Here in the Shenandoah Valley, we have a summer baseball league sanctioned by the NCAA, the Valley Baseball League. It's a wooden bat league where college players come here to work on their skills and maybe get noticed by scouts.
There are similar leagues around the country, but the Valley League is probably the No. 2 such program in the country. Many Valley League teams lose players to the major league draft each year.
Our town has a team in the Valley League, so I'm getting the chance to cover the games and meet the players. It's kinda neat to do that, having watched games when visiting my grandmother before we moved here.
The other night I was at a game and saw something I don't think I've ever seen before -- a broken-bat home run.
The bat went into three parts. The handle of the bat, about two inches worth, stayed at home plate. The middle of the bat went who-knows-where, and the head of the bat almost left the infield. Meanwhile, the ball easily cleared the 310-foot mark in left field. (Many games are played on high school fields.)
Quirky plays like that make the game of baseball so interesting. Now, if we could just get rid of heat and humidity, summer would be great!
Posted by JRC at June 23, 2004 06:05 PM | TrackBack