Personal Narrative: My High School Baseball Team

In my town’s Little League, everyone gets a trophy and a high five from the coach. When I decided to try out for my high school’s baseball team, I had the mindset of Little League: you show up and you play.
I arrived at tryouts wearing my school baseball hat. I hadn’t trained over the winter, but because sports are relatively non-competitive at my school, I felt confident I would make the team.
On the last day of tryouts, my coach called my name. “I don’t have room for you on my team,” he said.
It wasn’t just disappointment that I felt. The sport I loved most was the very thing I was being told I wasn’t good enough to play. Baseball has always been a constant in my life. It’s something I talk to my father about and discuss with friends. Baseball is a way to mark the seasons: the excitement of pitchers and catchers reporting at the start of spring and the thrill of the playoffs as the weather grows cool. All these are true, but in trying to explain why I love baseball, there remains an intangible that I can’t identify.
But I couldn’t let baseball go. Over the winter, I worked to improve my arm strength and bat speed. When tryouts began my sophomore year, I returned to the