Struck out with bases loaded, down by 3 on a full count in HS baseball to end the game. Dude threw me 6 straight curve balls...went down swinging. Basically ended my HS baseball days.
I think I've posted this here before, but for me it was playing softball filling in on a friends team as I occasionally did.... Mind you, we had no jerseys nor did the other team in any real capacity. We had a man on first, I'm up, and I cranked one to the fence. I rounded first, and saw what I thought was our base runner standing on second looking out towards center for the ball, with what I thought was the second baseman to his left. I'm like "GOOOOO, WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING" and was bouncing just off of first but not getting too far in order to not get thrown out since our base runner was clogging up bases looking for the ball. So, while I'm watching him and watching them field the ball during what should have been a triple, our "base runner" turns a bit and I see his glove on his left hand had been hidden from my sight. Our runner had already rounded third by the time I started looking, and scored while I was jockeying for position on my spectacular single. An entire field of people were yelling and then just all looked wide eyed at me like wtf. The first baseman looked at me and says "You thought he was on your team, didn't you?" I was relieved that anyone had a clue why I did something so ridiculous. It sucked. I've felt silly playing sports before, but this took the cake. This was out at Papa Blakley's in Katy, and I soon evacuated from softball.
Played tennis growing up and a little in college before I had to put it to the side to focus on school...Junior year of high school during the state championships, I played a guy that was ranked in the top 5 in Texas. Thought I would be able to at least hang with him, but deep down, I felt like I could pull off a win...but he beat me 6-1, 6-0. His serves were clocked at over 130 mph. Never been so dominated in my life, and it was in front of a crowd of about 1500 people and a bunch of scouts from big colleges. It's been 17 years and I still replay that match in my head, and the details are so vivid, that I feel like it happened yesterday.
Probably cause of the competition, no? Never heard of anyone spraining anything after a spelling bee. :grin:
A couple of...cough...humbling moments for me: 1.) Soccer - was a good soccer player and played multiple positions well growing up (goalie, halfback, and center-forward) but one game the ball was coming at me in a straight line on the ground when I was playing halfback, I wound up to kick it with everything I had, and I missed and fell right on my bum. I was so embarrassed. 2.) Soccer - tied and went to overtime in a playoff game for the championship. I was up to kick the first penalty kick and my kick sailed over the goal post. I cried my eyes out afterward. We ended up losing. It was for the championship. Also, I had scored the winning goal previously during regulation but one of our players was off-sides and it didn't count. 3.) Baseball - was thrown out running to first on a play and flipped my helmet as I crossed knowing I was called out. unfortunately, my helmet hit the first baseman when I flipped it and I was thrown out of the game. I was humiliated even though it was unintentional but they made it seem like I did it on purpose or something. Disqualified for poor sportsmanship. I still remember leaving the field and going behind the home plate net with this blank stare on my face like WTF just happened? 4.) Gold Rush - Leader of the settlers on a simulated stupid gold rush game in the 5th grade...like we were crossing the plains to get to California and the gold (yes we were all dressed up as the parts and had wagons, etc.). We had to make it to the gold and not be slaughtered by the Indians. Of course, it was set up where Indians would attack us and our defense was to circle our wagons. We were slaughtered after making a run for it in a last ditch attempt to get to the gold and unable to round up our wagons in a circle in time to fend off the attack. Such BS. I got screwed by some rule I remember in this game and we had no choice but to make a run for it at the end of the trail. Oh so close to the gold. lol. I think I'm on some plaque somewhere at my old elementary school for leading my settlers to slaughter. It sucks when you have those memories as a kid as they scar you and you don't forget them.
As a kid: Not making the 8th grade basketball team. As an adult: One day I was mountain biking and I had been riding 5 or 6 days a week and I was in the best aerobic shape of my life. I'm riding up Mt Tam, just north of San Francisco, and I'm over half way to the top of the mountain, and I've probably passed 25 people an nobody has passed me. I'm all proud of myself and thinking I should start racing. Then, some girl passes me like I'm standing still and crushes my ego. A little while later I get to a spot where lots of people stop to rest and someone asks me if I saw Paola Pezzo on my way up. (She's an olympic gold medalist mountain biker). So, that made me feel better, but not so much better that I ever started racing.
Not really sports related, but I was walking down the street when paulftk looked at me and immediately broke my ankles.
I walked on to my college swim team. Went to swim vs Air Force. Had a panic attack in the middle of the 200 breast. Most humbling moment was when I realized I cared enough about swimming to have a panic attack while swimming. Oh yeah I sucked at swimming too.
Mine aren't too bad but here they are: 1. First time playing Cricket for my primary school. I was rubbish at it but didnt know or care, I was only about 8. Went out to bat, smashed the first ball I faced straight up in the air. Easy catch. That sucked! 2. First day of high school in year 9. Me and my mates were kicking a footy around while the grade lined up for what ever the hell we were lining up for. We were kicking the football really high and catching it. Anyway the ball went up, I was determined to catch it. Kept my eye on the ball, BOOM, smashed into a raised garbage can that was cemented into the ground. Caught the ball at the same time. It didnt hurt but it was pretty funny. :grin: 3. My and my mates in highschool started playing golf (very badly) in about year 10. We were crap! Anyway there was a big line on the first tee and I stepped up to tee off. Swing and a miss. Swing and a miss. Swing and a miss. I picked my ball up and ended up teeing off at the second hole. Embarrassing but very funny too. :grin:
Running cross country first meet ever was UH Invitational. Not sure how it is today but back in the late 90s Kingwood was one of the best HS in the nation in CC. So I line up and think you know what screw it I'm just going to sprint as fast as I can and just try and stay up with the leaders for at least a little while. Come to find out really really good distance runners can basically sprint the entire 5k and do so faster than I can! I ended up with godawful cramps and basically limped the entire race to the finish. I ran marathons later and my first ever was a 3:40 and I took second place in my age group. Feeling pretty good I trained at high elevations I decided to run a race in Arizona at a lower elevation. I trained like crazy, bought a special watch for tracking pace, etc. etc. and had it all planned out to get down to 3:10 and qualify for Boston. Morning of the race the first 10 miles or so are fine and then out of nowhere I get massive charlie horses in my quads. I literally just hit the ground and have to massage them out. I have walk have limp to the finish line and end up at like 4:50 or something.
Just after finishing high school we'd play in a weekend rec league. We had a team of handicapped & Down syndrome players there as well that played against 'able bodied' teams...they were allowed one 'able bodied' player & I put my hand up. At first it was out of pure selfishness as I wanted more court time...but during a time out in one of the games an opposing player came over to me & said, 'aren't you embarrassed to be playing with a bunch of r****ds on a r****d team?' From that moment on I swore that we'd win this game and that they'd be beat by this team of 'r****ds'. I remember the ref letting me get away with a few illegal screens, and even shoulder charging a guy out of bounds when he tried to block a 5'3" kid with Down syndrome...I mean who does that kind of heartless crap? To cut a Long story short, I think I dropped 38 odd points, blocked a ton of shots & got the game within two...as I'm dribbling up to take the last shot to tie, they pack in the lane so I raise up for a 3 and have it tipped from behind out of bounds...ref missed it...I lost the plot...threw a few chairs...they won. As I'm taking a knee out there on mid court I here our team cheering like they've just won the lottery. I say 'we lost, why are all of you so happy?' One of the guys comes up with the score sheet and says...'No look, we all won!' What he meant was they each scored a basket, some of them for the first time in their lives. I can honestly say that I was truly humbled at that point. I stayed on with the team for two seasons and even coached a few of them...one guy Andrew was 7'2" but just loved to launch 3's because he didn't like contact. I told him 3 shots in the paint & you get 2 shots from 3. I'm listed as 6'2" 213lbs G/F...I had mad hops in my youth. I loved to play the post.
When I was in my 20's and worked for Enterprise Rent a Car, we had an annual basketball tournament. Me and some friends decided to put together a team. We thought we were pretty good....until we played the team from downtown full of AAU players. I got dunked on 3 times. We ended up having to forfeit because we literally couldn't keep up with their running game. It turned into a dunking exhibition for the other team... All their girlfriends were laughing at us when the refs finally called the game.....
After watching paulftsk's quick release free throw, I realized I have no chance in basketball and gave up
Its funny how many of these stories are about Golf. People just don't realize how stinkin' hard that game is to play.
