By Alex Barnett
Published in Law360 on January 23, 2025. © Copyright 2025, Portfolio Media, Inc., publisher of Law360. Reprinted here with permission.
In this Expert Analysis series, attorneys discuss how their unusual extracurricular activities enhance professional development, providing insights and pointers that translate to the office, courtroom and beyond. If you have a hobby you would like to write about, email [email protected].
“No, run him back to third base, don’t throw —”
But before I finish that sentence, the pitcher throws the ball over the third baseman’s head, the ball soars into left field, another run scores, the runner on first advances to third, the inning continues, and I hang my head, muttering epithets.
Then, I look up and watch as the left fielder throws the ball back in, missing the cutoff man. The ball bounces, then rolls until it comes to a stop against the opposing team’s dugout. The runner on third scores easily on this overthrow. As he crosses the plate, he is greeted with cheers and pats on the back — like a conquering hero, like someone who hit a grand slam. The reality: He simply took advantage of my team’s sheer and utter inability to do the little things.
The bases cleared and the damage done, I shake my head, hoping to erase from my mind what I just saw. Alas, no such luck. I take a deep breath as I watch the pitcher collect the ball and head back to the mound to face the next batter.
I steal a look at my watch and see that it’s just 9 a.m. Did I really cut my sleep short, my precious Saturday morning sleep, to get out of bed for this — to witness this … this disaster movie masquerading as a baseball game?
Yes. Yes, I did, because I’m a Little League Baseball coach. And while watching poorly played baseball early in the morning doesn’t sound like a good time, I love it. I wouldn’t give it up for anything. And, even as it has spiked my blood pressure, it’s an experience that has taught me valuable lessons that have helped me grow as a person and as a lawyer.
Mistakes get made.
Human beings are fallible. No one is perfect — not even you or me (especially me). In baseball — Little League Baseball especially — as in the practice of law, mistakes get made.
We’re not talking a small error that no one will notice. This is not wearing one blue sock and one black sock. No, the mistakes in Little League Baseball — like the mistakes in law — tend to be noticeable, and to have immediate and serious consequences.
And, almost to prove my point, our pitcher, stubbornly insisting on throwing his knuckle-curve — which doesn’t knuckle or curve, but floats like an escaped helium balloon — sails his next pitch over the batter’s head to the backstop for ball four, issuing yet another walk.
If he were an associate at my firm, it would be as if he wrote his brief in Klingon despite my admonitions to just write the thing in clear, declarative English.
Getting angry doesn’t help.
I feel the volcanic tide rising in me. In my head, I’m inventing a whole new lexicon of expletives, ones that are so rich in imagery, I’m sure to win a Pulitzer. That’s when I remember that getting angry doesn’t help at all. It feels good in the moment, but anger — white-hot, pound-the-table, cursing till you run out of breath anger — doesn’t really accomplish anything.
It’s not going to fix the incorrect citation in the brief that got filed. It’s not going to bring back the “reply all” email with privileged information that absolutely and definitely wasn’t meant for all. And it’s not going to stop our pitcher from throwing his mind-of-its-own, gravity-defying, drunken bumblebee of a breaking pitch.
I’m also sure that if this kid were 20 years older, it wouldn’t get him to stop writing in Klingon.
Accept the world as it is, not as you’d like it to be.
Anger is an indulgence, a guilty pleasure. But it’s not what’s called for. Anger can be satisfying, momentarily, but in and of itself, it accomplishes nothing. Rather, the moment calls for reason, objectivity and a measured response.
Easier said than done.
To do that — to move past anger, to find the solution — you need to have a clear mind, unclenched fists and blood pressure that’s not in the red zone. How do you get there?
It’s important to accept reality. The past is the past. Rewinds and do-overs are not possible. The mistake is made and cannot be undone. That citation in the brief is wrong. That email really did get sent to everyone. Our pitcher did just walk yet another batter — maybe the 10th walk in two innings. That’s reality.
Now what?
Understand the consequences.
It’s important to ascertain the consequences of the mistake. Is this a trivial error, or is it a big deal? Is that citation incorrect simply because there’s a typo in the case name? Or, is it incorrect because someone forgot to Shepardize, and it turns out your whole brief has been premised upon authority that was vacated and reversed … when Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. was still on the U.S. Supreme Court?
Likewise, is that reply all email devoid of any information of substance, such that the sending of it is merely embarrassing? Or was it chockablock full of case strategy, and you just handed the other side the playbook to destroy you?
I reflect upon this, as I watch our pitcher — facing a full count with the bases loaded — throw another one of his patented moon-scraping curveballs for ball four, and walk in another run, leaving our team 10 runs in the hole. No, he didn’t accidentally press the “Launch” button at NORAD, but this wasn’t a little mistake either, especially when you consider our team seems to view scoring runs as merely aspirational and not something that you actually do.
Have compassion.
Once you’ve assessed the ramifications of a mistake, it’s now time to formulate the response — the correction to make, ideally by the person who made the mistake. It’s important at this juncture to remember that the mistake-maker very likely knows they made the mistake, and they likely feel bad about it — perhaps worse than you. Unless, of course, it was you who made the mistake, in which case you feel exactly as bad as you do.
Accordingly, a measure of compassion is called for. This doesn’t mean you must coddle the mistake-maker, but hand-waving or name-calling are not necessary or appropriate, and are unlikely to elicit the response you want. If anything, such negative reactions may cause an equally hostile and defensive reaction from the mistake-maker. They might double down.
So, as I turn to the umpires and ask for “time” and walk to the mound, I’m formulating what I should say to our pitcher. I see from his hangdog expression that he feels bad. He knows he just walked in another run and let the team down. He knows that this was a direct result of throwing another strike zone-phobic curveball when a fastball was called for. And he knows that our team is as likely to overcome the 10-run deficit as they are to overcome their addiction to video games.
Also, he’s 12, and I’m in my 50s. I need to remember that he doesn’t have a lifetime of experiences. He doesn’t have the archive of lessons learned from previous mistakes made. For example, I think, as I approach him, he doesn’t seem to realize that the shoelaces on his cleats are untied, and if he leaves them that way, he almost assuredly will trip and fall, likely mid-pitch, which will result in another costly walked-in run.
I think all this as I approach the mound to speak with him. Thus, while I want to let fly with expletives, I don’t. I take a deep breath, advise him to take one as well. And then, in a calm and measured manner, I look him in the eye, tell him that I have confidence in him and that he should have some in himself, and that if he’ll just throw his fastball — which is actually pretty good — three times in a row, we’ll likely get a strikeout for a third out. Then, we’ll be able to exit the field before he and his teammates have been in the field so long they’re old enough to shave and drive.
He nods and says: “Got you coach.” I turn to go back to the dugout, feeling good that I handled that encounter maturely and appropriately, and praying to the heavens above that the kid will heed my counsel.
Coincidentally, days later, I was working with a more junior attorney who had made a mistake. As I prepared to have a discussion with them, I reminded myself that they were trying, they wanted to do well and they had 30 years less experience than I do. And, while their dad wasn’t watching from the bleachers, I still remembered that compassion and constructive criticism were the way to go.
The umpires are wrong — a lot — but they’re the umpires.
Having spoken with our pitcher and having walked back to our dugout, I watched with renewed hope that our pitcher would fire the three fastballs we needed to get us out of the inning. To his credit, he threw fastballs. But a couple were just outside the strike zone, so now it was three and two — a full count — and the bases were still loaded.
“You got this. One more, right down the pipe,” I shouted to our pitcher, offering a fist pump for extra encouragement. He nodded, toed the mound and delivered the ball. “Ball four,” the umpire said, pointing the batter to first base.
“What?!” I exploded.
The umpire looked at me and gestured that the pitch was outside and low — which, it wasn’t, unless one viewed it through the ump’s myopic eyeballs.
As I stood there, wondering about channeling the late Earl Weaver by charging home plate, turning my cap backwards and yelling in the umpire’s face as I kicked dirt on his pants, I remembered one of the truisms of Little League Baseball (which doesn’t have video replay) — the umpires aren’t always right, but they are always the last word.
Likewise, in law, as we litigators know, the judge isn’t always right, but they are the last word. Yes, our system of justice does provide for appeals (OK, so it’s not a perfect analogy), but it still is worth bearing in mind that when playing baseball, or practicing law, you have to understand and accept that sometimes the person calling the balls and strikes is not going to see it your way — even if you’re right and they’re absolutely wrong.
Get comfortable with lack of control.
Grudgingly accepting the umpire’s call, I took a deep breath and resumed my focus on the game. To my pleasant surprise, our pitcher struck out the next batter, and our team was able to come in from the field for their turn at bat. It wasn’t great, and they quickly headed back to the field for more punishment.
Ultimately, we wound up scratching out a few runs. But, in the end, we came up short — well short.
As my son — our team’s first baseman — and I walked up the hill, I thought about how much I wished I could’ve put on a uniform and played for our team. Yes, I’m 57, so it would’ve been against the rules — and ridiculous. But I was a good high school player (some 40 years ago), and maybe I could’ve helped, at least a bit.
But then I realized that’s the whole point — I’m the coach, not the player. I’m the elder statesman (which is horrifying to me) supposedly imparting wisdom. As coach, I must accept that so much of the game is out of my control. I can talk and encourage and demonstrate. I can cheer and clap and move the players this way and that from pitch to pitch, but in the end, it’s up to them to play the game. In short, the game — my players, the other players, the opposing coach, the umpires, the bounces of the ball, the weather — they are all out of my control.
So, too, in practicing law, we must remember that no matter what we’ve done and what we do, so much of the case is out of our control. All we can do is our best. So, no, our team did not have a winning record this season, but being a Little League Baseball coach definitely makes me a better lawyer.