OK, yes I am a slacker when it comes to blogging but last Saturday I had an experience that I just had to put out there and share. As the father of a little boy with Down syndrome, I have come to accept that the pleasures that most dad's share with their son's may not be shared the same way with me and Jonah. Jonah may never hit a home run with the bases loaded, having 2 strikes and his team is down by 3. He will never score the winning touchdown for his football team. Jonah's experiences are always sort of different.
A couple of weeks ago I received an email about a father and son walking by the park and his little boy wanted to play baseball. Yep, you know the one (it's gone around for a while). Needless to say, one of the teams lets the boy be on their team and in the last inning they let the boy play in the outfield. All of a sudden it's the bottom of the last inning, bases loaded and 2 outs and they let the little boy bat. You know how this goes, the other team's pitcher moves in closer so that the boy can hit the ball and once he does hit the ball, the other team continues to over throw each other and offer verbal encouragement until the little boy finally crosses home plate. Yes, because these young boys saw that winning was not the most important thing, the young boy's father had a chance to experience something with his son that he never thought he would get to experience. The email went on to say that the little boy went on to die that winter.
Now, my goal is not to tear you up as I a sitting here typing this but now that I have laid the foundation of the story, let me tell you the McBride version of this story.
For the last 3 months I have been coaching a couple of basketball teams for our church. One of the teams consisted of 1st - 3rd graders and this is the team that Jonah played on. Long story short, the team went undefeated during the year. Somehow, I was able to make sure all 13 (yes, we had 13 little guys show up to play at most games). At the end of our regular season there is a tournament. After our first round bye (due to being the top ranked team), we won the next game and then were going to be playing for the championship. Once again all 13 boys showed up for that game. I told them to play hard and not to worry, everyone would get to play and that they would play about the same amount as everyone else. Now this is a hard promise to try and keep for a couple of reasons: 1) We were playing for the championship and 2) When Jonah played, you were actually playing 4 on 5 because he would not play defense. I was hoping that we were gonna play this one certain team because I thought that no matter of the outcome, that they would help me achieve something that I could only dream of and that was Jonah shooting the ball during the game (and I wouldn't have cared which goal he shot at (well, maybe I would have cared a little). Well, God's plan was not for us to play that team. I still felt strongly about Jonah trying to shoot during the game so I shared that with Dustin (one of the refs). I told Dustin that we were going to try and get as big a lead as possible so that I could put Jonah in and let him try and shoot. Well, the game turned out to be a good one for all involved, we were leading but never by a large enough margin to were I felt that I could put Jonah in. At one point he decided to go and sit in the stands, first with his best friend Trent and then with my Mom. Finally, I guess he was ready to play and my Mom brought him back to our bench and let me know that he wanted to play now. I told him and her that he could play in the 4th quarter. The 4th quarter comes and I still don't feel that I can put him in yet; so, I asked Alek (one of our R.A. leaders that came to games to help me keep up with all those little boys) to let me know when there was 3 minutes left to go in the game. Next thing I know,Alek has told me that there was 3 minutes to go in the game. I waited another minute or so before I called timeout and was able to put Jonah in (now at halftime I had told the other coach that I would be putting my secret weapon in during the 4th quarter and he said "No problem"). So we are up by 8 with 2 minutes to go in the championship game and Jonah is in the game. To offset the lack of playing by Jonah, I also put Cade back in for 2 reasons. First of all Cade is like the energizer bunny on Red Bull and I knew that he could a) score if and when we needed it and b) he would try his best to get Jonah the ball. Well, the other team went down the court and scored a basket. I told Cade that we needed a basket and he went down and scored one for the team. The other team went down the court, shot and missed and we rebounded the ball. I yelled at Cade to give Jonah the ball. Jonah proceeded to dribble and carry the ball up the court and got to a place where he could shot the ball. Yep, he shot and missed. The other team rebounded the ball, went back up the court and missed again when they shot. Once again, I yelled at Cade to give Jonah the ball. This is where it gets fun. Somehow Jonah ended up standing in front of the right basket shooting the ball. He missed the first shot, then the most amazing thing happened. The boys were all standing on each side of Jonah and not a one of them were trying to get the ball from him. Jonah was able to shoot maybe 3-4 more times before finally making it (with the help of Dustin the ref). Jonah didn't care how it went in, all he knew was that he made it in and the crowd went nuts. With tears in my eyes, I could help but think how all the boys on the court understood that there was more to this than winning a basketball game. Well, this was all a time consuming event and the clock ran out shortly after that. The refs said that they were gonna let them play a little longer and I had no problem with it. Win or lose, my season was made already. The game ended a few seconds later and we won. I believe that no one lost that day, that the other team was just as big of a winner if not a bigger winner than we were. As I shook the other coach's hand, all I could say was THANK YOU.
That's it, that is our Sport's Illustrated moment but please read on...
It's easy to go out and coach boys to win but to teach the boys to be more Christ like far more important. So, if you know anyone who goes to Friendly Baptist Church in Tyler Tx, please tell them that you have heard that their LAD (1st - 3rd graders) basketball team made a huge impact on a little boy and his dad. They truly are a picture of what R.A. basketball is suppose to be all about.
As for the parents of my team, all I can say is THANK YOU. Thank you for sharing your boys with me, thank you for your support in getting the boys to practice and the games and THANK YOU for understanding the importance of Jonah being able to be on the team with your boys.
