So lemme tell you this. Baseball is a lot of fun. Even if you’re not playing on a team, or even if you’re not the best, it is still a lot of fun. And anyone can play it, anywhere they want to. But that is the problem, you can play baseball almost anywhere.

My brother Ryan, who you all know by now, grew up playing baseball with all of our friends.

It is no secret that a baseball is hard, and it is hard enough to break glass. Also, hitting a baseball with a bat will not always send the ball into the direction you planned and hoped that it would go.

The problem with Ryan, our friends and I is that we always used our front lawn and my neighbor’s front lawn.

The reason that is a problem is because we have a huge retention pond with all the space in the world to play baseball safely right next to our house. You could almost take batting practice down there. But the front lawn is where we played.

When we were all younger, I invented this game called “the grounder game.” Creative, I know. But it was very intense.

So the point of the game is pretty obvious. There was guy who would hit the grounders, one guy who would field them and the other acted as a first baseman. The goal was to field as many ground balls cleanly and make a good throw to the first baseman in a row. I just want to say that I was the best at this game… or I like to think I was at least.

In reality, Ryan was the better one at the game because he was the third baseman in the family, and I was a pitcher and outfielder when I was growing up. But on this day, Ryan was the less talented one.

It my last column I told you that you have to know your limits. I used the example of Ryan and I going on a bouncy house when we were pretty big kids. This actually happened around the same time. The reason I bring that up is that we were pretty powerful at that age. There is no good reason or logic for us to be in control of a baseball bat in front of two houses.

Thankfully, no houses were injured in the making of this game. That can’t be said for everything though.

So I was up to field my grounders, I was nearing 15 in a row. Ryan was the one hitting them to me. My neighbors had a basketball hoop right behind where the guy fielding was.

Ryan eventually gets a hold of one, and lines this ball from about 50 yards away and hits the ball straight through the backboard. There was a hole the size just larger than a baseball. I don’t think I’ve ever laughed harder, or been more scared.

The backboard was ruined.

The lesson I want you to learn from this is be aware of your surroundings. Anything can happen when you’re not aware. Hitting baseballs in a front yard is not being aware. Take this lesson with for the upcoming break, and I hope your spring break is better than mine.