Something to be said for old days

Don't get me wrong. It's all well and good to be organized, True, but in some instances things may work out much better by using that old "instant action" method.
Take your present generation where young athletes are organized. Their coaches are organized. The games are organized. The entire wide world of sports is organized. Pro athletes are organized to the extent where they have agents working in their best interests. Too much is not enough.
In our generation, things were much different. We didn't have uniforms, or shiny new spikes, We didn't have new baseballs or a wide array of bats to choose from. Sometimes we didn't even have bases. A new baseball could last a week or longer and some of the bats had been cracked and were taped. Some of the best hits came off the sweet spot of a taped bat. We did have T-shirts and later on a baseball cap which made us proud as peacocks.
There was never a word spoken about what we were going to do that day. We were never organized. There was always something on the horizon.
We didn't have expensive new equipment, or gloves. Sometimes we traded gloves or left our mitt at our position so the guy on the other team could use it, if he didn't have one. There were no Game Boy or X-Box games. We made do with what we had and our days were filled to the brim.
Growing up in Sharpsville had its advantages. There was always something to do and if we couldn't find anything to do, we would invent something. Strange though, everything we attempted seemed to have "sports" written all over it.
One of our favorites was playing fast tennis ball on Pierce Ave. We played right in the middle of the street as there wasn't much traffic in those days. The only problem we encountered was having no backstop.
If the ball got by the catcher, it sometimes rolled down the blacktop to the bottom of Walnut Street. If the ball was hit down the street it rolled forever and when retrieving it you could run into Stewart's Grocery Store for a soda. The store was located on the corner of Ridge and 7th Street. That may be exaggerating things a bit but it seemed that far at times.
Manhole cover
The only equipment we needed was a broom handle and a tennis ball. The broom handle was our bat and it wasn't hard to come up with an old tennis ball. A manhole cover was home-plate and the yellow markings painted by the borough workers served as first and third. Second was usually an old paper plate, a rag or whatever we could come up with. We had teams and played so many innings. I was always on the team opposite the heavy hitters and my tennis shoes were usually worn out from chasing the balls down the street. It seemed that way anyhow.
This fast-pitch tennis ball game usually chewed up several hours and pushed us into the afternoon hours. After running home for lunch, it was now time for the tough stuff, the football game over in Murray's side-yard.
Tough sledding
We had plenty of room for the game, however, the yard was on the side of a hill, If you were coming down the hill, it was all well and good. Running up the hill created some problems. But we always played our football games in Murray's side-yard. It wasn't the best of playing conditions available but it was big enough for our purpose. And the Murray family always welcomed us. Maybe it was because two of their sons, Bill and Fran, were always a part of the game.
Some of us NFL rejects wore helmets while the rest of us substituted curly hair, crew cuts and what have you. Baseball caps would help prevent concussions.
Tough day
And if we weren't too tired following the tennis ball game and the football encounter, we would all gather for a good-old-fashioned King of the Hill encounter in the early evening hours or before the street lights were turned on. A bunch of guys were situated on top of the hill and they tried to prevent any others from making it to the top. And then the sides switched. Oh yes, when the street lights came on, most of us had to head for home. That was our curfew and you had better adhere to it, or else.
On other days we would go three-on-three on the basketball court (driveway) and continue until the last man was standing. Man, those were brutal basketball games. Landing on the playing surface brought out cuts and bruises like you wouldn't believe. Almost as many as the street hockey game we used to participate in. That was another brutal game but one that helped prepare us for the NHL, or so we thought.
Indoor games
On rainy nights, it was off to somebody's home for a more quiet game, like the basketball in a box game, hockey in a box game, baseball in a box game, or the old reliable, Monopoly. Then when it was warm out, we would spend the night on the porch and "sleep out."
There were many other games we played, like Kick the Can, Release and others. We never seemed to have any trouble sleeping at night. I guess it was due to the many full days we encountered while playing our favorite sports games in Good Old Sharpsville.