by Cathy Byrd
“The way he shakes his head back and forth and up and down before throwing the ball is exactly what the Major League pitchers do.”
She further explained that the catcher gives the pitcher a sign as to what pitch to throw, and then the pitcher says yes or no, depending on whether or not he is in agreement with the call.
“I wonder if the Dodgers would ever let a little kid throw a ceremonial first pitch at a game?” she said, pointing to the pitcher’s mound. “That would sure be cute to see that little guy on that big mound.”
Without knowing it, this knowledgeable woman had planted a seed in my mind.
When we arrived back at home, the wheels in my mind were spinning about the woman’s suggestion to have Christian throw a ceremonial first pitch. I went to my computer and searched YouTube to see if a toddler had ever thrown a first pitch at a Major League Baseball game before. I was treated to videos of U.S. Presidents, Hollywood celebrities, and rap stars on the mound, but surprisingly, there were no young kids to be found among the ceremonial-first-pitch hurlers.
Even though YouTube had only been in existence for five years in 2011, it was already a household name, primarily due to Justin Bieber’s historic rise to fame after being “discovered” on YouTube in 2009. I had no interest in having our two-year-old son follow in the footsteps of Justin Bieber, but I figured YouTube might be a good vehicle for getting the attention of whoever it was at the Dodgers’ executive office who was responsible for deciding who gets to throw a first pitch.
I knew our window of time was limited because the main thing that made Christian unique was his early development when it came to hitting and throwing a baseball. Similar to babies who reach milestones like walking or talking earlier than their peers, you can always count on the majority of kids to catch up over time. I had no doubt that the “cuteness” factor would be long gone by the time he was five years old and indistinguishable from any other Little League baseball player.
When Michael got back in town, I told him about my harebrained scheme to have Christian throw a first pitch, and successfully talked him into creating a one-minute montage of the video clips I had shot at Dodger Stadium so we could upload it to YouTube. YouTube was already flooded with videos from proud parents showcasing their children’s every move, so in that regard, the video we uploaded was really nothing special. I wrote the following description under the video:
Our two-year-old son loves baseball and getting to play at Dodger Stadium was the highlight of his life thus far. He insists on wearing cleats, batting gloves, baseball pants and a jersey every day. Nobody in our family ever watched or played baseball so his fascination with the sport came as quite a surprise to us. He went to his first MLB game 3 weeks ago and was lucky enough to get a game ball signed by Matt Kemp. He made up the nickname “Baseball Konrad” for himself when he plays, but his real name is Christian. We have a crazy dream that he might be able to throw a ceremonial first pitch at a Dodger game before he turns three!
I e-mailed the YouTube link to my entire e-mail database, asking them to share the video with their family and friends, hoping the Dodgers would take notice if it racked up a lot of views. In retrospect, my prideful exuberance probably came across as a bit overzealous, but because of the events that were about to unfold, I can’t say that I would take it back if given the chance.
A few days after uploading the video to YouTube, my husband received an e-mail from a woman asking if the boy in the video was his son. She introduced herself as a fellow Horned Frog, a reference to the mascot from his alma mater, Texas Christian University. She said her company, Sports Studio, was desperately trying to locate the little boy in the video for a baseball-playing role in a movie with Adam Sandler.
Because I’d spent the majority of my 43 years on this planet living in Southern California, I had seen all kinds of scams devised to exploit people’s dreams of becoming Hollywood stars. I was sure that we were about to be the victims of some kind of YouTube hoax aimed at overly proud parents. My first question to Michael when he called from Texas to tell me about the e-mail was, “Is she asking for money?” Despite my skepticism, Michael decided to give her a call to request more information. As it turned out, Sports Studio was a legitimate casting agency that used social media websites, like YouTube, to find real-life athletes for sports-specific roles in commercials, television shows, and films. Who knew this was a thing?
“The casting director wants you to send her a video of Christian catching a ball with a baseball glove by the end of the day,” Michael said.
“Michael, you realize he has never done that before, right?”
“How hard can it be?”
Christian had been hitting and throwing balls for over a year, but we always rolled the balls back to him because we assumed he was still too young to catch with a glove. Our little boy was about to have a crash course in catching a baseball. By pure luck I happened to have a tiny glove for left-handed throwers because it was given to me by a girlfriend in a sports-themed gift basket when I was pregnant with Christian. Figuring that the odds of our son being a lefty were slim, I had tried to exchange the glove at three different sporting goods stores prior to his birth. Thankfully none of them had let me return it because, against all odds, Christian ended up being a lefty. Today this little glove would come in handy.
With Michael out of town, I needed a third person to play baseball with Christian so my hands would be free to shoot video clips with my handheld camera. My mom’s boyfriend, Dennis, willingly obliged to meet us at the baseball field at 11 A.M. Dennis was in his element in any sports arena, being an all-around athlete and ex-jock himself.
“What if he can’t catch?” he asked, when we arrived at the field.
“That’s not an option,” I said with a laugh.
Teaching a toddler to catch a baseball is hysterically funny to begin with, but two grown adults acting as if a child catching a ball was the greatest thing they had ever seen must have looked ludicrous. Luckily the only person in the vicinity to witness our shenanigans was the Little League groundskeeper, who was busy mowing the adjacent fields. Although Christian’s catching skills were far from perfect, we were miraculously able to capture a few video clips where the ball actually landed in his glove. As we were getting some video clips of Christian hitting balls with a regular-size bat, the Little League groundskeeper turned off the engine on his large riding mower to watch what we were doing.
“The kid has talent,” he yelled out to us. “Just make sure you keep it fun for him in the years to come.”
We didn’t bother explaining to him why we were taking our baseball video shoot so seriously, but I doubt he would have believed it anyway. I could hardly believe it myself until we boarded the plane to Boston, Massachusetts, two weeks later.
CHAPTER TWO
BABE RUTH WAS MEAN TO YOU?
“Grown men may learn from very little children,
for the hearts of little children are pure, and,
therefore, the Great Spirit may show to them
many things which older people miss.”
BLACK ELK, NATIVE AMERICAN SPIRITUAL LEADER
Our journey to Boston began with a bang when Christian, in terrible-two fashion, refused to let me fasten his seat belt. Witnessing my struggle to strap him into his seat, our gracious flight attendant came over to offer assistance. My son surprised us both when he loudly belted out, “When I was big, I didn’t wear seat belts, and I drank alcohol.” The flight attendant and surrounding passengers broke into laughter, while I did my best to wrangle my little despot into his seat.
“Someday you will be big,” I said, as I held him down with one hand and secured the metal clip with the other, “but you will always wear a seat belt.” I decided to ignore his comment about the alcohol.
Our seatmate, who happened to be a professional soccer player from the Los Angeles–based Chivas USA Major League Soccer team added, “That’s right. Moms always know best.” We were flanked by his te
ammates on all sides, and these young, energetic athletes kept Christian entertained with sports talk until he gently drifted off to sleep.
This was my first time being away from Charlotte, and I was already missing her like crazy, even though I knew she was in good hands with my mom while Michael was in Texas for the week. The production company offered to cover the expense of one adult companion ticket along with Christian’s plane ticket and the cost of an additional plane ticket for Charlotte on such short notice was way more than we could afford. My mom would have her hands full taking care of Charlotte, our two wheaten terriers, and my real estate transactions while we were away, but I had no doubt that she could handle it. After all, she had taught me everything I knew about parenting and selling real estate.
By the time we touched down at Logan International Airport in Boston, it was already well past Christian’s bedtime, yet he had plenty of energy to play baseball in the baggage claim area with our new soccer-player friends. The professional athletes took turns pitching his favorite foam ball to him and chased him around the bases while I conversed with their coach, Robin Fraser. Robin and I had met briefly many years before when he was a player on the U.S. Men’s National Soccer Team, and I was the director of promotional events for the U.S. World Cup ’94 Organizing Committee. As we were preparing to go our separate ways, Robin handed me his business card.
“Definitely let me know if your son ever switches to soccer because we look for kids with passion like that.”
His comment made me wonder if Christian’s baseball obsession was a passing phase or here to stay.
It was nearly 11 P.M. by the time we picked up our rental car and embarked on the three-hour drive to our final destination in Cape Cod where the movie was being filmed. While en route to our hotel in Hyannis Port, I received a call from a production coordinator instructing us to be on the set at 9 A.M. the following day. Knowing that the odds of Christian being able to function on less than eight hours of sleep were slim, I naively asked if we could make his call time a little later. I quickly learned that we were just one small cog in the movie-making machine, and the schedule that had been set long before our arrival was not about to be changed.
I spent the remainder of the drive envisioning every possible thing that could go wrong. Would he be able to catch the ball on cue? Would he be scared by the pressure? Would he completely freak out if they tried to get him out of his baseball uniform and into real clothes? Life with a toddler is always full of surprises, but a lack of sleep is generally a recipe for disaster, and he was about to get considerably less sleep than the 10 hours he needed. The fact that Christian had just sworn off diapers a few weeks prior to our trip added even more uncertainty to the mix.
The only information we had been given about the movie was that Adam Sandler would be playing the role of a deadbeat dad who shows up at his son’s wedding, and Christian was to play a member of the wedding party in a baseball game. Adam Sandler had launched his movie career in the mid-1990s with the very successful mass-appeal comedies Billy Madison and Happy Gilmore. By 2011 Adam had starred in more than 20 movies, many of which he also wrote and produced under the umbrella of his own production company, Happy Madison. His films were not generally critics’ favorites; however, his success at the box office was never in doubt because his films had collectively earned $2.5 billion worldwide at the time.
Coincidentally I was once seated in front of Adam at a Los Angeles Kings’ game in my mid-20s, and had found him to be just as friendly and approachable as he appeared on the big screen. Our paths were about to cross again, and this time we both happened to be in our early 40s and parents of two children around the same ages. It made perfect sense to me that Adam would choose a family-friendly place like Cape Cod to spend his summer doing what he loved—creating movies that make people laugh.
I was bleary-eyed by the time we checked in to our hotel. The graveyard-shift receptionist handed me an envelope with my name on it, and inside was a production schedule for the following day and handwritten instructions to be at the front of the hotel at 8:30 A.M. the following morning to be transported to the movie set. The filming location was listed as “Mini Fenway Park.” Out of curiosity, I asked the night-shift receptionist if he knew where that was. In a thick Boston accent he answered, “Fenway Park is the stadium in Boston where the Red Sox play, but I’ve never heard of no Mini Fenway Park around here.” I didn’t bother inquiring further because I figured we would find out for ourselves in a few short hours.
Prominently placed on the reception counter was a stack of schedules for the summer Cape Cod Baseball League games. I’m not sure if it was my extended glance at the display or Christian’s baseball uniform that prompted the receptionist to say, “You oughta check out a game or two while you’re here. The most talented high school baseball players from all over the country come to the Cape every summer to play ball. I’d bet money that you’ll see some of these kids in the Major Leagues real soon.” Apparently we had just arrived in baseball Heaven, not so much for me, but for Christian.
The next morning, I managed to get my groggy son out of bed, dressed, and fed in time for the 8:30 A.M. pickup. The large, white van was waiting when we walked out and the first person to greet us was a bubbly woman named Lynn, Christian’s “studio teacher.” Lynn explained that her job was to make sure that Christian did not “work” more than two hours per day with a maximum of four hours on the set, as dictated by the Screen Actors Guild child labor laws. Lynn’s peaceful demeanor was exactly what I needed to quell my fears about how the day would go and whether or not Christian would crumble under the pressure of having to perform on cue. I told her about my fear of Christian having a giant meltdown if they tried to get him to change out of his baseball pants, oversize Red Sox jersey, and cleats.
“I’m sure it will work out just fine,” she laughed. I smiled and nodded in agreement, but I wasn’t so sure.
Christian’s eyes lit up when he saw the movie set. It was a pristine baseball field with freshly laid turf and his favorite red dirt, just like the dirt at Dodger Stadium. The production company had obviously spared no expense in building this Little League–size version of a Major League Baseball stadium. Encompassing the outfield was a 30-foot-high green wall adorned with sponsor logos. A replica of a CITGO gas sign had been constructed to peer over the center-field wall, similar to the real Fenway Park, home of the Boston Red Sox. No wonder our hotel receptionist had never heard of Mini Fenway Park. It was an oasis built specifically for a five-minute scene in a Hollywood movie, and it would be torn down as soon as the shoot was over.
We were greeted at the field by an assistant director telling us that this would be a rehearsal day for Christian. Then we were joined by five former collegiate and professional athletes in their 20s and 30s, who were responsible for orchestrating what I had guessed to be a one-million-dollar baseball scene. Christian enthusiastically pulled his baseball glove, bat, and helmet out of his backpack, eager to play ball on this little field of dreams.
A guy who was wearing a baseball glove introduced himself as Mike, one of the owners of Sports Studio. Mike positioned Christian between first base and second base, and told him that his job was to scoop up the ground balls as they rolled to him, and then throw them to the girl, Carri, who was standing on first base. I was already impressed with Carri’s athletic abilities before learning that she was the softball coach at Harvard University. A cameraman filmed the action on the field while I shot videos with my camera to capture the moment. As Christian scooped up ground ball after ground ball, and threw them back with accuracy, Mike yelled with enthusiasm, “There are ten-year-olds that can’t do this!”
A steady flow of people, who appeared to be part of the film production crew, kept filtering in until there was a sizable crowd gathered at the baseball field. All eyes were focused on Christian, and it was obvious that he loved the attention of being center stage. At least one of my fears was put to rest. Mike then instructed a crew me
mber to bring a ladder over to first base so they could film Christian catching balls. They repeated this exercise more than 20 times in a row and, against all odds, Christian caught every fly ball. I breathed a sigh of relief when he passed the test. This was the first time I was told that the role Christian was cast for was originally written with a five- to six-year-old boy in mind. Mike told me they had been holding casting calls in Boston for a few weeks for young baseball players before they came across the YouTube video of Christian playing baseball. They say luck is when preparation meets opportunity, but in this particular case, it was all about timing.
When it was time for Christian to take his required breaks, the studio teacher, Lynn, made her best effort to get him to put down his baseball gear and rest. She quickly learned there was no hope of getting him to eat, rest, or stop playing baseball when he was in Baseball Konrad mode. I let Lynn know that playing baseball could never be considered “work” for Christian and as long as it wasn’t a violation of the Taft-Hartley Act, I was fine with allowing him to continue hitting balls on the sidelines during his breaks. Christian successfully recruited a friendly, unassuming guy named Kevin to pitch balls to him. We discovered that in addition to being a Boston Red Sox fan, Kevin was also a producer on the film and had been a close friend of Adam Sandler’s since their high school days together.
In between pitches, I asked Kevin the big question that had been weighing on my mind ever since I got the call from casting.
“Is there any chance that he will be able to wear his baseball uniform for the actual movie shoot?”
His answer was not what I was hoping to hear.
“Fraid not. Wardrobe will get him set up with clothes and shoes.”
I told Kevin about Christian’s fixation on his baseball uniform and joked, “The trip to the wardrobe department may be the end of his short-lived movie career.”
Kevin shook his head and smiled, “Nah, you see the way he loved the crowds? The boy’s a natural.”