Hooton's Still Scootin'

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Pretty cool story, a good one to post on Mother's Day ... Both of 'em are Texas natives, believe Burt was born in Greenville ... Kinda' funny that she never saw him pitch when they were in college together, but not all that hard to believe ... Despite the excellent college baseball in this state, especially at UT for something like the last 876 years, the parks were pretty empty until around the early-to-mid 80s on college campuses ... Football just ruled in Texas, still does in a lot of ways, but back then it had a stranglehold on the patrons.




by Alyson Footer @ MLB.com

Hootons still dancing after 30 years

Couple overcomes challenges of lifestyle

HOUSTON -- To a fan, the life of a Major League Baseball player seems pretty glamorous. Who wouldn't jump at the opportunity to play a kid's game in front of thousands of people every night, visit the best cities in America, stay at top hotels and travel exclusively on first-class charter flights?

But there's more to it than that. Including Spring Training and a total of three months of regular-season road trips, those affiliated with the national pastime are away from home for nearly half of a calendar year, often leaving behind wives and young children, who are forced to adjust to lives without one of the family's key components.

It takes a special person to succeed at juggling being a baseball wife, a mother and the primary caretaker of day-to-day responsibilities involved with running a household. Not all baseball marriages work. Burt and Ginger Hooton's, however, has, as evidenced by a union that has lasted 30 years and produced two children, now grown and enjoying their own successes.

Hooton, pitching coach of the Houston Astros, gives his wife most of the credit for the blessings they have shared.

"To last as long as we've lasted, she has to be very strong, very understanding, very supportive," he said. "My wife's been all of those things."

Burt and Ginger met as students at the University of Texas. He was a hot-shot pitcher on the Longhorn baseball team. She was a self-described "hippie," an art student who knew nothing about sports.

"I never saw him pitch there," Ginger recalled. "I didn't know that's what he did."

The two were members of an on-campus organization and one night, Burt offered Ginger a ride home. He then asked her to be his date to a formal and she accepted. What she didn't know was that on the day of the formal, Burt had thrown a no-hitter. She didn't find out about that until five years into their marriage.

"He was shaking everybody's hands that night, and you know he's not the most outgoing guy," Ginger recalled. "And I'm thinking 'Geez, maybe he hasn't seen these people in a long time. He's shaking everybody's hands.' I had no idea he pitched a no-hitter that day."

Ginger's interest in baseball grew along with her interest in Burt. When Burt was drafted by the Cubs after his junior year at UT, he asked Ginger to marry him. She changed her major to art history, obtained her degree, and before she knew it, she had become a baseball wife.

Today, she could write a how-to book and make a fortune.

When the Hootons started a family three years into their marriage, Ginger worked tirelessly to make sure their children -- son Gene, now 27, and daughter Lane, 24 -- maintained a close relationship with their father. This meant taking a rather unconventional route to ensure the family, based in San Antonio, stayed together. Where Burt went, they went, throughout his pitching career that ended in 1985 and into his coaching tenure.

"I was really criticized because I took them everywhere we went," Ginger said. "We went to Spring Training, and I'd take them out of school and just tutor them there. When we'd go to San Antonio for so many months, I'd take them to school there. That way, they were always with Burt."

And when they couldn't be together, they made sure to stay connected by telephone. Every day, without exception.

"Early in my career, back then, players might call their wives once in a road trip or once a city or once a week," Burt said. He decided that just wasn't enough.

"For a little less than 30 years, I've made a point to call every night when I'm on the road," he said.

Said Ginger: "We just decided we'll call every night since we're going to be apart. He would call every night faithfully and talk to the kids about what's happening every single day. That's how we kept that going at that time."

Challenges surfaced as the kids grew up. After Burt retired as a player, following a successful big-league career with the Cubs, Dodgers and Rangers, he went back to UT, obtained his degree, and became a minor league pitching coach. During that time, he spent two winters in Mexico, coaching Winter Ball.

"That was the hardest thing," Ginger said. "Our kids were in junior high and high school and they couldn't move around at that point."

Added Burt: "There were several times that she's been at home with just the kids for extended periods of time which wasn't easy. When I had to go to Mexico, she had to stay home when the kids were in school. That made it pretty difficult."

But they made it work. Ginger established a philosophy and stuck to it, which aided in keeping things as normal as possible for Gene and Lane.

"The hardest thing is when the dad sets the rules, that you go by those rules too, whether he's there or not," she said. "When he comes back from the road trip, he is the authority in the house. You go from being that authority and then give it back."

Burt may have been the disciplinarian, but he is quick to give proper credit where credit is due. For that, he points the attention back to Ginger.

"My wife has been very supportive, very understanding and deserves most of the credit for us being married for 30 years," he said. "We have two great kids. We've truly been blessed."