So I played yesterday... 0-2, 2 strikeouts and a walk. I'm pretty happy with the performance. I think I judged pitches very well. Both strikeouts were swinging, and the second one was involved fighting off a couple of extra foul balls x-and-2. Watching the ball through the point of contact is a big improvement. I just need to concentrate a little more on my footwork--I do ridiculous things like stop back with my back foot when swinging at an outside pitch, an instinctive but costly balancing effort--and be more patient. I'm way ahead of everything I swing at.
We won 8-3. Nate threw out three or four runners, and would've had two more if our first and third basemen were a little more on the ball early in the game.
The kids lost 10-2, but they're showing marked improvement. The pitchers did a much, much better job of hitting spots and just throwing strikes. Unfortunately, the opposition was very aggressive at the plate, hit a few balls pretty hard, and caught a couple of lucky breaks. Our fielding's improved a lot. Our hitting still needs to be more aggressive, we're still striking out too much and watching good pitches go by. It's not surprising we had trouble before, as a lot of these guys hadn't played travel ball or hadn't played it too seriously prior to nine months ago, so this progress looks very, very good.
Of course, after seven hours on ball fields with only lunch and a 40-minute drive to break it up, I was exhausted by the time I got home. There are certainly worse ways to spend a Sunday.
