Monday, August 14, 2023

What would a rabbi do?

"Charlie Lau was my hitting coach in 1974. At the time I was hitting .200 with 200 at bats at the all-star break. He put his arm around me and he said, "George I think you got a chance to hit but you're gonna have to change a few things." I said, "Well what do you have in mind?" And he said, "Well I'll tell you what. We have two days off for the all-star break. We have practice at 5 o'clock on Wednesday and then when we're going to jump on a plane and fly to Baltimore. Why don't you meet me at the stadium at 2 o'clock and we'll sit down and we'll discuss it and we'll try to figure out a philosophy and a theory that will work for you. Well we got out there and we looked at video of players that he's helped before and other players that maybe he wanted me to model myself after. And we started to take batting practice. Everyday that I think as long as Charlie Lau was our hitting coach, he and I had extra batting practice. 3 o'clock on the road and 4 o'clock at home. Some days it was for 5 swings, 10 swings, just to make sure you didn't lose anything from the day before. And some days might have been for 15, 20 minutes trying to find out what's happened from the night before. But Charlie thank you so much for molding me as a ball player and making today possible."

Baseball player George Brett at his Hall of Fame induction speech talking about Charley Lau, hitting coach for the Kansas City Royals, who help a young George Brett go from a .200 hitter to a career .306 hitter. Lou Piniella, who played for the Royals from 1969 to 1973, called Lau "the greatest batting instructor of them all."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AB1c_SBcMtA, 10:12

With a rabbi you are more likely to hear:

"You are not trying!"

"If you don't change I'm going to throw you out!!"

"The fires of gehennom will fry you!!!"

And if you object to any of that abuse: "Chutzpah!!!!"




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