A Home Run (But Not in Baseball)

Even when he was still in diapers, I was convinced my son Max was destined for the “big show” — Major League Baseball. I can still picture my wife’s expression whenever I’d shout, “Did you see that hit?” as he swung a plastic T-ball bat in our backyard. Her response was always the same: a gentle but exasperated reminder that no one in our family had ever shown that level of athletic talent.

But then I read Malcolm Gladwell’s 2008 book Outliers, and everything changed. According to the “10,000-hour rule,” greatness was simply a matter of practice. Ten thousand hours of catching, hitting, and fielding? No problem. I couldn’t wait to see the look on my wife’s face when Max signed his first MLB contract.

So, I threw myself into the plan. Every spring, like clockwork, Max and I headed outside for an hour of daily drills. We dodged dogs, kids on bikes, and the occasional unsuspecting neighbor who wandered into the line of fire. Along the way, Max logged extra hours in batting cages and took lessons from former college players — including Jim Crowley, whose father Terry had played for and even managed the Baltimore Orioles.

By high school, Max was the starting first baseman for the Park School Bruins. The team started out like the Bad News Bears, lingering near the bottom of their division, but with persistence and a lot of heart, they climbed all the way to the Championship Game his senior year.

So when Max sat me down and told me he wouldn’t be playing college baseball, I was stunned. It wasn’t a lack of ability — it was simply that his heart wasn’t in it. And that’s when I learned the real twist in the 10,000-hour rule: practice might build skill, but passion determines the path.

Max’s passion led him somewhere entirely different — to inventing. His first invention can detect trace amounts of peanut contamination in foods, a tool that may one day help prevent life-threatening allergic reactions.

As for me? I haven’t quite given up the baseball dream. I’ve just moved it to the next generation.

My grandkids don’t know it yet, but spring training starts early.

Michael MIller, MD is an Integrative Cardiologist and author of “Heal Your Heart: The Positive Emotions Prescription to Prevent & Reverse Heart Disease”, published by Penguin Random House.