Video of Parenting Done Right: We Had an Old Fashioned Donnybrook at a Tee Ball Game Over an Umpire's Call
Kentucky.com - Things got ugly at a T-ball championship game in Eastern Kentucky Monday when parents and coaches got into a fight, and now some involved could face criminal charges.
Video of the incident shared on Facebook shows more than a dozen adults on the baseball field, some of whom were shouting obscenities at each other.
“It’s really sad these kids that played hard all season and put their hearts on that field didn’t get to finish their championship game because ‘adults’ wanted to act like this,” Destani Renaye Knox wrote in a Facebook post, which included a video of the altercation.
Another video of the incident shared in a Facebook comment appeared to show one man throw his hat on the ground while in an argument with several others before another man rushed in, shoved people and took his shirt off. ...
Stanton police Sgt. Ian Morton told the Herald-Leader Tuesday that police are still speaking to witnesses and taking statements. “It’s possible” that people involved in the altercation could be prosecuted. ...
“Children’s sports leagues are meant to be fun activities where children can feel safe while learning a sport... but more importantly learn good sportsmanship,” the parks and recreation department said in a Facebook post. “The display tonight was anything but that.”
Spare us your righteous indignation, Facebook lady. Keep your platitudes to yourself, parks and recreation department. Hey, old guy on the news who used to coach, no one wants to hear how you did things back in Little League's Dead Ball Era. If you want to raise a generation of weak little pusses who want to go through life making space on their shelves for their growing collection of Participation Trophies, then move to another town. Stanton Kentucky is building winners.
Maybe other places are perfectly content not keeping score and calling every Tee Ball game a tie, but not them. Pardon these parents for trying to raise their kids right. Life has winners and losers. And the perfect time to drill those harsh lessons into the kids of Stanton is between the ages of 5 and 7. At the very latest. Personally I think it should be a lot earlier. I think that lesson should be learned by at least the end of their 2nd trimester, but that's just me. But we can all agree that if they don't have that fully ingrained in their heads by the end of Tee Ball, it's too late.
That old coach might think it's all about "having fun" and "being with their friends." But if they're still buying into that claptrap by the time they hit Rookie League, Rookie 2, Minors or Majors, then they won't have and "friends" to have "fun" with. They'll be losers on the field and off. Good on these moms and dads for disabusing their kids of any notion that they can go through their careers not sweating the umpire's call that could cost a team of kindergartens a hard fought victory.
Besides, for all these parents saying how appalled they are at this behavior, I think the dead giveaway for them that this was not the kind of Tee Ball league they want for their soft kids was when they got to the field and there was an umpire. Or umpires. What the hell does a Tee Ball ump even do? You eliminate balls and strikes right from the jump. Out vs safe calls are virtually unheard of, since maybe one kid in 10 is capable of throwing as far as the nearest base. I coached two years of Tee Ball and all I remember it being was a photo op for the moms. (Who happen to be the most attractive moms you will ever coach.) And if by the end of that season, if every kid knows which direction to run and half know which hand goes over which when they grip the bat, then your work here is done. Paying someone 50 bucks a game to ump at this level is so psycho we should be surprised it took this long for an all out parental mele to break out.
So congrats to all the parents who participated in this rhubarb. Even if you end up in jail over it, at least your raising your kids right.