Padecky: Throwing guru brings big-league expertise to workshop in Healdsburg
HEALDSBURG
“So, why is it,” Tom House asked Friday night, “that when an pro athlete gets on camera and is asked to say hello to his family, he always says ‘Hi, Mom’?”
Seated in the cafeteria at Healdsburg High School, the 15-year boy looked at House a bit befuddled. He didn’t see the question coming. He had signed up for a three-day clinic with House, the guy who works with 28 of the 32 starting quarterbacks in the NFL, the guy who extended Nolan Ryan’s career by eight years, the guy who works with anyone who wants to learn how to properly throw a baseball or a football or probably even a Frisbee without pain.
House teaches throwing. He is the one sought out by athletes, pros and amateurs alike, any sport that requires moving hips and shoulders through space. The seminar had yet to begin Friday when House, 68, engaged in a soft give-and-take with kids and their parents.
It was clear he was warming up the crowd of about 200 with that question. House, a former major league pitcher with a doctorate in sports psychology, wanted the people to know he was more that a verbal data producer and explainer of all things linear and graphic.
“Here’s why,” House said. “A mother (of which they were a few in the audience) will love her son no matter what. Unconditionally. The father on the other hand, and I’ve been guilty of this, will take personally what his son does on the field. If his son makes a mistake, his shoulders will sag. He’ll have that look of disappointment. He might say something.
“That’s why when their son get his first paycheck as a pro, the first thing he buys is a Mercedes for his mother.”
The laughter was loud and solid but a bit nervous to be fair. House was here in Healdsburg over the weekend to show kids - as young as 7, as old as 20 - how to throw a baseball efficiently, how to look at the game as, well, a game. It is point House couldn’t emphasis often enough.
“Kids should have fun with the sport and not begin to take it seriously until they are a sophomore or junior in high school,” House said.
That opinion - to anyone who has spent some time sitting in the stands at youth baseball games in Sonoma County - will be met with a chuckle and a shrug. House knows that.
“I tell parents,” said House who played for Seattle, Atlanta and Boston in the 1970s, “that if they care more about the game than their kid, there’s a disconnect. There’s something wrong. They need to take a step back. They’re ready for their kids to play pro ball but they’re only 12.”
Of course there’s an environment that breeds such expectations.
“I was watching a Little League World Series game,” House said, “and the broadcaster was asking the winning pitcher, ‘So what did you do to set up the hitter?’?”
For cinematic effect House’s jaw dropped and he stared straight at me as if I just told him I had lunch with Big Foot earlier Friday. House even addressed the issue of Little League All-Star teams and how to eliminate the griping and whining that comes from parents who think their Johnny should have made the team.
“Trust the kids, trust the players,” House said. “It’s just as true for Little Leaguers as big leaguers. Kids don’t lie. The kids know (who belongs). They absolutely do. If you ask them, they will tell you who’s the hard workers, who’s the lazy ones. They will tell the ones who care and the ones who won’t. They are very seldom wrong.”
In the course of his three-hour introductory presentation Friday, House spiced the data and the charts and the graphs with humorous anecdotes. Funny, conversational, engaging, House very much displayed the flavor of the game while keeping it real.
“In any one given year there are 6.4 million Little League-aged kids in the world,” House said. “Three years later there are 2.8 million high school-eligible. At the end of high school there are 91,000 college-eligible. At the end of college that are 7,300 minor league-eligible jobs. Then there are only 1,000 jobs every year in the big leagues.
“In other words the odds say no one in this room will play baseball past high school.”
That may read like a buzz-buster. Who wants to be told there’s a ceiling to ambition? Limits? We don’t want no stinkin’ limits. That wasn’t his point. House was telling the crowd not to focus on the Giants or A’s or buying mom the Mercedes. Such obsessions obscure the moment, dilute if not eliminate altogether the very enjoyment of childhood and a sport. Let the kids be kids and, if along the way, an exceptional talent emerges, all the better.
In the meantime play it safe. Start, said House, with a most simple thing when learning how to throw properly.
UPDATED: Please read and follow our commenting policy: