Parents share heavy load when athletes multi-task

Published 11:36 pm Saturday, June 13, 2009

I don’t know how Miranda Granger and her family do it.

When I was assigned to write the story about three-sport high school athletes and their attempts to navigate all three during the summer, I knew it was a good topic and I knew it was a subject I could write about.

That’s because, to an extent, I understand.

When I began talking to Granger, her parents and her coaches, memories came flooding back from my own summer sports experiences while in high school 20 years ago.

Now, I was no athletic star during my school days. Indeed, I played just one sport in high school. And even if I did play three sports, at that time the idea of summer high school basketball leagues or year-round select soccer teams was foreign.

However, the one sport that was always going full-speed during the summer was baseball. That just happened to be my sport, and once I hit high school my summers became a bit complicated.

For two summers — those following my freshman and sophomore years — I played on two different baseball teams. I played for a North Central (Seattle) Little League senior team for players aged 15 and younger, and I also played for the Northeast Athletics, a Mickey Mantle 16-and-under team made up primarily of players from my high school, Seattle Prep.

And it was a grind. When I was a sophomore I was a swing player in high school. I was a full-time member of the JV team, and when the JV team didn’t have a game I played for — OK, I usually benched for — the varsity. That summer my North Central team won the district title and advanced to the state tournament, and the Athletics also traveled to a number of tournaments. From mid-March through July, I estimate I played in about 80 games.

It was a heavy load, and yet it’s merely a fraction of Granger’s summer schedule. The travel wasn’t anything like Granger’s. There was no criss-crossing the country for me, the furthest I had to go was Vancouver. Plus, I didn’t have to worry about switching gears from one sport to another.

So I understand just how difficult Granger has it, as well as how impressive it is that she seems to pull it off so easily.

But while my summers weren’t nearly as busy, I still remember having my parents race me cross town from one field to another, changing uniforms in the car and making it to the field just in time to take pregame infield. I remember having to set priorities and call coaches to let them know I couldn’t play in a game or games because of conflicts.

I didn’t realize it at the time, but this was all a part of learning responsibility.

But you know who were the real heroes in this story? My parents.

I was a tad young when I began school. As a result I didn’t turn 16 and get my driver’s license until I was a junior in high school. That meant that during these two crazy summers I had to rely on my parents for transportation to and from games.

My parents both worked full time. Yet they found a way to make the time to get me where I needed to be. Even with my high school games, when the team was ferried to and from fields in the school van, my parents made sure they attended almost every game, inconviencing their own schedules to support their son.

It was a challenge for my parents, and they only had one kid to worry about. Gordy and Cheryl Granger, Miranda’s parents, are at a completely different level. In addition to Miranda they have two other children, 12-year-old Makayla and 8-year-old Derek, both of whom are also heavily involved in athletics. While talking to them they told me tales of trying to transport everyone to the correct locations, including one horror story where after a particularly hectic day they met up and realized neither one had the then 5-year-old Derek (he was found playing in his same spot at a field adjacent to on where Miranda was playing).

I guess what I’m saying is that having experienced this on a smaller scale, I appreciate the hard work and sacrifices being put in, not just by Granger but her whole family.

So to the Granger family and all the others out there going through similar circumstances, I salute you. Here’s hoping your schedules manage to remain as untangled as possible.