The truly older players of the senior league are my favorites. Not that the 50+ thumpers and the still-streaking 60’s are not great to watch (and play among), but there is something special about the 70+ ballplayers that arrests your attention. It’s the spirit of perseverance, the attitude of permanence and a general feeling of awe that they are even out there going through the game’s motions that grips you. To be able to suit up for the battlefield when 99% of our peers are just glad to take a stroll about the block? But then to go out and perform respectably while in your 70’s is something that other senior ballplayers admire and look up to. They dream that it will be them someday.
Although their steps might be slowed down, those well-ordered steps know where they are going. Watch the concentration on them as they play. It’s the savvy and the surety that guides their actions. It’s like watching twenty old coaches out there putting on a clinic. As batters they work the pitchers because they know beforehand what they want to do up there. As fielders they move with a certainty that puts first things first and as they go through the motions you can almost see them thinking the play into being. So what if they didn’t get the out, they really just want to get their part right.
Sure, on the surface it is easy to quickly compare their slower moves with the fleet 50’s and still-streaking 60’s, but if one looks beyond the speed and power factors, there is an underlying fineness to the oldsters moves. For these guys play a larger part of the mental side of the game than the younger divisions. They have to in order to survive physically and even skillfully. Mental mistakes can take you and your team down, and this is where the wisdom of the elders save their teams from unseen errors. Knowing what to do is half of the battle and this is how they battle each other out there underneath the surface of the game. Even when playing "down" with the younger guys, a 70+ division player can be valuable because he can be counted on for fundamentally doing the right thing with the ball when he gets it. He can out think a pitcher and whack that ball into a hole he had planned. His quiet leadership in the dugout can put some mettle in the other guys that may lead to the kind of stuff that wins a game because everybody tightened down a notch. I think that a 65+ team is blessed to have one or two 70+ aged players on the roster. Just for leadership and spirit if nothing else.
It is lightly amusing to see these remarkable "fossils" still creaking around out there. I have an umpire friend who enjoys doing the upper senior division games. He stated to me with great admiration that he felt like they didn’t need an umpire out there.
These basically even-natured players are out there to let the chaff go by and get to the grain as quickly as they can. The general mood out there is, "I will not be distracted by attacks." Their basic desire is to return to the carefree days of when you concentrated on the immediate play at hand and your part was to be in it. Know your part in the drama as it unfolds and see if you can do it right and don’t make a big fuss over it one way or another, no matter what the outcome. There will be another one coming along shortly. Wind ‘er up and get ready, always be ready for the next play, physically and mentally.
That’s hard enough anyway, isn’t it?
The worse thing is to break companionship with the game. To get upset and break off the relationship with the one you came out to be with. At all costs, don’t lose your grip. There are lots of distractions out there. They are the enemy, don’t fall prey, stay even, and win at all costs. To defeat this enemy one must use the wisdom of ignoring, remaining calm in the firestorm of events.
FANTASTIC 50’S AND STRONG 60’S
Not to sell the 50+ and 60+ divisions short, let me tell you an awesome story that anyone who plays softball will admire for its sheer support of seniors who come out to excel.
It was in 1998 in Phoenix at the SSUSA World Championship tournament. I was there umpiring and I had a game with a 50+ ‘Super’ division team (players drawn from all over the U.S.) and a top-notch ‘AAA’ team. The first time the ‘Super’ team came up to bat they hit seven home runs in a row. Before their half of the inning was over, they had hit twelve! The game sort of went on like that, with the ‘AAA’ team collecting some runs along the way but nothing like these monster mashers put up on the board. It was like an exhibition show and just showed how seniors can also put a softball over a fence well over 300 feet away. Fifty year olds can be superb athletes. Seniors, too, can swat the superman stick. Either of those two teams could easily have defeated some of the very best of younger men’s teams. Go figure that out.
Since then I have seen regular senior league teams put on fantastic displays of hitting and fielding. Playing marvelous ball that has all of the thrills of an intense upper-division men’s tournament game. There is a lot to be said for senior ballplayers who can get into shape and hone their skills to the point where they could go out and play alongside some of the best 30 year olds.
As a matter of a fact, this is precisely the reason that many of the senior players come out to play. To excel. It’s the quest to accomplish something. This is true softball, a few great players along with the mostly average and a below average Joe or so along for the ride. That is what it is. All shades of talents blending into a clump of camaraderie that can laugh at their errors, cheer at their exceptional moments and not stress over the outcome that much. No matter where you fall into this overall picture, just make sure of one thing: Wherever you find yourself, it takes ALL of us to make up a true senior league. The game needs you_as long as you need the game.