Sometimes nice guys(gals) don't finish last

Tim and I are coaching our daughter's softball team this year. We assisted for 4 years prior
which was not easy as the head coach was my neighbor, not a good coach, and defensive
as hell if I(a lowly woman) ever made so much as a suggestion. It got to the point that we really couldn't stand being around him, he was so obnoxious. His daughter then started to treat Olivia very badly as Olivia was a better pitcher than her and that turned out to be a
real pain too. So this year he stepped down, I took over and put his daughter and him on
the other team. GOOD riddance. Unfortunately the coach of the other team and I got together
to draft the 2 teams and it's a long story but he knew a lot more of the girls than I did(they come
from different elementary schools and ours has a lot less players than theirs) and he stacked his
team with all the strong players he knew and lied to me about the skills of the players I wound
up with. All the while, we were saying we could do this fairly, it's all about the girls etc. I was pretty disappointed with this guy. What a schmoozer. I was ticked at myself for falling for his big "nice-guy act" too. When will I ever learn? Well a woman who runs the softball association and coached many of these girls in the past caught this
and went to town with him on the phone several times. She knew exactly what he and his assistant coach were up to and she took 2 weak players off my team, gave them to him and took
2 girls off his team and gave them to me. Well, he still was no idiot, as he knew there were issues
with these 2 girls too. 1 decided not to play after all as her schedule was too full and the other used to play baseball with the boys, she's so good but struggles to hit cause she is too choosy
about pitches and swings for Kentucky everytime. ANYhoo, we had a scrimage with them a few weeks ago. Tim had to stay home with Olivia as she had her strep recurrence and I went and
coached by myself against this team which is coached by a total of 6 men incuding my jerk
neighbor. It was the boyz against "lil 'ol me! Bring it! I felt compelled to wear my Harley Davidson shirt to the game just to bring out the TAWANDA in me so I did. Well we beat their butts. At one point one of his
girls asked if they were winning and he said "this is a scrimage, we're not keeping score."
He was full of bull dinky. He was darn sure keeping score. We thrashed 'em. I tell ya, I could
have bought every one of my girls Jonas Brothers tickets, I was so pumped. NOT that I let
this show. ;o) So yesterday was our first game. It was time to play ball for real. Olivia got up
to pitch with no warm up and I also used another pitcher whose parents now bring her
to the same lessons I get for Olivia. I have worked really hard with my girls and have a lot of fun with them too. Well I could buy my kid a new car I tell ya. That brat that
was being so mean to her last year(the neighbor's kid) got up to bat. Olivia struck her right
out!!!!! THAT'S MY GIRL!!!!!!! Then we proceded to beat them again and this time, it counts.
YEE-FREEKIN'-HAW!!!!! Honestly, I love coaching these girls. It's all about building their self-esteem and having fun. Nothing makes me happier than to see one of my poorest players get
a hit and stand on 1st base grinning ear to ear. I was even helping the pitcher from their team. But I cannot say that there was no pleasure in what happened yesterday. They coach
their girls so intently. They HATE to lose. Hey we all like to win but I just expect my girls to
try their best and I am no nut case or sore loser. This was just a situation where 2 men tried to
do something really unfair(and against the rules), got caught, and then got their come-uppance.
Man it feels good!!! GIRL POWER!