She's no Curt Schilling

Hannah's Little League team started out this season as "coach pitch". A few games ago they switched over to "kid pitch". I didn't figure that Hannah would ever actually do any pitching. She loves playing but her heart definitely isn't in it like some of these little boys who are fantastic at the game. The really cool thing though is that she is game for anything. She is the only girl on the team and nothing seems to intimidate her. I was really surprised when they asked her to play catcher one day but she loved it. She has done it a couple of times since then.

Last Sunday was a beautiful day for a Little League game. Tracy and I were sitting on the hill in the sun watching the game. Her son Hunter is also on the team and in the videos below he's the one catching. Lincoln had Jake off playing in the shade but was standing and watching the game.
As a new inning was starting we watched Hunter get suited up to play catcher. All of a sudden I could have sworn I heard the coach say "Hannah" and "pitch" in the same sentence. I looked at Tracy and said "What did he just say?" and then up at Lincoln who was looking at me with an equally astonished look on his face. Yep, Hannah was headed out to the pitchers mound.

Hannah is okay at baseball. I would say she's average at batting, catching, and throwing but she doesn't love the sport enough to practice when she's not at a game so she's not great at it. I was a little worried she wouldn't be able to pitch and people would get frustrated with her. She was a little wild and she did load the bases with a lot of walks (and give up a few points along the way) but no one said a single thing about it. Even the boys that are really intense about their baseball were very encouraging about her pitching. Tracy said she was impressed that Hannah even agreed to do it and said she didn't know if Hunter would have. Hannah managed to get a few good ones across the plate and a few boys managed to get hits off of her but she did awesome.

Despite my nervous laughter in the videos I was incredibly proud of her. Like I said, she shows no fear out there and absolutely no self doubt. It is amazing to watch such a self-confident little girl handle herself in a "boys world".

I think my favorite part is at the end of the 2nd video when Hunter throws her the ball and she misses it. Another kid scoops it up and tosses it to her and she misses again as it heads back towards home plate. Instead of getting flustered or embarrassed she makes a joke of it and just yells "It's not keep away!" That's my girl.