Alexis, my pitching coach, has always been hard on me because she wants me to succeed, but she also has a fun side to her. She always makes fun of me and can always can think of something new. After my last pitching lesson, I realized something.

As a previous successful high school softball player, Alexis knows a great deal about softball and even more about pitching. As my pitching coach, I look up to her, or as I like to make fun of her for, I look down at her for being short. But every time I see Alexis, I’m always inspired by her. She has the same background story as me, so we have a lot in common and I hope I can accomplish as much as she did in her high school years.

Last month, I had a pitching lesson with Alexis inside. I was pitching well, but of course, Alexis thought I could still pitch better. Like usual, I tried my best when she told me to pitch the ball hard.

I also had a lot of distractions. There was another softball practice going on, music blasting, coach’s yelling, people’s eyes watching me pitch the ball, and Alexis staring at me to see what she can make me do better. I put that all to the back of my mind.

I stepped on the mound, took a deep breath, and just like it was the game winning strike, gave it my all. “Good,” replied ¬¬ Alexis. After I got that response, I started talking to Alexis about everything. We talked about my shirt, which said, Legally Blonde, the musical. As I stepped on the mound to pitch another pitch, I hear Alexis whisper to Emily, who is watching me pitch, “She should be a blonde.” Haha, just another one of her making-fun-of-me moments. Even though she was making fun of me I couldn’t stop laughing. “She’s illegally blonde,” proclaimed Alexis a few moments later. After she said that, I cracked up.

“Pitch!” yelled Alexis in a serious, but happy tone.

I wound up into my pitching motion, but started laughing again. Alexis knows once she gets me laughing, it’s hard to get me to stop. Alexis told me, “You’re not allowed to talk.”
After a few more pitches, I started to talk to her. We started talking about my plans to go see the play tonight. After talking too much, I could see that she was starting to get a little frustrated with all my talking.
“You need to focus,” Alexis demanded me in a serious tone.

Next, I was pitching to “fake batters,” where there are imaginary people standing in the batter’s box. I was doing a good job pitching to my imaginary batters. I threw whatever pitches I wanted to. I struck that batter out. Now it was Alexis’s turn to call batters, and that’s what I prefer. She told me to throw a curve ball and then a screw ball. Two easy strikes. Now it was time to throw my waste pitch, so I threw a fastball six inches off the plate. Alexis told me to throw my rise ball, which is my worst pitch. I threw it three times in a row, never getting it to be a strike. To strike the batter out, Alexis called a low outside fastball. I started to pitch, released the ball, and watched the ball hit my dad’s glove. It was a strike, a perfect strike. “Nope,” Alexis smirked in response to my last pitch.

“What are you talking about?” I asked.

“Yes, it was a strike, but it didn’t go where it was supposed to go. So give me ten push-ups.” Earlier we had agreed that if I walked a batter I would do push-ups.

“Alexis…it was a perfect strike.”

“Ten push-ups.”

Alexis was big on push-ups. She tells me she wants me to do them every day to get stronger, so she expects me to have good form. I got down into push-up position and did ten quick push-ups. That wasn’t so bad. Ten push-ups is nothing compared to the sixty I had to do earlier in my conditioning class.

The last five minutes of my pitching lesson, I barely talked and just focused on my pitching. After this day, I learned that I really need to stay focused during my pitching lessons. There will be always be time to talk to Alexis, who I love to talk to. I think it is hilarious when she makes fun of me. I know that Alexis will always be there for me. Even though Alexis is hard on me sometimes, she has an amazing personality. Alexis has been an awesome role model the past three years for me and I hope that I can continue to look up to her. She has helped me so much in my life and made such a difference. Alexis is the kind of person that I will never forget. She has made such an impact on my life. I am very lucky to have such a great person as my pitching coach.