What I will keep is the hotel lobby, the beach, the blue vase, Rita’s, Duke, the cornhole games, and the boys laughing together into the night.

    As we were leaving, I saw a father in the batting cage with his young son, feeding him pitches while the two of them were completely lost in it. I remembered when James was that small. For a moment, I could see the whole circle of baseball life right in front of me.

    The tournament gave us a reason to go. The time between the games was the reason it mattered.

    I already miss it.

    These are the good times.

  • The Championship

    The Championship

    Sponsored by your friends, really your parents, who buy you the experience and cart you there.

    After last week’s game, there was a high. We had beaten the first-place seed, not just beaten them, but come from behind and dusted off the psychological ghosts of games past. Knowing you beat the best team, that you were down and didn’t fold but bore down and made it happen, it’s a powerful feeling, almost intoxicating. You knew you could do it, but now you had. Theory became reality.

    So this was our game to win, and with that comes its own kind of angst. But you take a breath, like always, and go back to the basics: see the ball, hit the ball. Take each play as its own little world and live in that moment, play by play, until you create your game.

    The Five Star Gold was our last hurdle, the obstacle to our goal. We had to find our way through, around, under, and over until we were victorious. Our D2 division had fifty teams, and Gold was the number-two seed. We had never played them before. Arriving just before the game started, I didn’t get a chance to see them field or get a sense of their energy. It doesn’t usually matter; good warm-ups don’t always translate under pressure. Metaphors and aphorisms can cut both ways.

    We got off to a slow start, but the good news was we were making contact. Hitting the ball and timing the pitcher eventually lead to good things. We were the away team but couldn’t produce a run after the first inning. The Gold managed to convert one run after two errors in their half. Luckily, we got out of the first only one run down. The parents were pacing along the third-base line. “They’re just warming up, it’s cold out,” one said. It was nice to have a reason. I nodded, though I couldn’t help thinking the other team was outside too. Didn’t they feel the cold?

    In the second inning we started to heat up, scoring two runs and taking a 2–1 lead. The wind started to blow again. We cooled off until the fourth, when a pitching change let us break through for four more. Suddenly it was 6–1. We were quietly optimistic, some of us a little louder, but cautious not to jinx it, just staying positive. Our pitching and fielding were outstanding, shutting the other team out for three more innings.

    By the fifth inning, it was 8–1. The cold wind that had been cutting through was forgotten as the clouds parted and we basked in the fall sun. In the sixth, we were on fire. The other team began to unravel. It’s the oldest cliché in baseball: it all comes down to pitching. We were hitting, yes, but also drawing walks, grinding out at-bats, playing with rhythm and confidence. You could feel it; the whole team was a unit, and they were all feeding and contributing to this win.

    Then Kevin came to the plate with the bases loaded and drove the stake in with a bomb to the outfield, clearing the bases for three runs. Like Icarus, he flew too close to the sun, trying to stretch a double into a triple, and got caught. I was jumping around myself like a kid hoping he’d make it, but he did his job and gave them mercy.

    Now up 15–1, the Gold had one last chance. Three at-bats, three outs. Joe, who had pitched all six innings of this championship game, finished like a star, striking out the final batter swinging. For a moment, time froze. Then the outfield crashed in, all the boys running to the mound, piling on one another in a swirl of laughter and joy.

    Just like that, we had champions in our midst. What an arc from our last fall season.

    For James, it was his first championship win on any team. So many runner-up finishes, so many consolation prizes. So close, so many times. It made me realize why this was the right time and why it felt deeper. He finally had the right team, a group of kids who loved and cared about doing the thing they loved. Maybe that’s what made it hit deeper. You only learn how to win by learning how not to. This victory wasn’t luck; it was layered with all the years of almosts, all the bruises and disappointments, all the small lessons that built the resilience to finally finish the job.

    As the team gathered for the photo, faces flushed, caps tilted, medals being bitten in the midday light, you could feel something bigger than baseball. It was joy, sure, but also proof. Proof that grit, patience, and faith in one another can build something lasting.

    That’s the beauty of a championship. It’s the journey, the stumbles, the rise, the shared heartbeat of a team that finally believed it could get there.

  • The Playoffs

    The Playoffs

    Driving down to our playoff game, the mood in the car is relaxed. So much has changed since we started our travel, competitive AAU baseball journey, even since last fall. Back then, we were a new team, a group of kids coming together from the western side of Connecticut with a few New York drop-ins. No single town was overly represented; we were all looking to get away from the small-town Babe Ruth baseball we’d played for the last five years and find something grander.

    It’s hard to describe your emotional state as a spectator and parent on the sideline. It’s like having your heart walk out of your chest and start hitting and catching balls. You pray, hope, and will things to happen from the fence, wishing to see your kid succeed in their own effort while keeping the team’s momentum alive. It really is an emotional roller coaster that you do your best to keep hidden as you coolly post up on the side of the fence.

    Our feelings that day were subdued, a kind of quiet solitude going into the game. We’d had an amazing season, only really facing a few defeats. The Patriots were the number one seed in our division or group, whatever you want to call it. When we beat them earlier in the season, it seemed they thought it was a fluke, a one-off their coach told them to shrug off.

    I remembered one of their fathers from a previous spring or summer game bragging about how his son was so talented that everyone wanted him on their team. He said that this wasn’t even his son’s “real” team, that it was the level below, and on that day, they beat us. He was the kind of dad who knew everything about everything, his sideline gear manufactured by pretension. He was a John Kreese type who expected victory, preached “Mercy is for the weak,” and could imagine punching through a car window if his son failed.

    Now we were playing his son’s team — the A team, the gold or diamond-level best. I hadn’t forgotten, because that kind of peacocking surety in a game of probabilities leaves a stink you don’t forget.

    We got off to a great start, two runs batted in, momentum on our side. Our pitching was superb, and we closed the first inning up 2–0. That held until the third inning, when two quick outs were followed by an error that let in two runs. We’ve never been the kind of team to rally with two outs, and we always seemed to face teams that did.

    We escaped the inning tied 2–2, but then the errors came, and we couldn’t hit anymore. The tie turned to 2–4, then another run came in. You could feel the momentum shift. The other team’s parents, whose voices somehow sounded like nails on a chalkboard, started chirping, and I walked down the line muttering a few expletives to myself.

    We entered the seventh inning down 2–5 but starting with the top of our lineup. I was restrained but hopeful. It was our best shot, though being down three runs felt heavy. James singled on a line drive to center, and we had a man on base. A dash of energy stirred as Will hit a fielder’s choice to second. Thankfully, James stayed up instead of sliding, and the baseman couldn’t complete the double play. One out.

    Up next, Joe hit a clean single down the line, putting runners on first and second. Our big hitter, Liam, stepped up. The stars aligned; the outfield was playing too shallow, and he crushed one to left that rolled to the fence. Two runs were scored, and now it was 4–5.

    They changed pitchers. Casey was hit by the new hurler and took a base. Runners on first and third. Keegan smacked one down the line, bringing Liam home and tying the game. Our runner advanced to second. Two outs. Tommy came up to bat and knocked a solid hit to left, bringing Casey home. 6–5, Rangers Black.

    We just had to hold them for one more at-bat.

    Then, like Maximus fighting the northern tribes, Will unleashed hell from the mound. Three pitches, three strikes, one out. The second out came from Kai making a ground play to first. Now two outs, no runners. The parents were burning up in the cool forty-five-degree air. We were doing all the chirping now. Their last batter popped one up, and Tommy charged in for a tough catch to close it out.

    It felt incredible. Even as I write this, I can feel the energy again — the kids shouting and sprinting toward one another. A hard-fought victory, not just over their opponent but over themselves. They learned what it means to stay calm, stay focused, and win through mindset as much as skill.

    As we drove home, the energy of the game still filled the car. We replayed the moments, analyzed the plays, and basked in the joy of his experience. All the gripes about playing on a cold Sunday night an hour from home disappeared, and even the smell of his cleats couldn’t touch this high. For one night, this was our World Series, and nothing on TV could compare to the greatness we felt out there under the lights.

  • Phase 3: The Never-Ending Summer of Baseball

    Phase 3: The Never-Ending Summer of Baseball

    We’re now entering Phase 3 of our young teenage son’s baseball career. The never-ending rhythm of summer tournament play. Long weekends, hotel rooms, musty cleats that stink up the car, dugout dust, and emotional highs and lows packed into 72 hours.

    The truth is, we haven’t been all that competitive in our past two tournaments. We’ve run out of steam, lost our foam, just didn’t have enough Rizz to carry us through the lean moments. But this weekend, something shifted.

    This tournament, War at the Shore, held near the tribal lands of Mohegan Sun and Mystic, CT, felt different from the start. We opened with a strong Friday night showing, and our team rolled through with three wins before falling short in Sunday’s matchup, a rematch with our toughest opponent.

    It was a winnable game. We battled back from a 5-0 deficit, but baseball, as always, has its element of luck. A few balls dropped into the Bermuda Triangle, just out of reach beyond the infield or along the foul lines. Add in some costly errors, and we lost our edge, both in pacing and psychology.

    Still, we made it back. And though the ride home felt especially long, there was something satisfying in the silence and the over-analysis of what-ifs. Every small moment matters in baseball. And somehow, every moment mattered this weekend.

    What really stayed with me wasn’t just the score or the stats. It was the time spent with my family. It felt like we were gone for a week, not just a weekend. Watching your child play is like being pulled into a Broadway show. You lose yourself in the performance and production. Every play, every at-bat takes something out of you. The butterflies, the anxious pangs in your gut, the quiet hopes;  it’s all part of it.

    I sat slightly away from the crowd on a grassy knoll on this warm summer day, a little removed but with the best view. It gave me perspective, a moment to breathe it all in. The game below, the sky above. The majesty of it all. These are the days that move fast and live forever.

    Every kid contributed this weekend. They showed up, brought their energy, and let their favorite juiced bats bring out the best in them. They thought they could, and so they did.

    There’s a synergy now. A chosen family dynamic forming between the boys. The time spent together on and off the field. I love watching them come together, the way they cheer for one another. The way they shout to their teammate who made an error, telling him to shake it off and get the next one. No blame, just TLC for one another. We’ve played on many teams, but this is a special group of young men.

    Then there’s the parental chaos. Multiple hotels, packing and repacking supplies, forgetting essentials, trying to make a reservation for 30 people to eat together, then figuring out how to split the bill. Ending the night with fireside table chats in the bagel buffet lounge. We become friends, make it work, and enjoy our time together.

    These joyful, chaotic weekends are forging memories that will carry them through the long walk of life. Because we’re not meant to just try. Life isn’t something we have to do, it’s something we get to do. We’re meant to reach. And the bigger the challenge, the greater the memory, whether or not we come out on top.

    And maybe that’s what makes it all so special. The dirt on their cleats. The voices in the dugout. The pain of a loss, the joy of a win, and everything in between. Chasing childhood greatness with your friends, giving it everything you’ve got, leaving it all out there.

    That’s the part they’ll remember.
    That’s the part that lasts.

  • Field of Dreams

    Field of Dreams

    Field of Dreams is one of those movies that leaves a lasting impression. I’ve seen it many times, and each viewing through the different epochs of my life, feels a little different. It’s an ode to a beloved game, but at its core, it’s really about a father and a son.

    I was never a big fan of baseball. The furthest I went in my younger years was T-ball or maybe Charlie Brown baseball. But the movie isn’t only about the sport. It’s about connection. About time lost. About youth and the wisdom that only comes from looking back. It’s about how pride can quietly wedge itself into the spaces between men, especially fathers and sons. It explores the classic “what if,” and reminds us that what truly makes life worth living is the love we share; our connections, our relationships, and especially that sacred bond between father and son.

    Our generation—Generation X—is denoted in mathematics as the unknown. But if there’s one thing we do seem to know, it’s the importance of being present in our children’s lives, especially in their sports. Our parents’ generation followed a more traditional arc, only to realize later that they wished they hadn’t spent so much time working. Through their passing and their experiences, we’ve begun to see through the shroud of that false reality.

    For my family and for my son that sport has always been baseball. America’s pastime.

    I know how precious this time is as a dad; the small window of adolescence when a father can still be both a hero and a friend. I can feel the life-sized hourglass pouring sand through my fingers. I get excited on game days, leaving work early, picking up my son,  and sharing that anticipatory car ride to the field. We talk about the game, what he’s working on, what he’s going to try. We talk about the effort he’s put in at practice, and always the psychology of hitting. Continously working on a routine so that thought doesn’t interrupt what repetition has already mastered.

    I drop him off and watch as he hustles toward the field. I take a breath and work hard to be in the moment; the warm spring air, the bright sun inching toward the crest of the tree line. Our games are held late in the working day, and most parents are there. We bring our folding vinyl chairs and line them up together along the baseline. No one congratulates themselves or talks about the “sacrifice” of being there, because we already know the heavy price of regret if we are absent.

    We watch our kids with heightened anticipation, that nitrous-like jolt of nerves as they step into the batter’s box or push off the pitching mound. My joy isn’t rooted in some longing to live vicariously through my son. It comes from being a proud, loving, and deeply content father, watching the most beautiful thing I’ve ever helped create simply living his life. The strength and rhythm of youth, the untarnished optimism, and a glorious, unknown future. I just want him to know how proud and loved he is, and for him to be able to step back and truly enjoy his moment.

    We sit quietly, offering our hopes and wishes to the baseball gods. Hoping for that “good hit”, that allows them to beat the throw to first. We know a bad at-bat will replay in their minds, and we just hope, deep down, that they can recognize the wisdom of not placing too much weight on any one moment. Smile. Breathe. See the ball. Hit the ball.

    Time is limited. And while the days can sometimes feel long, the years and life itself are incredibly short. I try never to rush the day or the moment. I take time to breathe in the air, to say my own quiet prayers of gratitude, and to give thanks for the chance to be part of something this beautiful.
    I remember the line in Field of Dreams, when the father turns to Kevin Costner’s character and asks, “Is this Heaven?”
    And in moments like these; watching my son, the sun setting behind the trees, a gentle spring breeze carrying a well hit ball through the air. I think to myself, it is.