Though their intentions are almost always honorable, sports parents can be a blessing to a child’s efforts to make a way in athletics, and they can also be a curse.
It’s not an easy line to straddle, and unfortunately many at times lean too far toward being an interfering parent instead of just an involved one.
The fallout can be nasty, leading to unfulfilled expectations and untapped potential for all involved, as well as a lingering bitterness for the athlete when looking back at what might have been.
Not so for Steve Miller and wife Laurie Fouse-Miller, who have experienced what it’s like to be the parents of a talented baseball player with professional aspirations.
The Millers don’t hold themselves up as some sort of parental model of decorum though. They’re too busy being thrilled for, and proud of, son Gage Miller, a 2021 Palmyra graduate whose meteoric rise from solid high school prospect to a hitting machine at Alabama this past spring to a recent third-round draft pick of the Miami Marlins, has been head-spinning – incredible, to say the least.
But maybe not to the Millers, who got an early indication of Gage’s love of baseball and his aptitude for it.
“The kid picked up a bat at 1 year old,” Steve said, looking back, “and was loving it.”
“My buddy coached a (youth) team in Cornwall, 6-, 7-, 8-year olds. We wanted to see them play so we went to a game and they were short on players and asked Gage if he wanted to play. He was 3 years old. He went in and played second base, got like four hits and never stopped playing. He just could always swing a bat.”
And while they enthusiastically supported their son’s blossoming career, even putting their own athletic ambitions on hold – Steve has played softball competitively for years as an adult, and was a key player in Annville-Cleona’s state baseball title run in 1986, while Laurie also played softball extensively – they taught Gage about the importance of family from a young age.
“We are able to go with him everywhere,” Laurie said. “Steve still plays softball and I played softball and (Gage) always went with us. He had to sit on the bench until the game was over. And he would just sit there and watch. Then after the game we would play with him until our next game.”
“We both traveled (to play softball), but Gage was really, really good. He sat on that bench and waited, then we played.”
The Millers also made sure that Gage was exposed to other authority figures on the diamond. Steve coached him for a time, but knew when it was time to back off a bit.
“He probably got slighted a bit,” said Steve lightheartedly, of coaching Gage, a job he shared over the years with Annville-Cleona teammate Gavin Osteen and former Palmyra head coach Neil Weber. “I didn’t have him at the top of my lineups all the time. Sometimes I’d sit him, sometimes I put him in right field. But he understood.”
“It was also good that he learned from other people instead of mom and dad,” Laurie said. “Because when high school comes he’s not gonna be your coach anymore.”
Having that perspective was beneficial when Steve and Laurie put their parent hats back on full-time after Gage’s high school career.
They were heavily involved with their son’s decision to attend Bishop State Community College in Alabama, which led to him joining the big boys with Alabama and landing in the vaunted SEC this past season. Gage made it one to remember with his 18 home runs out of the leadoff spot, many of which were witnessed from the stands by Mom and Dad.
Despite the geographic challenges involved, the Millers made it to far more games than anyone could have reasonably expected.
“We went to seven home weekends,” Laurie said. “But it was an amazing thing, I think we drove 50 hours in three weeks. We put a lot of miles on the car, but it’s fine.”
“That Tennessee series was unbelievable,” Steve said. “He loved us being there that weekend. He hit the game-winning homer in the last game. We took him out to eat with his advisor at the time and guys recognized him on the street. We were like, ‘Holy smokes.'”
That day ended up paling in comparison to Monday, July 15, the second day of the MLB draft, when Gage received that fateful phone call from the Marlins, who because of the pay scale indicated by his draft slot, will pay Miller $800,800 on his first professional contract. Miller is still awaiting his minor league assignment after spending this past week in Miami with the Marlins’ other top picks.
The family hosted all of Miller’s former coaches on the first day of the draft to thank them for their contributions to his career, then got to celebrate in earnest mid-afternoon the next day when the Marlins, who grabbed him with the 92nd.
“It was awesome,” Steve said.
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