As I open my door and put my Ray Ban sunglasses on, I see a group of young boys standing on the field. The boys are dressed in white pants with blue stripes and orange shirts saying Southern Bank of Commerce Mets. I stood in front of those young ballplayers and said, Do yall know why I am here? One of the kids said, No, why? Your Coach Cook has asked me to come and speak to you about the importance of practicing the fundamentals of baseball.There are three fundamental skills of baseball: hitting, catching, and throwing. Coach Cook asked me to talk to all of you, because he thinks you all do not want to practice. To succeed in baseball, you must practice because repetition is the key. Whenever one repeats an action it becomes customary and easy for one to perform a task.When I was a ballplayer, my teams were very successful because my coaches told us the importance of practicing. One year my coach could not coach us because he did not have the time to do it. That same year the teams were shuffled and everybody had different teammates. My best friend, Wes Cook, made it on my team. Wes was the best player anybody had ever seen. However, He did not enjoy practicing. He thought he could succeed without practicing. Our new coach was laidback at practice. This made Wes especially happy. Coach did not make the team practice hard; we just had to catch fly balls, ground balls, and practice hitting. I batted third after We. My team, the Price Drug Braves, started the season hot; we won our first five games.Wes and I were a great duo. I had the highest batting average for our age group, and he had the second highest. Wes had five homeruns to my two. As the season progressed, we cooled down. Everyday, when I had a chance my dad and I would practice in the batting cages. I would call Wes and ask him if he wanted to come with us and he would tell me that he was busy playing Super Nintendo and Sega Genesis. I would try to tell...
