Tuesday, November 13, 2012

Update From the Diamond

As usual, life is speeding along at the speed of light.  J recently finished up both his junior swim season and his fall baseball season.  Try outs for spring baseball will be in mid January, and while J will have a bit of a breather in regards to games, he's still focusing hard on his training to be ready for the next steps in his baseball career.

Yesterday, J and I made a trip to visit Coach C for a progress check.  You may remember me posting back at the start of the summer season that J had suffered some back sliding in his game that was causing him some difficulties, Obstacles to Overcome.  Since none of us wanted a repeat of that scenario, we decided it would be best if Coach C made periodic checks of J's progress.   I am happy to report that Coach C was extremely pleased with how J is looking on the field.  J had made improvement by the end of the summer, working hard to fix the deficiencies in his game.  Yesterday Coach C said he could see even more improvement, which really gave J a confidence boost. And no matter how much hubby and I pump J up, our pep talks and praise never quite have the effect that Coach C's do.   So what's next?  J is continuing his training program.  Coach C will be giving him a new, more intense workout routine next week when he comes home for Thanksgiving.  In addition, J will be swimming a few days a week for extra conditioning, as well as keeping up his hitting and throwing drills.

 His school season will begin in January.  I'm going to briefly touch on something here that needs to be said and then put away.  J's school program is not everything we would like it to be, which is a source of great frustration for all of us.  I especially have a hard time dealing with it and tend to work myself  up into a bit of a frenzy at times.  That stops now.  I don't want to say or do anything that could negatively impact J's mental focus when he's on the field playing for the school team.  So from here on out, no matter how hard it is, no matter how upset I get, I will only say positive things about the program.  I will do my very best to only think positive thoughts.  The focus is J, and on helping him do everything he can to improve his game and achieve his goals.  I promised both J and Coach C I would do my part on this and it's a promise I intend to keep.  I'm a naturally optimistic person, so starting now I'm thinking positive thoughts for J's school team to grow and improve in the upcoming season.  And as always, I have faith that J will give his all to the team and have an outstanding junior season.

After that outstanding junior school season, it will be time for a third summer season with TP, led by Coach C.  We talked about the summer season yesterday and the plans Coach C is starting to make.  There will definitely be more to come on that as we get closer to the summer!

The upcoming season is an extremely important one for J.  As a junior, he only has two school seasons left, along with two more more summer seasons for TP.  He's worked long and hard to get to this point.  He's still determined to realize his dream of playing college baseball and now is the time when things could start to happen for him.  He's filling out intent forms for schools he's interested in playing at.  He's working on registering with the NCAA Eligibility Center.  Most importantly, he's continuing the hard work that has gotten him this far.  The journey is a little closer to the end, but it's far from over.  J is determined not only to complete the journey, but to end up exactly where he's been dreaming of for so many years.  

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