“You don’t steal bases at 78.”

Dave Wheeler didn’t wink at me then, but by the end of the week, he would. The first game with a new team is always a chance to get to know each other. I love coaching first base when I play because you get to talk to every batter. I talk to them while they’re batting, when they reach first (safely or not, as a post-mortem) and while they’re on base. I go through the whole litany of the situation: outs, runners ahead of them, what they should do on a line drive or popup, and (since baseball allows stealing) any tips on what the pitcher and catcher are doing to prevent a steal. I do this for everyone. It doesn’t matter if it’s the first time you’ve ever been on base or if you’ve been doing it longer than I’ve been alive. So, I kidded Dave Wheeler that he should steal on the first pitch. He didn’t know I was kidding. That would come.

I love baseball. It requires thought and action. Simple changes in how you do something can result in huge performance differences or no difference at all. It’s a slow game, except when it’s not. There’s complexity and simplicity. Importantly, as we now know, you can play when you’re old, just as you could when you were young.

When I played softball with the Humble Flies, one of my teammates, Pat Race, would always clap his hands and shout encouragement to the rest of the team. I joined in. I found, over the years, we seemed to play better as a team when Pat and I did this. If nothing else, I enjoyed it a lot more. Pat moved on, but I kept doing it. I don’t know how much of it came from encouraging my Boy Scouts over the years and how much was due to those games with Pat.

When I play softball with the company team down on the Mall, I am relentlessly positive, always pointing out when my teammates do something right, even if they might not see it in the results. A line drive caught by the shortstop from a player who usually grounds out to the pitcher is huge! Someone who makes a good stop, but not the throw, on a really difficult play deserves praise. As anyone who plays on that team, or who played on our MSU alumni team back in the day knows, I don’t just do this for my teammates. If someone on the other team excels, I let them know. I do it right away.

In Ponce de Leon league play, an umpire told everyone how much he liked me because, even when I struck out, I was happy. It was a darn good pitch and I let the pitcher know it right away. He smiled and I smiled as I shook my head walking back to the dugout.

Our Ponce de Leon manager, Fred Jaffke, said to me while we were down at spring training, “Dave, if I’ve told you once, I’ve told you a hundred times. Don’t tell them they did a good job DURING the game. Do it after.” I have a terrible memory. I tell them when it happens both because it just comes right out and because I’m not sure I’ll remember it after the game.

So, at the end of the week banquet, they give out Kangaroo Court fines. Typically, in baseball, you get fined by your teammates in the Kangaroo Court for not showing enough effort or making a boneheaded play. Any money collected in fines goes to charity. In our spring training, there are always more interesting things to assess fines for than just that. One guy was fined for calling for his “two-strike bat” during an at-bat. He’d gone up with one bat and, once he got a second strike, he called over to the bench to get his other bat. Another guy got fined for attempting to call “time out” while running the bases (more on that later!)

Each team’s manager announces a few Kangaroo Court infractions at the banquet. Our manager was current Minnesota Twins first base coach, Jeff Smith. Smitty was a catcher in the Twins system, with his route to the majors blocked by A.J. Pierzynski. He’s managed 11 seasons in the minors and is now in his first season in the majors, as a coach. We all just called him Jeff, and he’s the nicest, most positive guy on the field. Smiles and encouraging words abound, so we fit in well together. However, at the banquet, I got called out for a Kangaroo Court fine for… being too nice!