Super QBs Play For Love of the Game

Baseball may no longer be America’s prime time game BUT as Mahomes & Purdy recently said, they became Super Bowl QBs by playing hard ball on the diamond as youths. It triggered my own “Love of the Game” story …

The WSJ piece extolled Purdy’s high school baseball coach noting his shortstop’s “lightning-quick release & ability to throw from almost any position just made him a natural fit for something else entirely.” Who’d a thunk NFL football? Mahomes had that similar skill set at short AND also had a dad who played pro ball. But, that’s where the similarities end. Purdy’s consistency makes him a great “game manager” while Mahomes’ creativity makes him a great “game changer.” Suggested the WSJ, maybe the NFL stars “are a loud rebuttal to why early specialization may be the exact wrong idea.”

Whatever. I & millions of other baseball boys will relate to Purdy’s & Mahomes’ obvious love of ANY game, including the game of life. Throughout my youth, I & my South Side Chicago gang played baseball in a makeshift neighborhood park from morning to sundown. If you hit a home run over the fence, you lost the gang’s ball to an angry homeowner tired of the broken windows we caused. A few of us went on to play high school & college ball. I became an all-city third baseman & college conference all-star even. But, in the end, it was the life lessons baseball taught us about commitment, patience, discipline & faith, as well as that love of the game, that stayed with us throughout life. If MLB was not in the cards for me, then, being a pro in some other way was the ticket. In my case, going on to law school. For my best buddy, it was an engineering degree. For others, it might have been becoming the damn best trucker, farmer or soldier ever. To simply have used one’s God-given talents to be the best you can be.

Davd Soul