THE UNUSUAL SUSPECTS

My team (The Grass Kickers, woo woo) is unable to play in the fall kickball leagues, so I had a decision to make: no kickball til spring or join or create another team. I know, I know that's blasphemous, but can you image no kickball til spring? Me either, so despite better judgement me and a few of my team mate joined another team. Now let me back up a little we were actually recruited (yeah we are pretty good) and we accepted. We were sold this idea of us coming in and maybe helping this team win a few game. NOT SO!!! We were not warmly welcomed. First off you don't know these people, their abilities, their strengths or weaknesses and they don't know yours. Secondly because you're joining them trying to impart any knowledge that may improve the team is looked upon as cocky. So you sit back and watch game after game after game after game get away from you because of bullheadedness. We are adults people how about we get over ourselves and let's win a DAMN game! But the hope of winning is fading with every dropped ball and every pop out and "I just can't believe we're going to walk in to certain death" (Verbal, The Usual Suspect) because the UNusual suspects won't play nice.

Kickball: Pitchers Make The World Go Round

I've been playing kickball for a while now. I've always been the pitcher, nothing but and this is from my view. I started off as a slow ball, middle school roller I might as well been using 2 hands and swinging it thru my legs then rolling it to the plate. My 1st season we got creamed and as any pitcher I felt it was all my fault. Thing is the whole league was pitching slow, except for one guy and he pitched like we did in high school curves, back spins all that jazz (you know how exceptional kickballers did to dominate). We called him Roger Clemens. He blew my mind, he made us kick where he wanted us to kick, but unfortunately his outfield suck so ..... When I started doing it, he pulled me to the side showed me some things and from there I said my next season will be crazy.  

Now in the next season I'm not gone say I changed the way pitching was viewed and done in our league. We joined a different location in the same league and no Roger Clemens. So I watched some YouTube videos SFKO, WAKA all that and saw how they dictated the flow. Make this person pop up, 2 people on, 1st and 2nd, kicker wanna go down 1st make him kick to 3rd possible double play.  Really I got that crazy in learning how to pitch this ball. And just like that, it was happening granted my defense was stellar and I put them in spots I felt would utilize my thoughts of directional pitching. Nonetheless we were off and running. I was actually striking people out it was nuts. Thats when I realized "Pitchers Make The World Go Round" just like in baseball.

Now I'm playing in 2 leagues where I swear every team has a fastball pitcher not just fastball let me be more accurate a Crafty Pitcher (well the new teams after they see what I do to em') and we're in a pitchers war like every game. Some teams allow girls to pitch so they can put more guys in the field and honestly those teams aren't doing so well (not saying a girl can't get down) but the extra fielder is useless when the pitcher pitches that slow crap and good kickers have time to make his/her mind up where to go with the ball.  Truthfully, it's like watching Cliff Lee vs. CC Sabathia or Verlander vs. Halladay or whoever you get my drift, pitch it out. Our games are low scoring 1 point wins maybe 2. The satisfaction of pitching 1 kickers or 2 kickers, shutouts, and strikeouts is incredible. There is a team in my league, my rivals called Kick In A Box and believe me when I say that they were already dominant, but I've seen them come from giving up 20+ runs in previous seasons which is superb, too these 2 seasons we're in now with their pitcher blacking out actually giving up less than 10 points in both leagues. Don't get me wrong with experience comes success, but in this league I've seen a total 360 in some teams mid season just with pitching changes. Same thing for my squad we only gave up 17 points this season. Pitching. Like I said 80% of the league is like this now and I personally think its better because of it.  I love/hate winning 12-1 and 14-0, but I love being up 10-9 bottom of the 9th runners in scoring position 2 outs with a full count and striking the kicker out to win the Tournament Championship. Yes it happened. Pitching Wars. I will be doing more on this later.

Athletes or Athleticism

What is an athlete? Webster says that an athlete is, "a person who is trained or skilled in exercises, sports, or games requiring physical strength, agility and stamina." Few would argue that definition right? Right... well kind of.

Let's ignore Webster for a second and define an athlete as someone extensively trained to perform at a high level for a given sport. Sport being singular because very few people are true athletes in multiple sports. Sure people play multiple sports but are they athletes or are they simply athletic.

For me? I'll take athleticism over athlete any day of the week and I'll tell you why.

Athletes know their craft. They've been playing since they were little, coached for as long as they remember, and most will tell you they're experts in their field. They have been trained to outwork the opponent: kick further, run faster and throw harder. They are stronger, bigger and better than the rest and that's why they will win... wrong.

Kickball doesn't always suit itself to fastest, strongest nor biggest. Kickball is a game of situations and those that play regularly will tell you more often than not you play with your brain not with your iron foot.

Track athletes put their head down and run as fast as possible -- I need you to keep your head up and let your legs move naturally while your eyes tell you to speed up or slow down.

Soccer athletes kick the ball far and hard -- I need you to read the situation and place the ball in the most opportune spot to benefit the team.

Basketball athletes take over the game -- I need you to trust your teammates and make smart decisions when the time comes.

Athletes are great at what they've been trained to do. Athleticism is a product of adapting to the situation around you, learning, and then taking those learned skills and applying them in the necessary field. And when it comes to kickball I'll build my team with the latter any day of the week.

The Hangover (Bad Game Wasted)

This has happened to every kickballer in the world. The day of a "BIG GAME" "RIVALRY WEEK" or any cliche to describe the game against your worthiest opponent. You sit at work, in a restaurant or at your moms house picturing all 9 innings play by play, you even know when they're going to score, how you plan to counter, EVERYTHING. You even show up early to watch other games and play it off like it's no big deal. Talk with other teams, talk to your nemesis, all the while sweating bullets. Then before you know it. Like in the movies in the blink of an eye, its the bottom of the 7th and you're down 6-1 and you lucked up on that 1. Each inning was like taking a shot of (insert drink here). You wondering how in the hell did this happen. 1st game you played 2-1, 3-4 2nd game, 3rd game 1-0 in extra innings, 11-10 games, Walk off homers, sacrifices to end games, even strikeouts. Now you're getting blasted and other teams watching, because they heard about you're "EPIC" battles. You drop grounders, you drop pop ups, you walk girls anything you can imagine that could help you lose, does. Two fielders run into each other and don't get hurt, but don't get up and the ball rolls 20 feet for no reason. Just a total meltdown. You play that game over and over for 6 days straight, hence the hangover. So how do you bounce back from this for the next game?

It's only one solution for this. Only one.
You gotta kick the s@@@ outta your next opponent, beat them 15-0 no mercy.

Welcome To Kickball

I've started a kickball blog for all of the fans of "America's NEW Favorite Pass Time". I know people are thinking what can be said about kickball to start a blog. Well stay tuned. We'll be talking about different techniques for pitches and kicks, pitching styles, the different leagues and teams around the world and make comparisons. It's going to be fun for kickballers all over. I'm Rob and I'm hooked on Kickball. Play twice a week, run a youth kickball league in St. Louis and got a Kickball Camp in the works for the winter at an indoor sports complex. It's going down.