Baseball book written in the 70s

[Indiana]

I was volunteering at a used book sale fundraiser the other day - some of the books we had donated were a riot; including one kid's book baseball story written in the 70's . Brief synopsis - a kid sees tryouts advertised in the local player. Kid isn't very good, but wants to try out. He tries out (complete with a black and white photo of a kid wearing jeans and a 70s style butterfly collar shirt) and is marginal. The coach calls everyone over after tryouts and says "OK, you six, you're cut. Tryout again next year. You 12, you made the team. You 10 (including the kid), come here, I want to talk to you. OK. You 10 didn't do so good. We could take you on the team, but then we'd lose. So you can practice with us, but you can't play in games."

Six of the 10 kids bailed, four (including our hero) - stay. Kid goes home and tells his older brother what went down. Older brother, a baseball phenom, basically says "wow, you stink". End of story: kid gets his older brother to teach him how to bunt - last game of the season kid gets one at bat and manages to lay down a bunt (after the coach gave him the "take" sign until he had two strikes on him - kid really wanted to hit the second strike, but knew that he had to do what coach said), advancing the runner on first, securing his spot on the team for next year.

Next baseball book - written in the 90s. A boys and girls coed team. At tryouts, coach says "everyone here will make a team. Tryouts are just to split you all up." Boy makes the purple team, his friend makes the yellow team. Purple and yellow play eachother. Purple kid hits a rocket to center field. His friend on yellow catches it. Purple kid was "really happy!!" that he hit the ball well, and "really happy!!" that his best friend made a catch.

Hmmm. There is some sort of profound social commentary in all of this. Anyway it made me shake my head and laugh. We've all be talking a lot lately on this site about past vs. present, and here it all was: the recent history of youth sports, in 20 pages -

 

[Coachmom]

Message I get...
Old book..hard work and perseverance pays off in the end. And even though you may not be the best you can still contribute.
New book...utopian dream where every kid makes the team, every kid gets a hit and every kid makes the catch because everyone is the same. No one is better than anyone else.
Did the game end in a tie?

 

[Indiana]

Ha ha - actually neither book mentioned the outcome of the game. I can't think of any kid who would actually be happy that his or her line drive got caught! I think you're absolutely right... when I first read the 70s book I laughed thinking, wow, this book is really harsh. But I hadn't thought of it from the angle of being able to contribute to the best of your own ability - that's a good one.