Have you ever been cut from a team? I haven't.

Has your child ever been cut? Mine have.

I'd much rather have been cut myself than to have seen my children hurt by being cut. Tyler was cut from a select baseball team when he was 10. He was then cut from another one when he was 15. That was tough. But those were also wonderful teaching moments. Lyndsay didn't make the cheerleading team at the University of West Georgia and, as a result, saw her cheerleading career come to an end. That was tough too.

Since high school baseball is right around the corner, lots and lots of kids are about to be cut from that sport. For many, it'll be the first time they've ever been cut from anything. That can be a fairly traumatic event for both the child and the parent. Handled properly, it can be one of the major building blocks in a child's life. However, handled improperly, it could provide a huge stumbling block toward adulthood.

When I was coaching high school baseball, I absolutely dreaded "cut day". I thought about it all year long. My assistants and I would meet in the Fall to discuss the upcoming season and make a list of our returning varsity players. Then we'd start listing kids who hadn't been on the varsity the year before but we could see them making it this season. Every single year that we did this, that initial list was wrong. Every year, some player would come out of nowhere and force us to keep him on the team by the way he performed in tryouts. One year, I even said, "With the tryout this kid has had, with the way he's hustled, if we don't keep him, there's no need to ever hold actual tryouts."

We kept him.

But, as fun as it was to look at kid in the eye and tell him that he'd made the varsity team, that fun didn't outweigh the true stress I'd feel over having to cut a kid. Like I said in the beginning, I've never been cut from a team. So, I have no idea what that personally feels like and, to be frankly honest, I always thought I would have been better on "cut day" if I could actually empathize with the player I just cut. When I cut a kid, I always cut him face to face. I looked the kid in the eye, told him that we had to let him go, and why. Sometimes, there were tears. Other times, anger. But, there was always hurt. Always. No matter if everyone knew the kid had no chance to make it, that kid believed he did. No one tried out for my teams just for the fun of it. I was known and a fairly intimidating coach. So, if anyone tried out for my teams, they were serious about making the team. So, when they didn't make it, they were hurt. I suppose that I could have avoided all of that by just posting a list like some coaches do, but to me, that's cowardly. Look the kid in the eye. Tell him how to get better. Answer all of his questions. Posting a list doesn't help the kid being cut in any way.

The thing about cutting players in baseball is that it's almost completely subjective. Oh sure, you can have the player's running times, how hard he throws the ball, and other measurables. But, outside of that, shaping a team was really just what the coach preferred. Let me assure you of one thing, if you are that parent who is known to be...umm, challenging to deal with, and your child is on the bubble to get cut, more often than not, he's cut. I got one of my school players on an elite select team, but later on his dad acted like a complete idiot before that select season started. Guess what? That kid got cut. Coaches don't want to deal with that sort of drama. So parents, you can absolutely cost your child a spot on the team, a scholarship offer, or any other recognition by acting the fool. Be careful.

Anyway, most often the player thought I was in the wrong to cut him. If I'm being completely open, I've made the mistake of keeping more boarderline kids instead of just cutting them. Practically every single time I kept a kid who was on the bubble, I lived to regret it. The kid would pout if he wasn't getting the playing time he thought he deserved or the parent would become a huge problem in the stands...over playing time, usually...and it would have just been better if I had employed the "rip it off like a band-aid" theory and cut him on "cut day".

But back to the actual experience of being cut. I suppose every coach and parent has heard the "Michael Jordan was cut from his high school basketball team" story and used it when trying to encourage a kid who just got cut. That story isn't entirely accurate as Jordan didn't make the team as a sophomore. It's not like he was cut his senior year and wasn't ever going to play again. But, it's a good story to use when encouraging a kid to keep on pressing towards his dream. I didn't put a particularly talented freshman on the varsity team one year...and I got some push back over it...but: 1.) my team won the state that year, so I obviously had the right guys on the team and 2.) that player didn't quit pursuing his dream, got over the disappointment, used it as motivation and recently signed a scholarship with his dream school.

But what if the kid is truly a bad baseball player? Those exist, you know? I recently read a book titled "Shoe Dog". In it, the author described one of the most painful and disappointing days of his life: the day he was cut from his high school baseball team. As a person who has cut kids from their high school baseball teams, reading the author's account of his despair made me uncomfortable. I didn't want to factor into a kid's life that way...but I was certain that I had. But, the best part of that story, or one of the best parts, was what came next. After moving past the disappointment of getting cut, the kid went out for track. As it turns out, he was pretty good at it too. Eventually, he got a track scholarship to the University of Oregon. While there, he ran for a legendary and revolutionary track coach. That coach was always tinkering around with shoes and trying to make them better so his athletes could run faster. That interested the kid. Eventually, the kid opened up his own company and started selling track shoes. He's been moderately successful. You've probably heard of him. His name is Phil Knight. His company is Nike.

Today, he's worth about $25 billion dollars.

But, consider this: what if he'd have made his high school baseball team? Would we have Nikes? Air Jordans? "Just do it."?

Of course, we'll never know.

But soon, there will be hundreds or thousands of boys feeling the same disappointment that Phil Knight felt when he got cut. Make no mistake, cuts are coming...and they hurt. If you're that player who gets cut, it's not the end of the world. You can be another Phil Knight. Look for your calling. Look for your destiny.

If you're the parent of one who gets cut, handle it positively. POSITIVELY.

This past summer, I read a book called "Living Forward". In it, the author talks about when bad things happen. He says,

"One of the best things you can ask yourself when something negative happens is this:

What does this experience make possible?"

Do you know what? He's right. That's a whole different perspective on things and, as he says, that question can change everything if you'll let it.