Moments

For me playing sports is all about being able to experience certain moments that make it all worth it. I’ve played many different sports and pretty much all of them have those type of moments, here are some.

In baseball there were 2 moments that I cherished. As a pitcher there was nothing better than throwing it as hard as I can, have the guy swing late and strike him out swinging as the ball makes a resounding crack into the catcher’s glove . As a hitter, of course hitting a homerun was as good as it got. My most memorable one was at some park where instead of a fence they had a creek. I swung and didn’t even feel the ball hit the bat, it just took off and got very wet.

In golf the moment comes when you hit the driver off the tee and the ball comes off low and hard a bit to the right and then the spin on the ball makes it swoop up and left, winding up down the middle of the fairway, far, far away. Once I get to the ball I enjoy looking back at the tee area and being proud of the distance the ball covered.

In tennis the moment occurs when I switch from my normal right hand shot to the left hand to wind up and hit a screaming forehand with downspin that just clears the net and settles down against the back fence before the opponenet ever got a chance to swing at it.

In bowling after I let loose on shot that I give a little extra turn to, that hooks hard into the pocket, makes a whole lot of noise and sends all 10 pins rocketing to the pit behind, the moment has arrived.

In racquetball the moment was when I was serving and hit a serve as hard as I could at a hard angle. The ball would dance around the other player as he tried to catch up to it which he rarely did. If he was lucky, the best he could muster would be a weak shot high onto the wall.

In football there were lots of moments. Juking multiple people out on the way to a score, throwing a long pass that hits the receiver in stride or snatching an interception and running it all the way back all gave you the rush.

In volleyball there are two punctuation marks for me. The first one is when the other team is going up for a hit, swings as hard as they can and my hands are in the proper position to send the ball back down on their side harder than it came at me. The second is when I get a set that is in front of me, in line that I don’t have to adjust to. I get a good approach, a good jump and hit the ball in rhythm, hard. The satisfying thump it makes as it hits the surface on the other side only milliseconds after leaving your hand is the feeling that I search for most on the court.

Maybe moments translate into simple adrenaline rushes, I don’t know. All I know is I yearn for them, I play for them and I remember them.