Why I Love This Photo

Sometimes a photo just makes me smile. This is one of them.

Let’s go back a few years. Summer of 2000: my son Chris was 12. He was a fierce competitor in the Red Bank Dixie Youth baseball league. A tall, skinny kid who wasn’t blessed with the natural athleticism of some of his peers. I mean, look at his dad.

Nevertheless, he had a great year, and was selected to the All-Star team. For the first time in three decades, Red Bank fielded a squad that could compete with the powerhouse teams from across Tennessee.

Chris’s specialty was hitting. He had blossomed into a consistent, often powerful hitter. However, he hadn’t developed the arm strength to become a laser-throwing shortstop,  or the blazing fastball that some All-Star 12-year-old pitchers had.

That’s where his coach comes in:  Ken Livingston. Unlike me, Ken is an outdoorsman. He’d played and coached baseball for decades.  Somewhere along the way, he learned how to throw a curve ball. Better still, he could teach others how to throw it. Early in the season, Ken took Chris on as a special project. He knew that Chris expected a lot from himself, and he took losses hard. He also knew Chris didn’t have an overpowering fastball. So he taught Chris the tried-and-true Livingston curve ball.

During the regular season, Chris surprised his coaches, opposing players and even himself with his improved pitching prowess. In one epic extra-inning game, he went past the standard six innings, going head-to-head against the league’s hardest-throwing pitcher, only to lose 1-0 due to a 9th inning error. As always, the curve ball was his “out” pitch that night, but he felt he had fallen short. Coach Ken tried to console him, but losses weren’t easy for Chris to shake off.

By All-Star time, Chris played various infield positions, usually wherever the heat-throwing pitchers would play if they weren’t on the mound. Now he was playing with other top hitters, and Coach Ken had been displaced by a new set of All-Star coaches. The state tournament, held in Dickson, Tennessee required multiple games to be crammed into a short amount of time. Although Chris had won plenty of games as a pitcher in the regular season, the coaches sent their stronger arms to the mound, instead of the kid with that odd, slow-bending curve ball.  I wasn’t pleased that my son had been overlooked as a pitcher for several games; he just didn’t throw hard enough, I guessed, and Coach Ken wasn’t in a position to call the shots.

Game after game, Chris was being overlooked, until finally they had run out of pitchers, at a most inopportune time. All the fastballers had pitched as many innings as they were allowed, and Red Bank was down to the elimination game: if they lost, they would go home without the trophy. I was livid. In my view, they had set my son up for failure. By now, he hadn’t pitched in several weeks and had not even been asked to warm up. Yet now he was given the ball with the state title on the line. He had to face the mighty Goodlettsville team, which had already beaten Red Bank once, and seemed likely to do it again.  Of course, if he lost he would be “the goat” for the rest of his life. I couldn’t have been more angry. Chris Carroll was destined to be the big game loser, through no fault of his own.

Except for one thing: that amazing curve ball that Ken Livingston taught him. To this day, we look at the video tape (now carefully preserved on DVD) and get teary-eyed. There’s my gangly 12-year-old, making opposing batters buckle at the knees as the wobbly baseball floats by for strike three. Some flailed at it helplessly, others just watched it sail by in disbelief.

In a most dramatic fashion, the last-option pitcher led his team to a 2-1 victory and an eventual state championship. Chris would tell you it was a highlight of his childhood. As a father who was pacing nervously far away from the action (so the coaches couldn’t hear my disgusted grumbles), it was a moment I’ll never forget.

Chris’s baseball career continued into his high school years.  In his final game, as a junior, he got two hits off Cory Gearrin of Rhea County, now an Atlanta Brave.  But the curve ball that was so effective while he was pitching from a 45-foot Dixie Youth distance wasn’t quite as sharp from 60 feet. He never developed the eye-popping fastball that wows the scouts and puts fear into the hearts of opponents. Eventually we both realized that only a handful of teenage baseball players make a college team, and even fewer go to the pros. Chris’s claim to fame would come in a different field, one of which I’m equally proud (government).

That brings us back to the photo I love. To this day, Ken Livingston, now a grandfather and no longer waving 12-year-olds around the basepaths, is still a Chris Carroll fan. He was as proud as anyone of Chris’s 2000 All-Star heroics, and deserves much of the credit. He took an uncertain, less-than-confident 12-year-old, and gave him the support he needed. When I saw Ken at the recent 50th anniversary celebration of Red Bank Dixie Youth baseball, he asked for Chris’s phone number so he could visit with him during his next trip to Washington DC, where Chris now lives and works.

A few days later, it was a pleasant surprise to see the photo that Chris had posted. It seems the night before, Ken had taken Chris to a Washington Nationals game, much to Chris’s delight.  You see the smiles.

That’s why I love this photo. Baseball obviously means a lot to me. More than anything, it’s about the bonds, friendships and memories that are created when a caring coach makes a connection with a kid that lasts a lifetime.