How important is a sacrifice bunt?
I love teaching girls how to sacrifice bunt. I mean I LOVE it. Partly because of the importance in the game, but more importantly because sacrifice is such an important part of life. Which is why it absolutely breaks my heart that in this game I love I see so much incredible sacrifice from parents, and so little from the players.
Performing a sacrifice bunt actually requires very little skill. The only true requirement is a simple desire to sacrifice ones self for another. The ability to bunt or not bunt, is a simple indicator of where the players heart is at. Because at the end of the day, at the end of the season, the most important things are not what can the team or coach do to help you. They are: “Where is your heart?” and “What are you willing to do to help the team?” Because those are the things that will carry you through the rest of your life.
It’s called a “sacrifice bunt” because it is supposed to be a sacrifice. You don’t get the glory, like you do for hitting a home run, because if everyone in the stands jumped up and down and chanted your name then it would be called a “glorified bunt.” The life lesson in the sacrifice bunt, is that it requires your heart to be willing to say “I want my teammate on base to get applauded for scoring the winning run, and I want my other teammate to get the applause for having the winning RBI. I’m willing to take the back seat and perform this seemingly meaningless task and be happy for them because their success means that we win.” If that is what goes through your head, then your heart is in the right place to be a great teammate and my guess is that you put 100% effort into bunting practice. But if your heart isn’t in the right place, then my guess is you really don’t put much effort into bunting practice because you are constantly thinking “Let’s just hurry up and do hitting practice so that I can look good.”
Challenge yourself as players to really examine where your heart is at. Would you want you as a teammate? If you honestly can’t answer yes, then as a player the easiest way to get your heart into the right place, is by starting with “sacrificing” yourself at home first. Seriously! Your tournaments last until after midnight many times throughout the course of the season, yet your uniforms are magically clean and ready to wear when you wake up for the first game of the next day. So when was the last time you put your cell phone down and stopped texting long enough to do the laundry for your mom during the week? When was the last time you closed the lid on the laptop and shut down Facebook long enough to help your little brother/sister with their homework so that mom could go get a mani and pedi?
Hopefully the next time you see a girl lay down a sweet sacrifice bunt, it will transcend the field and the actual act and you’ll get a glimpse of her heart. That’s where I’ll be looking.