Hey Powell, are you ready?     
     It was Sunday, July 7, 1985, I will never forget that day. Inside Busch Stadium in St. Louis, MO, the temperature was more than 102 degrees on the Astroturf. Our usual player chatter was interrupted when the bullpen phone rang, then I heard coach say, “Powell get ready.” I grabbed my glove, chugged a cup of water, and hustled to the mound to start warming up. Before long, my heart was pumping as if I had just received a shot of adrenaline. I did not know if it was fear or excitement. Moments after I had thrown about twenty pitches, the phone rang simultaneously to coach hollering,   
     “Are you ready?”       
     “Just a few more!” I nervously replied.     
       It had taken some time, but all the instructions my prior coaches had voiced and demonstrated had become evident with my rapid climb through the minors. They themselves had undergone a lot of training to enjoy the benefits, privileges, and honor that come from being a coach and seeing their work mature through my development and promotion. 
       After relaying my response to the manager, he quickly signaled the catcher from the dugout, prompting him to walk out to the mound where he stood casually talking, and stalling until the umpire came out and broke up the meeting.     
       As everyone headed back to their positions, the manager’s head popped up out of the dugout, and he started towards the mound. Then my bullpen coach uttered those words every rookie wants to hear, “You’re in kid.” The current pitcher was relieved after throwing his warm-up pitches to start the bottom of the seventh. That short delay gave me just enough time to mentally prepare myself. It was the day I would pitch in my first major league game for the Los Angeles Dodgers. I had been in the minors for two short seasons grooming for this moment. I was ready.         
      That debut had all the similarities to the day of my birth, except my parents didn’t have the luxury of signaling the doctor to stall my delivery. Ready or not, the time for me to make my entrance into the world had come. I arrived just like all the other babies, technically a rookie, innocent, ignorant, and crying. Once all the newborn excitement between my parents faded, the duty of gradually teaching the rules of society fell squarely on the shoulders of my father—my coach for life.  
       For any little boy, his father is the ultimate role model, and mine was no different. …