2011 Spring Training

In March 2010, Tim MacDonald ’58 joined the Hackley Varsity and JV baseball teams in Florida for Spring Training, and spent the week working closely with the JV boys on hitting. He wrote about his experiences with the team, as well as his own Hackley baseball memories, for Hackley Review 2010. A great example of alumni-student connection, the boys came away with a valuable mentor, and Tim gained a lasting appreciation of the soul of today’s Hackley - -as well as a nickname, “Cinco Ocho,” in honor of his alumni year. This year, Tim joined the team again in Fort Pierce, Florida, and he shares his reflections here.

Tim “Cinco Ocho” MacDonald ’58 reflects on his second annual Spring Break spent with Hackley’s baseball team in Fort Pierce, Florida.

The term “teenager” seldom crossed my mind.

They were young men, these Hackley Freshmen and Sophomores. Firmly grounded, focused on task, and bent on getting the job done.

Around me, that job happened to be batting. It was my second year at Baseball Spring Training, and I’d been charged with being available to the Junior Varsity. Years of experience in hitting instruction came along with me.

If, as more than one pundit has suggested, sport is mock warfare, then at-bats represent skirmishes between pitcher and hitter, their battlefield this pentagonal prism of airspace starting knee-high above home plate and stretching up to …. up to …. well, up to wherever some umpire says it ends, I suppose. For every trajectory through this hitting zone, there’s an optimum time and place when and where we can drive the sweet spot of our bat into the center of their hurtling projectile.

The enemy pitcher tries to stop us from doing that.

Batting practice produces combat skills. With appropriate game adjustments, we prevail. All this involves bat/eye coordination, correlating directly with the number of quality practice swings we’ve taken during the season to date.

By the end of the week, improvement at the plate was palpable. Bad weather up North had curtailed outdoor practice there, so this time spent in Florida made a huge difference in everybody’s game.

________

At dinner, we were just a couple dozen kids and their coaches digging into some Sonny’s Real Pit Bar-B-Q at the far end of that popular Fort Pierce restaurant. Then a retiree came over from her table in the center of the room.

She said she’d been a teacher, and wanted to complement everyone on our wonderful teenagers, and tell us how unusual this group of kids was in her experience. Quiet, well-mannered, appropriately behaved. She enjoyed dining there with us, and thought it important that we should know that.

You got the impression this woman hadn’t had the opportunity to say as much very often, maybe ever, and relished her shot now. She seemed drawn by some professional obligation to share.

To be honest with you, the coaches and I, we weren’t thinking all that much about what the lady was saying at the time. My mind was on the pulled pork plate in front of me, with fries and a side of slaw. Wondering if I should have gone for the pulled chicken. It had been a toss up.

________

There’s been a sense of Hackley as a family here in Spring Training the past two years. From the thoughtful way our students interact with one another and more – the common ties, the sense of belonging. Two of Bob Akin ’54’s grandchildren were there with me. A number of last year‘s Seniors left for colleges my hilltop classmates attended half a century ago.

The ties were never stronger than what I came to actually feel by the end of our 2011 sessions, thanks to three Varsity ballplayers, Robert ’13, Austin ’14, and Spencer ’14, who made time to tell me about their parents. In each family, at least one had graduated from Northwestern, my college alma mater. A pleasant surprise - for all of us. I thoroughly enjoyed my days out in Evanston, and the folks I met there. I’m in your debt for coming up and saying something, guys. Thanks for doing that.

Really belonging somewhere should be a comfort to us all, particularly when that somewhere is as special as our remarkable school.

________

According to an informed media source, it was Shane, Class of 2012, who hung the moniker “Cinco Ocho” on me during the 2010 regular season, and the name stuck. That’s Spanish, sort of, for my Hackley graduation year. By the last day of this Spring Training, I was going by my new first name, Cinco.

Cinco would like to thank Uno Dos for this honor, and hopes to have the clout to hang Uno Dos on Shane just as effectively. Maybe the ball club will give a hand.

_______

Steve Frolo is a straightforward, stand-up guy radiating confidence. That’s the first impression you get of Hackley’s Varsity Baseball honcho. There’s absolutely no doubt that his world is totally under control. Flying a slew of high schoolers to Florida during what is everyone else’s notorious Spring Break could prove to be an adventure in the very worst sense of that word, but not here.

Coach is on top of absolutely everything, especially anything that could turn into something, and before things ever get started, there’s nothing to them at all. The man’s people skills are exemplary, his concern for his boys flat out all-consuming.

You can’t help but notice how much more there is to coaching than coaching when you’re around Steve. What would seem a mind-boggling responsibility for anyone else comes off as no big deal to him. And he actually seems to have fun coping with all its formidable nuances.

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JV Baseball has been sealed off inside some miraculous cocoon of Steve’s creation, so we think, talk, and play ball without distraction, and experience a well-chosen taste of South Florida while we’re at it. Also, Spring Training is offered by a capable family of guys named Vinny, providing one totally secure environment for Steve to function in, and one Vinny or another is usually with us everywhere we go.

Ballplayers look forward to this trip all year long, and it’s easy to see why and also why parents keep letting them come back with Coach Frolo.

Steve says that a number of school teams are off on similar jaunts all across the country. His daughter came down to Florida too - with Hackley Girls' Lacrosse.

We’re having a weather day. Every time the word “tornado” comes up, the cell phone gets stuck in Coach’s ear, and you don’t have to ask who he’s talking to.

________

Joe Boscia and Dale Mueller are JV co-coaches this year. Joe is all about the kids, and it shows. It’s why he’s been coaching for years and also why he enjoys himself here so much.

Mule is a former pro centerfielder/lead-off hitter, getting there via a championship-studded, all-conference collegiate career at Butler. Strange as it sounds, I’d never listened to an actual outfielder coach outfield before, and kind of hung around while it was happening to see what he’d come up with. As far as coaches go, I’ve worked mostly with former shortstops, catchers, a bunch of pitchers, one third baseman, and several long-time fans who never played anything. I probably learned more from Mule this year than the kids did.

Both co-coaches belong here. Each brings something different, and the tandem was outstanding all week long.

________

Assistant Varsity Baseball Coach Jim Gorton is a retired New York City fireman. I asked where he got the courage to run inside those burning buildings while everyone else was running out. Jim said it was a group thing. He’d never do stuff like that on his own, but because his guys went, he tagged along too. And wanted to.

I still haven’t come to grips with all there is to that one.

Jim applies the same kind of insightful wisdom to everything he does for Hackley’s children, and his views are well worth tapping. While in the Air Force, I served with several highly decorated World War II heroes from the bomber squadrons. The closer our conversations got to core values, the more steadfast - and just plain right - they became. Like interviewing characters from an American History text book, I eventually concluded. Apparently, fireman are cut from the same mold.

We’re all better people for knowing Jim.

Memo to self: do not get into a trivia contest with this man. If anything Yankees happens to come up, just smile, seal your lips, and try to learn something.

________

Rising media star Pete Barrett ’11 runs his own web site over at http://www.nysportscookie.com. It’s easy to understand how this talented Senior wangled himself that production internship with MLB Network this summer, to be followed by a similar stint for mets.com. (For Journal News story click here.)

Kudos, Pete. Cinco is impressed.

________

The Mets fan yelled out at us while pulling into his parking space. Need help with the wheelchair, he shouted. We were outside Digital Domain Park, headed in to watch the ballclub’s final spring game, and he was decked out in gaudy orange and blue, obviously a rabid supporter. Closer up, you saw he was alone.

Without hesitation, Alex ’13, Brady ’12, and Luke ’13 crossed over to the car, wrestled the wheelchair out of his hatchback, set up the unfamiliar contraption, and brought it around to the driver’s side. They stayed while the Mets fan kind of slid himself onto it, attached the pedals, and locked the vehicle he‘d struggled to get out of. It was his wife’s car, and he wasn’t used to driving it, he saw the need to point out, and fumbled around a bit for a time.

When the Mets fan was finally ready to roll out, we left for our piece of the grassy knoll beyond right field.

The retired lady at Sonny’s Real Pit Bar-B-Q would’ve been proud of Hackley Baseball, I‘m sure.

Read all the Tim MacDonald Baseball stories:
Hackley Baseball 1956 – 1958 | 2010 Spring Training | Cinco Ocho Rules! | 2011 Spring Training | 2012 Spring Training

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2011 Spring Training

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