I was in a crowded coffee shop on Lexington Ave. the other afternoon standing behind a small guy who resembled a bowling ball. He had a cup of coffee in one hand and a cell phone in the other, and he was so loud that the whole place was his audience.

"Michelle knows that Glen isn't a very good player," the guy was shouting. "But he has fun just being on the team. It's okay."

Now he was listening, taking a sip from his cup.

"Well, I'll try and get him in Saturday's game," he said. "We're playing the Cubs, and I know, Ronnie told me, a couple of his best players aren't going to be there. Gone for Easter or something."

Listening again, drinking some more.

"Really? And how did Gary look pitching? He had a rough outing last Saturday. I'm going to have to work with him. He's a big kid for 12, good mechanics."

The guy looked like he'd have trouble catching a cold, never mind a fly ball. He reminded me of every creep I've ever met who never played a single inning growing up, but by the time he has a kid of his own in Little League he thinks he's Joe Torre. And it is indeed that time of year again, when kids are trying to have fun and too many parents are in the way.

Baseball, in addition to being our best game, is also the simplest. Throw the ball. Hit the ball. Catch the ball. That's about it.

And when kids between the ages of 8 and 12 are playing, the rules of the game are even simpler: Have fun, don't forget your glove and pick up a Popsicle on the way home.

Any confusion, anger or tension that accompanies Little League is driven by adults. And it usually begins just as spring starts, when coaches in each district, each little town and every suburban enclave get together to select players for their teams. A lot of these guys act more demented than pro football coaches - a genuinely insane group - do on NFL draft day.

Some of them spend months checking kids out. Some others tell kids with above-average ability to skip indoor tryouts during March so other coaches won't find out about them. We're talking about 10- and 11-year-olds here.

In their desire to win, they forget the only real hard and fast rule to remember about a Little League draft: Pass on any kid with jerks for parents. It doesn't matter if they have Soriano-like skills; if his father is one of those dopes who is always in a coach's face about how his son ought to bat third and pitch because he's the best, skip down the list. It's not worth the aggravation.

I have seen fathers get in fistfights with their kid's coach. I have seen adults screaming over a game just played while their kids wait for them at the ice cream truck. Once, I witnessed a coach get tossed by the ump, a 16-year-old high school junior, and then get so angry that the cops came and arrested him on the field right in front of his 12-year-old son, who happened to be at bat when the incident began. Talk about a great family moment.

Some grownups forget that the world is filled with people who peak at 12. Get a kid who can throw 65 mph and put him on a mound 45 feet from the plate, and he looks like Roger Clemens. Twelve months later, everyone else has grown a few inches, gotten stronger, faster, quicker with the bat. The diamond is bigger and the kid's baseball career is a memory.

That's why it's important to relax and enjoy the moment. Especially now. We've just endured a war. Some fine young people have been killed. The shadow of terrorism and its enormous impact cling to us still. And will for years to come.

The days are getting longer. The sun a little warmer. There's not a better sight in the land than a bunch of kids playing baseball on a bright green field. Sure, there's a reason why they keep score, and winning is indeed nice, but one of the reasons baseball is our best game is that it teaches a player how to lose. If kids don't figure out how to handle a loss, they might end up going through life acting like sore winners.

The fellow in the coffee shop was barely able to handle the cup and the cell phone he held in his hands. From the one-sided conversation I heard, he resembled the ultimate Little League nightmare: a guy living out his failed athletic past through a bunch of 12-year-olds who are only looking to have a good time.

The reality is that the kids know something about baseball that too many adults forget: Just before the first pitch, the umpire says "Play ball" not "Work ball." And those specific words are used for a very good reason: It's only a game.

Originally published on April 19, 2003