All it took to play was desire, a glove and my brother’s old spikes.
Back then, Mr. Smith would provide the bats, the balls and catcher’s gear — mitt included — stuffed into his old Army duffle bag. He’d roll it all out behind home plate. It didn’t cost us a penny.
Listening the other day to Lela Jenkins’ story, though, I arrived at two conclusions: If I were a kid today, there is no way I would ever be able to step onto a baseball field.
The second, of course, is that I am old.
She contacted me about her beef with her son Troy’s former high school and its baseball program. She laid all of it out with lists, numbers and explanations. My head is still spinning but not because of the school quarrel. No, what was staggering is the amount of cold, hard cash required for one boy to go out for the school baseball team.
Troy’s baseball experience did not end well. Two years ago when his mother, having paid out more than $2,000 to keep him on the team, asked where all of the money was going, Troy suddenly was no longer welcome.
Troy skipped baseball his senior year and is now a freshman at Colorado State University. The bitterness for Lela Jenkins, 35, persists.
“Not a penny of the thousands I paid into the program went to help teach my son the proper way to play baseball,” she said. “I just asked why.”
The first expense was a request for $10 to $15 “or a case of bottled water” to stock the snack shack. It would prove chump change for what was to come.
Each player was required to raise $250 by participating in a baseball marathon game.
“He was supposed to get sponsors as he played in the game, but eventually I ended up just writing a check,” she said.
There was a $100 fee for spring baseball. Jenkins understood this to be standard. But then there was the $225 charge for winter workouts, the $10- to $20-per-plate fundraising dinner and the required $100 to $500 cash donation to become a member of the baseball booster club.
Every player hoping to make the spring club was required to pay and sign up for summer ball. That was another $650 to $850 fee.
Summer ball meant traveling, and that was a minimum fee of $600 per player. More than double that if you wanted to go see your kid play. Then you have to add in, she said, the spring baseball travel fee of $200 to $300 per player.
It isn’t just high school that is expensive, she said. When Troy was in middle school and playing on competitive, traveling teams, the cost averaged $3,000 a year.
She did it, she said, because she wanted her son to be happy. Right or wrong, she said, it is hard to take a dream away from your child.
I wished her good luck and later went over her numbers again.
Immediately, I think of every janitor’s kid, which I once was. I think of the kids of bus drivers, hotel maids, the mailmen. Is the game, the joy of playing it and the very same dream Lela Jenkins’ kid dreamed now unavailable to them?
Bill Johnson writes Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. Reach him at 303-954-2763 or wjohnson@denverpost.com.
