Saturday was our final coach pitch game of the year. My youngest daughter will be too old for that league next year, so it was my final time on the mound.

It turned out to be an odd game. We only had three players show up because the rest of the team was on vacation. The other team only had seven. So they gave us two players, and we scrimmaged five on five. Each team fielded an infield and a coach played catcher. There were no outs (including no strike-outs), and batted around once per half inning. That way, every girl got to bat and run the bases.

It actually worked out better than a regular game, since our team had a some girls who weren’t hitting very well. In fact, one of the three girls there Saturday had never hit the ball all year, not even a foul ball. I was worried about saying she could bat until she hit the ball because I didn’t know how we were going to get her to hit the ball. But to everyone’s delight, she did well on Saturday. She would have struck out if we were counting strikes, but she fouled off a few and eventually during each of her three at bats, hit a little dribbler toward the pitcher’s mound. We were all pretty excited to see her finally make contact and get on base.

At the end of the game, we said our good-byes to the two other team-mates. And now I will hang up my glove (metaphorically speaking, since I didn’t wear a glove while pitching - it is a soft ball and they don’t throw hard) and retire as a little league pitcher. The scouts weren’t that impressed by how well I could strike out seven and eight year old girls, and I won’t get a call by the big leagues.

I hope that years from now, my daughter will remember that I really didn’t have much of a fast ball, and that she got some pretty good hits off of me.