by AlwaysImprove » Tue Apr 15, 2014 8:21 am
Acknowledged. The chance of my kid getting hurt on a baseball field is near zero, she does not go on them.
My kid and everyone of her 30-40 friends have played for 12 years, at the highest levels of the sport. They have never played with a mask and not a single injury. It feels perfectly safe. They worked on their glove skills. Were they afraid of the ball at times? Yes. They worked through it. Many went on to play D1 ball, and still love the game, played at the highest level. Many many many times as many injuries every year from ankles, knees, wrists. But no, we going to focus on face smashing incidents.
By the way, I had a chance to ask several of them. They like the no masks on the batting helmet. They think the kids that go no mask are tough. When they pitch to a kid with no mask their is definitely an intimidation factor.
The kids we did see wear masks. They ended up reinforcing their fear of the ball. Never learning to trust their leather. They bounced out, or topped out, of the sport freshman year of high school when the speed of the game got serious and the players got aggressive. The upper levels of the sport is not for everyone. It is going to naturally select the more competitive.
It turns out there is a death worse than the one eteamz suffered. I realize you guys will not stop. I mean hell Ralph Nader is still carrying on about some crazy safety danger endlessly. He made a pretty decent living on it and turned "the cause" into a presidential campaign. I can see it now, "Jonriv for Boring Heybucket President - Tireless droning about kids getting their face smashed at D3 games"
Perhaps you have not noticed, this place emptied out long ago. I am sure you are more than happy to take silence as agreement. The reality is that no one cares. They are fine with you "winning" this debate, as long as they are no longer have to suffer the pain of being drug into a conversation with you.
So hear you go. Despite all the reasonable evidence that says a kid is relatively safe playing ball, I have changed my stance on this issue. I now agree with you that masks should be mandatory, lest some kid get their face smashed in. I declare, masks are deemed, herby and for to wit, fully accepted.
From here forward no on shall ever:
- call anyone wearing a mask a sissy,
- or point out that they appear deathly afraid of the ball,
- or suggest that if they worked on their glove skills they may not need that massive piece of goofy looking plastic, with 3 inch wide hunks of plastic and 2 inch wide peep holes.
- or suggest if the ball is getting hit to hard for little suzy, this may not be the sport for suzy, maybe she should move over to slowpitch or soccer.
Now that we are all in agreement, maybe we let someone besides President jonriv bore people for a while. If nothing else our newly chosen path should bring a change of pace around here.