SAN ANTONIO — Not football. Not basketball. But it's baseball that the most oddities of any sport we know and love.
"I think baseball is one of the most superstitious sports out there," said Brandeis Broncos Head Coach Austin Jupe.
Take for example the field of play. Some hitters stand in the on deck circle, and some don't. Some coaches stand in the first and third base coaching boxes, and more others never do.
"This is my 39th year and I've never been in there, and I'm not planning on ever getting in there," said Johnson Jaguars Head Coach Gordon Gesell. "I consider it bad luck."
And no player, or team for that matter, is more superstitious when they have winning streaks. Take the Reagan Rattlers right now. They'll stay with what works during practice.
"We lost to Johnson early in the season, and then after that we just starting listening to straight rap," said senior Jimmy Burk. "We started winning games, and we got rolling, and after that we were just straight rap. We won't listen to anything else but rap music."
You gotta go with what works, right? Just one of the baseball superstitions that teams have used for years. Jimmy is more a country music fan as is his head, Chans Chapman. 'He likes the Texas country like I do', said Chapman. 'Whatever they want if we keep winning. I'll listen to whatever.'
And sometimes somebody finds a stick at practice, and then somebody brings some cereal on the bus. And of such, baseball superstitions are born.
"We just thought it was a good idea," said Brandeis Broncos infielder Nycholas Vasquez. The Broncos taped some cereal boxes to their stick, complete with a Wonder Woman cut out.
"You know I just don't ask questions sometimes, and if it is something that the kinds wanna run with, and if it gets them fired up, we just kind of let it go," said Jupe. You never know what baseball players are gonna decide is gonna be worth some good luck, and it must have worked, the Broncos made the playoffs.
"Parents will ask what is wrong with that? What is that for? We just say that it was good luck basically," added Vasquez.
The high school baseball playoffs continue this weekend!
