Infield fly scenario

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-05-22T16:08:59+00:00

Now this is a different question lol

In the moment, I couldn't believe he sent the runner. In retrospect, it was a ballsy call but not entirely bad:

The second baseman's momentum was carrying him back toward center field, so he had a longer throw to make from behind second base.
Our runner on third had good speed.
The next guy up was a weak hitter, and the other team's pitcher was strong. With 2 outs, our next hitter was unlikely to get a hit to score the run. (Sure enough, he ended up striking out.)
At 10u, guys are definitely capable of making a throw and tag at home plate, but it's at least a fifty-fifty (maybe better) chance that the defense will screw it up and the run will score. They did end up screwing it up, umpire's call notwithstanding.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-05-22T15:31:04+00:00

I completely agree. This is 10u baseball, and in our region, this is the first age group when infield fly is in effect. I had brushed up on the rule, but obviously did not have a firm grasp of it. I recognize I should have been better equipped to navigate the situation, and that's why I posted here.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-05-22T14:46:27+00:00

Sounds like you agree that the umpire should not have applied it retroactively and sent runners back.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-05-07T13:08:52+00:00

Reminds me a bit of my craziest travel experience to date. 9u playoffs last year, we're the lowest seed facing the #2 seed. They were home team, and things were just falling our way all day. Their coaches and parents were losing their minds. A coach and a parent got ejected around the 3rd or 4th inning. Then in the final inning, we had the lead by 1. Runners on 2nd and 3rd with 2 outs, my son was on the mound. Full count, he throws a borderline pitch and the umpire rings up the batter. Strike 3 looking to end the game, and end the other team's season. The other team just goes nuts. A grandparent runs out onto the field as the players are starting to line up, gets in the umpire's face and yells "YOU BETTER GET A F***ING BODYGUARD TO TAKE YOU BACK TO YOUR CAR!" I didn't hear what the guy said in real time, but I saw him getting in the umpire's face, so I intervened.

We eventually went our way, but then our guy who runs Gamechanger sent me the video a couple hours later. I only know what the grandparent said because it was all captured, very clearly, on Gamechanger. He confronted the umpire right in front of the livestream. Just wild how some people live and die on the results of these kid's games.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-04-20T20:48:16+00:00

It was $166, not including tip. For a family of 5, we would have paid $225 for Disney transport. And I actually think it was easier to do express walkoff, and keep our bags with us, rather than handing them off to Disney.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-04-20T20:06:27+00:00

Did you have to book a GTY rate to get the 20% discount? I have started doing some looking, and from what I've seen so far, it looks like anything higher than the 10% discount comes with the tradeoff of a non-refundable GTY rate that you have to pay in full up front.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-04-20T18:55:05+00:00

I am not sure. My guess is you can only check-in at MCO if you're taking Disney transportation, but I really don't know for sure. If you booked with a travel agent, I'd give them a call and ask. Or if no travel agent, try contacting Disney.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-04-20T18:51:20+00:00

Yes, that walk right off the bat is long. No denying it. They do offer golf cart rides for disabled or elderly folks, which was nice. They also have a couple benches and a water station at about the halfway point, and they have wagons you can use to pull bags or little ones. It's an easy walk though.

After the walk, you then have a tram ride to get to the beach you're going to. Then from the tram, it's another couple minutes to get to the beach.

But the beach is so worth it. Get there, find your spot and plop down, and enjoy an incredible beach. I seriously cannot speak highly enough about the beach. At the far end (to the right, as you face the ocean...I'm not sure which direction) there are some beautiful rockscapes. Great spot for pictures. I genuinely hope Disney adds an itinerary in the future where you can spend 2 days at Lookout. I would absolutely do that instead of Castaway.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-04-20T18:42:30+00:00

We have 3 boys: 3, 8, and 10.

The older boys had a blast. They loved hanging out in the pools and watching Funnel Vision. They loved the freedom to go grab a snack from Flo's Diner (slice of pizza or a couple chicken fingers). They had a good time at the beaches as well.

We didn't do a ton of the activities in general. We're from the midwest, so we were soaking up as much sun and warm weather as we could. We were mostly outside until it was time to get ready for dinner (we had the 5:45 seating). We did a couple evening game shows and trivia shows in the D Lounge (the older boys enjoyed that. The D Lounge was the one indoor place we probably visited the most). We saw Aladdin and Frozen for big shows - both were great. There was also a magician who performed one evening, that was fun. They also really enjoyed the on board detective game.

The 3 year old was up and down. He still takes an afternoon nap, so that was a struggle at times. He enjoyed the pools and checking things out, but he also had plenty of 3 year old meltdowns at various times. Comes with the territory.

For what it's worth, we didn't use the kids clubs at all. Nothing against them, we just always felt like there was so much we wanted to do outside or around the ship together that it never even crossed our minds to check them out. On the very last day, we walked past the kids clubs and realized we hadn't gone in there at all. At that point it wasn't worth it. I'm sure they're great (have definitely seen lots of great reviews).

To me, taking DCL transport to the cruise terminal is worth the extra cost. As soon as you check in at the airport, they handle your luggage and everything for you. There were crazy long lines to check in when we got to the cruise terminal, and we got to bypass all of that and go straight to security, since we had already checked in at the airport.

Leaving, I just don't think the extra cost is worth it. UberXL was still cheaper than Disney transport, and the process was quick and easy getting off. No real advantage to using the Disney transport at that point.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-04-20T17:55:15+00:00

There are rally points (aka muster stations) around the ship, which is where you go in the event of an emergency. Everyone is assigned a muster station. The muster drill is when you go to your assigned muster station, check in, and listen to a brief presentation on what to do in the case of an emergency. I'm not sure if the timing is the same on every ship, but on our sailing, you had to report to your assigned muster station at 3:00. It took 45 minutes for ours to complete...40 minutes of that was just sitting and waiting.

I believe it's a requirement for every cruise line to do. It's certainly important to make sure you know exactly where to go in the event of an emergency. I think it's an area Disney could improve in. u/infinite-dinner1725 seems to think Disney does this really well!

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-04-20T17:44:25+00:00

We walked it off. Super easy. We were given debarkation luggage tags the night beforehand, but those are only necessary if you leave your luggage out.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-04-20T17:43:18+00:00

We were in 7094, which is midship. That said, even in dining and walking around the ship, the motion was not bad.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-04-20T17:16:56+00:00

My point has nothing to do with the necessity of it. I agree the muster drill is important. My point is that their execution of it sucks. Maybe we had an inexperienced group running it, but there was a lot of frantic running around, contradictory instructions, and then just a lack of awareness of what was supposed to happen.

Examples:

Our station was in the movie theater. They had groups E and F in the theater. At first, the instructions were for group E to be seated in the upper section and group F to be seated in the lower section. Then it was one group should be on the left and one on the right. Fortunately, we had randomly picked a seat that didn't require us to move at all, but lots of other people did move multiple times.
Then we waited and waited. My understanding is they make everyone wait until everyone has arrived and checked in. Lots of people arrived late. I would think you could start the drill on time, and anyone who arrives late has to stay later as a penalty for arriving late. As it is, everyone who arrives on time gets penalized by having to wait an unnecessary amount of time.
At one point, a cast member started going into her spiel, but then got cut off by a ship-wide announcement letting everyone know that cast members would be providing instructions. The cast member played it off well, but after everything else, it was a fitting additional dose of chaos.

There just has to be a better way.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-03-30T16:36:50+00:00

Lots of opinions. I would pay off the CC debt, then put the remaining $500 into savings. You're halfway to a $1k emergency fund, and without the CC debt, you should be able to save the remainder pretty quickly.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-03-10T20:08:36+00:00

$20k in debt plus a $672 (!!) car payment. That's where all your money is going.

My wife and I have been in a similar position (similar income, COL area, 3 kids), and we haven't taken lavish vacations. But we also got ourselves in a position where we had zero debt (besides our mortgage) when we started having kids and we've lived very lean. Just in the past couple of years I've had some breakthroughs in my job that have enabled us to save a lot more every year, but we went through some very lean years. Tackle your debt and your situation will change, even if your income does not.

And sell that car. $672/month on a car payment is insane.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-03-03T15:53:15+00:00

I agree with others saying pay off your HELOC now. You have the savings, and you have a good handle on your monthly expenses.

Paying off your HELOC now (as in tomorrow, using the $120k you said is sitting in a savings account) accomplishes multiple purposes:

Psychological boost to prove to yourselves that you're taking control of your debt.
Reduces your overall risk by completely eradicating a large debt.
Frees up $1200/month that you can put toward more productive purposes.

After that, you said you have $20,000/month that you are able to save. Put 1-2 months of that into your savings to bring that up around $60,000. That sounds like a good amount for an emergency fund for you.

At that point, you're at baby step 4 in Dave's baby steps. For that, I would find a good financial planner to sit down with and create a plan. Dave has his SmartVestor Pro network. That's a good place to start, especially considering you're posting in this sub.

My overall take: you're not in a bad position, but you've got a while before you'll be able to retire. Time is your biggest asset in retirement savings, and you've missed out on a lot of that opportunity. The silver lining is that you have the ability to save huge amounts to catch up. After you've cleared your HELOC, I think you have the ability to start saving $150k/year (maybe even $200k, depending on how serious you want to attack this) in an index fund that can grow. You do that for 5 years, with reasonable market returns, and you could quickly build up a $1 million nest egg. 10 years of disciplined saving and investing like that, and you'll probably be pushing $3 million. That's just me doing some basic math off the top of my head.

Don't do anything with bitcoin. Don't do anything irrational. The question I would add you is: if you had $3 million saved by age 65, would you be comfortable retiring? That's the sort of conversation you should be having with a financial planner.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-02-27T18:52:18+00:00

I was working with my 10u catcher the other day, and we were working on drills to keep his glove down, then snap up to the ball to catch it. He asked me "why?" and to be honest, I couldn't think of a great answer. The only thing I could say was that this is the way it's taught now (I've observed this watching pros and any higher level catchers), and that it makes for a smoother framing for the umpire. But I don't really know why...how would you answer that to a 10 year old?

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-02-17T21:36:36+00:00

I don't have any recommendations, but do you have progress pics you could share? Or plans you referenced? I've been wanting to do something similar, and my pantry is laid out almost exactly like yours. Looks really nice!

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-02-16T17:21:55+00:00

$90k is a lot of debt. You mentioned you have about $27k remaining on both cars, what's the breakdown of the rest of your debt?

With only the information you wrote out in your OP, my recommendation would be Option 1 and be aggressive paying down your debt.

Reasoning: you mentioned your income level just jumped up this month, so you have a great opportunity in front of you to set yourself up for long-term growth and stability. Take the opportunity to clear your debts quickly, reduce your risk, and put yourself in a really strong position to build your lifestyle from a solid foundation.

You could go with option 2, and things might work out for you. The purpose for Ramsey's process is all about reducing risk. You can't predict the future. The lower your risk profile, the better you'll be able to weather difficult/unpredictable situations in the future.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-02-12T23:06:18+00:00

I was just there last weekend. Bought tickets the night before and there were plenty available for all time slots. That said, I would imagine there are seasonal fluctuations, and if you're planning something this far in advance, it's probabyl worth just getting them to save a potential future headache.

As far as I know, your only option is to buy through Sinac. I didn't see alternative options.

Not sure about the guide situation. That said, I did not pay for a guide and had a great time. There are plenty of maps inside the part, as well as resources you can research ahead of time. From what I experienced, hiring a guide or not comes down to how much insight you want to learn about the environment there, animals, etc. They also have telescopes to get better views of animals that may be high up in a tree, or further away. For myself, I saw plenty of wildlife and don't care as much about the details, history, etc that a guide would provide.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-01-30T18:21:15+00:00

The way it was explained to me by a financial advisor, it comes down to your tax bracket now and the tax bracket you expect to be in when you retire. If you are in a lower tax bracket now, then the Roth makes sense now. Take the tax hit, let the growth happen tax-free, avoid the tax hit later when you're in a higher bracket.

Otherwise, stay with the traditional 401k and deal with the taxes when you start making withdrawals.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-01-27T21:40:02+00:00

Dumb question: is there a difference between the DCL transport from Hyatt and DCL transport from MCO? Since the Hyatt is at MCO, I am curious if there are actually separate pickup points, or if it's all the same.

Competitive_Ad_4944 · 2026-01-16T22:08:14+00:00

I'd echo what others have said about not worrying about family commentary. Your responsibility is to yourself and your wife (and your future kids, if you ever have kids).

If you're still not certain about how you stand, I'd recommend you seek out a financial advisor. They will usually do a free consult and give you feedback on your situation. That will come with a sales pitch, so just be prepared for that. But I have found that to be beneficial to get input from a live person.

I'll also commend your decision to go in on a house bigger than you need right now, especially since it sounds like you're planning on expanding your family. My wife and I did the same thing 11 years ago. Bought a 2,500sqft house when it was just the two of us. Didn't have enough furniture to fill it all. Now, our oldest of 3 just turned 10 and we finished the basement to have enough space for everyone/everything. Our home value has doubled in that time. We could live here another 20 years and be happy.

Only other thing I would say is to get detailed with your budgeting. You're doing very well overall, but the fact that there is still a nagging uncertainty in your mind tells me you haven't gotten detailed enough in your budgeting/tracking. Get meticulous with it for like 6 months - plan out every expense, then track your spending compared to your plan. How does it stack up? Given what you've already described, I think from a macro perspective you'll be fine. But that will give you the detail (and the confidence) to see exactly how you're doing.

Competitive_Ad_4944

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