The pigskin vs. the horsehide: Just throwing it out there

Playing catch isn’t always just about throwing a ball back and forth.

Sometimes it has more to do with our connections to people we care about. And about the conversations we have while we’re out in the backyard or at the park.

You knew that, of course. Playing catch didn’t become a cultural classic just because we enjoy tracking the graceful arc and seemingly slow-motion spin of a ball in flight. But here’s a question.

Here at the calendar crossroads of two sports seasons, which better facilitates meaningful conversations: tossing a football around or playing catch with a baseball?

For Bill Reichert, it’s throwing a baseball.

“There is more rhythm in tossing a baseball,” said the project engineer for the federal government’s General Services Administration. “Catching the ball in the mitt, transferring the ball to one’s throwing arm, and subsequently returning the ball.”

Martin Wells agreed. “Playing catch was always mostly for conversation,” said the Lutheran bishop for Eastern Washington and Idaho. “Somehow football throwing didn’t do that.”

Rick Hosmer echoed those sentiments. “Playing catch with a baseball and having a meaningful conversation fits hand in glove,” said the creative director at the Klundt/Hosmer design firm.

But Nicole Duvernay, a math instructor at Spokane Community College, would rather toss a football. For the simple reason that, though she is athletic, she might take her eyes off the ball and would prefer not to be hit in the head with a baseball.

There’s a reason, after all, they sometimes call baseball “hardball.”

Michael Schock, a manager at STCU, shared this.

“From a logistics standpoint, the answer is definitely throwing a football. A football allows conversation and thought to develop as the ball is arced through the sky at a low rate of speed. Also, it many times encourages mimicking the act of going under center or at the very least taking a five-step drop to view the field before finding the open man. All this can help the flow of conversation.”

So how to settle this? A baseball or a football?

Tiffiny Santos, a third-grade teacher at Spokane’s Westview Elementary School, asked 25 of her students which they would choose to throw with a parent or grandparent.

Twelve boys and girls said they would prefer to play catch with a baseball.

Ten would choose throwing a football.

Three opted for neither.

Of course, those are not the only options for activities that allow for outdoor heart-to-heart talks.

Diane Stutzman, a botanist, said two things she has found to be conducive to important conversation are long walks and riding a chairlift up a ski hill.

Pub owner Tim O’Doherty is the son of a high school football coach. He has a loyalty to tossing a football around. But he remembers that nothing brought out the secrets, stories and advice quite like a game of horseshoes. “My dad and his brothers would play horseshoes while solving both the problems of the country and the Catholic Church. Later, when I got older, my dad would spot me 15 points and still beat me to 21. Meanwhile we would talk about what was going on in our lives.”

That last part, that’s what can elevate playing catch to a special status.

Spokane lawyer J. Scott Miller did not play catch with his father. But he sought to make that connection with his own children.

“When our kids were growing up I wanted to give them the experience of playing catch even though I was pretty terrible at it. We tried footballs but it was almost impossible for young kids to throw one accurately and it was an exercise in frustration. We tried baseballs, which was better but still not great. We settled on playing H-O-R-S-E at our neighbor’s basketball hoop.”

For John Petrofski, a retired insurance claims adjuster who recently has faced serious health issues, nothing beats fishing when it comes to talking about the stuff that matters.

And, for what it’s worth, software engineer Mike Almond said tossing a Frisbee is absolutely the worst for sustaining a conversation.

But is the idea of there being some sort of social magic about playing catch really more myth than reality?

Depends on who you ask.

“Memories of the hours I spent playing catch with my dad are some of the fondest from my childhood,” said Marya Hammer, a credit union manager. “So when I got married in 2008, I wanted to pay homage to those hours well spent and scheduled in 15 minutes to play catch, a surprise to him. As it happened, time got away from me on my wedding day, and I just didn’t prioritize those 15 minutes.”

That’s not the end of her story.

“Unbeknownst to me, my dad had seen my schedule for the wedding day, and as we walked into brunch at my parents’ house the next morning he tossed me my baseball mitt and we went outside to throw the ball around. We talked about Dave Niehaus and the 1995 Seattle Mariners season, keeping your eye on the ball even when it’s heading straight for your face, and all the fun we’d had the day before. It was just like old times. And as is often the case for parents, it turns out those hours spent playing catch with me were some of his fondest, too.”

Not everyone loves it, though.

For some who grew up in poverty or with an absent parent, it was never a part of their life.

Another reason it is not a universal touchstone might be some people did not grow up playing sports and simply don’t throw with an easy, fluid motion. For them, the activity is not enjoyable.

Perhaps a little coaching might help.

“I think the biggest misconception regarding throwing is that people believe it is only done with the arm,” said Dan Ramsay, head baseball coach at Whitworth University. “I think the biggest mistake non-athletes make is they attempt to make a throw without engaging the rest of their body, like using their lower half.”

What about passing a football? Analysis of the throwing motion can get pretty technical. But what advice would former NFL quarterback and Super Bowl MVP Mark Rypien give someone tossing it back and forth in the backyard?

Relax, he said. “You don’t have to throw a perfect spiral.”

But even if you have no intention of picking up a football or grabbing your glove and heading outside to toss a baseball this weekend, memories might linger.

“I remember very fondly playing catch with my dad back in the early 1960s in our backyard,” said Donivan Johnson, K-12 music instructor for the Selkirk School District in northeast Washington. “He was a welder all his life who worked six days a week. But every Sunday, after church, was our time for throwing the baseball and talking.”

Even those who have not chucked it around in years might recall the feel and signature sound of a baseball snapping into a pliant leather glove. Or of a zipped football burrowing into your waiting arms.

When the University of Idaho’s Sharon Stoll was about 10, she would play catch with her older brother and he would tell her what to watch out for in future interactions with boys.

“I think those kind of conversations can happen because the activity relaxes you,” said the professor of physical education and director of the sports-focused Center for ETHICS.

There is, of course, a reason old baseball movies from “Field of Dreams” to “The Natural” end with virtually sepia-toned scenes of fathers and sons playing catch. There is an emotional resonance about the real thing that cannot be denied.

Which is not to say tossing a football hasn’t had its moments in our collective psyche.

In countless American families, few remember-when stories trigger affectionate laughter more reliably than reminding a younger sibling of a time he or she was sent on a very special kind of fool’s errand.

“Go long.”

Baseball? Football? Maybe what you throw doesn’t really matter as much as what the two of you find to talk about.

And your athletic ability? That probably doesn’t matter much either.

A good heart beats a good arm every time.