"The Final Inning - My View From the Stands" (7/8)
Bryce played with the Ohio Hitmen during the summer of 2017. They were coached by Tony Tupta and Bryce loved Tony’s coaching style. Very knowledgeable about the game, good teacher, almost always upbeat and encouraging and Tony had a great sense of humor. He also valued Bryce’s ability and his contribution to the team. Bryce felt respected and appreciated.
The Hitmen had a very good collection of talent and the players got along really well.
Their very first game of the tournament season, they faced a team from Pittsburgh that had been a nemesis to the Hitmen in recent years. Bryce started in center field but was summoned to the mound in the second inning as the starting pitcher was struggling and the Hitmen had fallen behind.
Bryce had a great initial pitching appearance for the team as he quieted the opponent’s bats enough for the Hitmen to catch up and push the game into extra innings. In the bottom of the ninth, Bryce had a walk-off, RBI single, giving the Hitmen their first victory of the year.
That relief effort on the mound seemed to propel Bryce in the eyes of the coaches and by the end of the tournament season, he had logged more innings pitched that anyone else on the staff. Bryce was also the winning pitcher in the Hitmen’s lone tournament championship of the summer.
Bryce batted in the two slot and struggled a bit in the early games of the tournament season. Tony dropped him in the order to relieve some pressure for a couple games. Then, right before a game at Mount Union University, Tony told him that he needed him back in the 2 position and that he had a feeling that Bryce was about to “bust loose.”
Tony turned out to be a prophet as Bryce went 4 for 4 with two singles, a double and a triple… a home run shy of hitting for the cycle. Bryce was never moved out of the 2 position again and ended up one of the top hitters on the team.
The fall of 2017 ended up being one of my favorite coaching memories.
My buddy, Mark Szekely and I, at the urging of Coach Mac, put together a fall team. The Ohio High School Baseball rule book, allows a maximum of four players from the same high school program, to play on the same fall team. So we picked out our four Northwest High School players… Bryce, Jared Szekely, Canyon Foster and James Elliott. We then had to find about six more players to fill out the roster.
We contacted a couple guys who used to attend Northwest and were excellent ball players… Nicho Adams, a childhood friend of Bryce’s who still lived in our subdivision and Clay Crawford, who was our MVP when our team won the Ohio Hot Stove State Championship in 2012.
We named the team the “Fulton Express.” We were based out of Canal FULTON and, well… I don’t know, we just liked the name “Express.”
We filled in the roster with other players that we knew, and we were ready to roll. And roll we did! We played 20 games and won 18 of them. The two we lost were by a single run.
This team was phenomenal, and the dugout chemistry was the best I had ever witnessed. It was pure joy to coach and watch this group perform. Awesome pitching, clutch hitting and solid defense.
Bryce had his best hitting season ever, leading the team with a .511 batting average. Our stiffest competition came during a four-game tournament where we finished 3-1. Believe it or not, Bryce never made a single out during those four tournament games. He was 7 for 7 with six walks. I had never witnessed that during a tournament. The kid was on fire.
It was sad to see that season end, as it would be the last time that I would ever coach one of my children again. I first coached one of my kids in 1987 and had coached at least one of them most years after that. 30 joyous years of sharing this experience with my children… had come to an end.
After our final home game, I hung around until everyone had left and then sat alone in the dugout for a little while and reflected on the season… and on the many seasons that preceded this one. So many good times. So many memories. I may or may not have shed a few tears onto the dirty, dugout floor.
Bryce started his senior year of high school in August of 2017. Wow! Where had time gone? He was just 7 years old when we moved to Ohio in 2008 and now, he was in the home stretch. I tried not to dwell on that fact.
By this time, I was entering my second year as the President of the Northwest Diamond Club (high school baseball boosters). Coach Mac had handpicked me, Mark, Kelli Kohler and Becky Stayer to run this organization. It was a good group to work with. They were smart and energetic, and we were doing a lot of cool things for the baseball program.
One of the ideas that we had kicked around was taking a spring trip to start the 2018 baseball season. At first, we talked about taking the team to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina but then decided not to bite off more than we could chew this first time. Eventually, the school Athletic Director, Mr. Hathaway, suggested we go to Kentucky… the Louisville area. He had some baseball contacts down there and he would clear everything with the school administration.
This wouldn’t be cheap! We went to work, raising the money, securing transportation, renting a huge house that slept 20+ people and weaving through all of the intricate plans to make this a successful trip and a template for such trips in the future.
The kids and parents were excited. Heck, I was excited!
Over Christmas break, I received a phone call from Mr. Hathaway. He told me that he had some “bad news”… that the Superintendent of Schools had pulled the plug on the spring trip. Apparently, Mr. Hathaway had never actually cleared the trip through the proper channels.
I argued. We were still three months away from the trip, why couldn’t they approve it now? It turns out that the superintendent was fearful of a Title IX lawsuit.
Title IX says this, “No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving Federal financial assistance.”
It’s a law that attempts to, among other things, keep an equal footing between men and women’s athletic programs.
In essence, he was afraid that someone would cry “discrimination” because the boy’s baseball team was taking a trip and the girls’ softball team wasn’t. Stoking that fear was a Title IX lawsuit that the
Initially, we were resigned to the fact that the trip was cancelled. But the more we talked about it, the more fired up we got. We felt cheated. We had put forth so much work and energy to raise the funds and plan this trip for the boys. And we weren’t stopping the girls program from doing something similar. In fact, I was contacted by the softball booster’s President and Vice President, who told me that they were 100% in favor of the boys taking this trip and they offered to accompany us to a meeting with the Superintendent in a show of solidarity. I was so appreciative of that support.
We also spent time researching the matter. We talked to other coaches and athletic directors in the area who had teams that took trips. We researched similar cases on the internet. We even talked with a lawyer. Everywhere we looked, the answer came back the same… this was NOT grounds for a Title IX case.
Mark and I, along with the softball booster leaders, met with the Superintendent of Schools a few days later. He told us that school’s legal counsel had advised against allowing the trip. He was polite but firm. The trip wasn’t happening. No room for negotiation. The decision was final.
We broached the subject of bringing it up at the next School Board meeting. He quickly shot that down. Said it wouldn’t do any good. In fact, he said if it got reported in the local paper, it would make the baseball program look bad. He was very clear… taking it to the School Board was not a good idea!
We didn’t listen.
The School Board met on January 8th. I had prepared a 3-minute speech, the private citizen time limit, to deliver during the meeting. We had also requested the presence from our players and their parents. I was happy to see over 30 backers pack the relatively small meeting room.
I gave my speech, pleading our case. Several others also stood and spoke in support of our cause. The five board members listened intently and promised to address the issue in two weeks, after a full meeting with the school’s legal counsel.
On January 22nd, we again packed the room and waited nearly an hour for the board to complete their private meeting with the lawyer. As the board members filed in, I immediately looked at Bob Schilling, a new school board member and a friend of mine. I was confident that I’d be able to pick up his subtle body language signs. But there’s nothing subtle about Bob… he winked at me and gave me a “thumbs up.”
After briefing us on the meeting with legal counsel, the motion was made to vote on whether or not to authorize the trip.
Five to zero. Unanimous! We were going to Kentucky.
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