Home Stretch

One of the great aspects of playing and watching baseball is that it is done outdoors - with the associated pluses and minuses.

It's hard to fathom - what with a layer of ice and snow still on the ground - that baseball will be in full swing in a couple of weeks. The Yankees and Mets will return from the Sunshine State while local college and high school teams will brave the elements to battle for seven innings or more.

I can't wait.

The first couple of weeks of the season can be challenging weather-wise, to say the least. Anyone who has ever tried to hit a fastball with chilled hands or - from a spectator point of view - struggled against the elements to take in an entire game when a warm, inviting car is just a few yards away in the parking lot can vouch for that. But we sit through it because we love the game and we know that before we know it the chill will give way to the cooling breeze that makes playing and watching such a delight. Soon after that, of course, we'll be playing and watching in the summer heat, but even that has a certain charm.

Then, of course, there is the chill of Fall Ball and the World Series - which does not seem officially the World Series if at least half the games are not played in The Bronx.

But we will have to weather a lot of challenges before we see that happen this year.

- Michael Watt

Proper Mechanics

One of the most intriguing aspects about baseball is the idea that the more you learn about the sport, the more you realize how much more there is to learn.

Like most baseball fans I have been actively involved with the sport since I was a Little Leaguer in the late 1960s. Nonetheless, whenever I take my sons - Alex, 16 and Max, 12 - to their various clinics and lessons I am amazed at how much there is to know about how to play the game properly. The details of pitching mechanics alone could - and have - filled volumes. Hitting, too, can be just as daunting - although I have always subscribed to the Yogi Berra theory that "you can't hit and think at the same time."

The problem with there being so much to know is that there is a lot of mis-information out there. Well-meaning Dads and Little League coaches who were taught improper techniques for playing the game often pass along that bad information to their sons or offer meaningless advice to pitchers like "throw strikes" when the pitcher is experiencing control problems.

That is why clinics and lessons offered by professionals - not necessarily former major leaguers but men who have enjoyed significant success playing the sport - are so important. Learning the proper fundamentals not only helps hone the skills of young players, it helps reduce the risk of injury - particularly with young pitchers - as well.

Fortunately, there are a dozen or academies on Long Island that offer excellent opportunties for young boys to learn the game of baseball properly. When you check out these places ask the names of ball players who have been through the academy and where they are now. Do not be shy about inquiring about the qualifications of the men giving the lessons, either. Most likely they are well qualified to teach your sons.

All the lessons in the world, however, can't replace the benefits of playing the game. Encourage your sons to play as much baseball as possible (and no, video games don't count).

Playing Catch

I go to a lot of the baseball academies across Long Island and see lots of dads (and some moms) hanging out while their sons work with pros, former pros and almost-pros. As a parent I know we feel good about providing these opportunities for our kids - opportunities that most of us did not have when we first dreamed of being in the big leagues as kids. Ask any male over the age of 35, for instance, about the "baseball academies" of his youth and most likely he will laugh.

The closest thing to an "academy" we had growing up on Long Island in the 1950s, 1960s and 1970s was a strike zone painted on the side of a school building. Here was your basic baseball lesson: Throw the ball and hit the strike zone on the wall in a way that prevents the batter from striking the ball. Do that more frequently than your opponent and you win.

One of the advantages we did have, however, was more opportunities to just play catch - throwing the ball back and forth. (Of course, we had this opportunity because we did not have video games like those that are available today. I am sure if the same dads who lament the amount of time their kids devote to playing video games had the same access to those games when they were kids, they would have played the video games just as much.) Video games not withstanding, however, not enough young ball players today play catch. Ball players can never be too young - or too old, for that matter - to take a few minutes to throw the ball back and forth with a parent or a friend in the backyard or down at the local field.

It is a ritual that dates back to the origin of the sport, of course, and it helps limber up the body. But it also gets you into a baseball frame of mind, reinforces your eye-hand coordination skills and, when conducted outside, introduces some much needed fresh air into your lungs. A "catch" also provides an excellent opportunity for its participants - particular fathers and sons - to talk about whatever's on their minds.

If nothing else, the sound of a baseball slamming into a leather announces the impending arrival of spring better than anything else.

-- Michael Watt

Pitchers and Catchers and Other Reasons To Go On Living

As the oil burner pushes steam through the radiators in my home and serenades me with a song of shelter from the brisk cold of a February morning in New York, I read about pitchers and catchers reporting to Spring Training this week and all is good with the world.

As usual there are a ton of questions yet to be answered in both the Mets and Yankees camps, but whether A-Rod can find true happiness (while counting his ever-growing pile of cash) is not nearly as interesting to me as what is transpiring on Long Island. Hundreds if not thousands of players who play for the love of the game are already limbering up their arms and legs - if they indeed ever stopped playing over the winter - in anticipation of spring baseball. Bring it on! Not that I am looking forward to standing on the sidelines under several layers of jackets while my sons endeavor to hit the ball out of the infield without feeling as if their hands are going to fall off, but even that is better than feeling confined to my home without nothing on the tube but those indoor sports that insist on letting a timepiece tell them when the game is over.

Baseball is upon us, my friends. "Pitchers & catchers" is more than just a phrase employed by talk-show hosts to keep us interested until something interesting happens. It is a phrase that tells us we survived another winter. It tells us that it is just a matter of time before we hear the sound of baseballs being slapped by wood bats into leather gloves. It tells us that before we know it, we will feel the warm sun on the backs of our necks as we anticipate the outcome of the next pitch, and the pitch after that and the pitch after that.

I can't wait.

February 1st launch - Long Island Baseball Network

The Long Island Baseball Network is a portal Web site designed to help baseball players and their parents tap into wealth of baseball academies, clinics, tutorial sessions and travel leagues that can help a player realize his full potential. It will do this by making it easy to cull through what is available and make the coaches, tutors, leagues and services accessible with the click of a button.