Straight Paths-

It All Starts with the Man Upstairs

Loren Hardin

The Ashland Beacon

 This is part four of a series about Michael who departed this world at age sixty-two due to terminal cancer. Michael was an outstanding high school and college baseball pitcher, softball coach, a mentor-leader.  But most importantly, Michael was a “man after God’s own heart,” (I Samuel 13:14).

            Michael’s father, Bill, and I met at Bob Evans Restaurant Tuesday mornings to collaborate on writing this series. One morning Bill insisted, “You need to hear from somebody besides me. You need to talk with Bill Newman. I really don’t think you could talk to anybody around here who doesn’t know Bill Newman.  Bill coached American Legion ball for twenty-nine years and umpired. He was so well respected that they had “Bill Newman Day” in Portsmouth in 1983.  Mike always said that Bill taught him more about how to conduct himself on and off the field than anyone else. I think Bill took Mike under his wing because Bill lost his five-year-old son. Bill even named his daughter, Michelle, after Michael.” 

             I took Bill’s advice and met with both Bills at Bob Evans. This is where talking about two Bills could get confusing. Therefore, I will refer to Michael’s father as “Bill P” and to Michael’s American Legion coach and mentor-leader as “Bill N”. 

             Bill N reflected, “Michael’s father prepared his son to move to the higher elements of baseball, so I didn’t have to teach him much. He was a tremendous team player, a complete ball player.  I umpired, so I got to see local players in real game situations, and I looked for the best players for my American Legion team.  At fourteen, when Mike played for me, he played against young men, eighteen and nineteen years old.  Mike thought he was too young to be a starting pitcher. He didn’t think he was ready.  But I asked Mike, ‘If you can relieve why don’t you think you can start?  I’m going to have you for a long time. You are only fourteen and I’m going to keep you until you graduate from high school; and I expect you are going to have a fine career.’  And it was the start of a fine career.”

            I wondered if Bill N. had seen himself in Michael, that young insecure fourteen-year-old pitcher. You see, in 1942, when Bill N. was only sixteen years old, he played semi-professional baseball for Ramey Feed in the “Tri-State League”. Bill N recounted, “I played against grown men.  A lot of them were ex-professional ballplayers. They were rugged men.  Back then companies hired men just to play baseball for them. I asked my coach, ‘Coach, are you sure I’m ready?’  He put me in as short stop and in the first game I let three balls go right through my legs like when you play croquet. It was humiliating.  I assumed I wouldn’t be playing in the second game. Then the coach asked me why I wasn’t warming up my arm I told him, ‘I didn’t think I’d be playing. I had a pretty bad game, didn’t I?’ He told me, ‘Yeah, you stunk! But you were highly nervous.’  I told him, ‘I sure was!’ He put me back in and I did bad in the second game too.  After the game I told the coach, ‘I’m too young. I have a lot to learn before I’m ready. Then my coach told me, ‘The only way you’re going to learn is by playing the game. I’ve seen you play, and I know you’ll get better.’”  His coach was right. Bill N signed with the Cleveland Indians; but his career was cut short because of an injury at the beginning of his first season. 

            Bill N concluded, “Everyone isn’t going to be an exceptional ball player. Only about one percent of the athletes in our area goes on to play Division I ball.  It all starts with the man upstairs, and it trickles down to us, to what the Good Lord gives us and then you start with the basics.” 

             “For who makes you to differ from one another? And what do you have that you did not receive? Now if you did indeed receive it, why do you boast as if you had not received it?”, (I Corinthians 4:8, NKJV). 

            “For I say, through the grace given to me, to everyone who is among you, not to think of himself more highly than he ought to think, but to think soberly, as God has dealt to each one a measure of faith…Having then gifts differing according to the grace given to us, let us use them…” (Romans 12:3-8). 

            Loren Hardin was a social worker with SOMC-Hospice for twenty-nine years and is presently an active volunteer. He can be reached at 740.357.6091 or at lorenhardin53@gmail.com. You can order Loren's book, "Straight Paths: Insights for living from those who have finished the course", at Amazon.