HAVING A (T) BALL : A GAME THAT IS GOOD FOR LAUGHS - AND TEARS.

Byline: Eric Sondheimer

Attention Disney, Warner Bros. and Universal: Here's a TV series that will produce more laughs than ``Seinfeld'' and more tears than ``ER.'' Just follow the weekly exploits of the neighborhood T-ball league.

Those who think being a surgeon is a tough job ought to spend one game coaching a group of 5 and 6-year-olds in T-ball. Besides patience, the next required virtue is levity. Anyone coaching T-ball in the hope of becoming the next Tom Lasorda won't make it through the first inning.

``You better love kids and you better have the patience of a saint,'' advises Gary Magnone, player agent for Northridge Little League.

Here are some highlights from watching opening-day T-ball games the past two seasons:

A player ran to first base and kept running and running while his mother screamed from the stands, ``Touch it! Touch it! No, stop!''

When another player slid safely into second, the coach shouted proudly, ``Mommy's got to do the laundry now.''

One player tried to the hit the ball off the tee, with a teammate shouting, ``Hit it to the airplane in the sky.''

When a player got hit in the mouth with a ball, he started to cry. His mom charged onto the field, the player cried on her shoulder, then was suddenly ready to play. Who needs a trainer?

The key to any successful T-ball team is refreshments. The players don't care what the score is - they want an iron-clad promise that somebody brought cold drinks to the game.

``They're looking for refreshments about halfway through the game,'' Magnone said. ``The acknowledgment that they'll get their refreshments might convince them to stick around for the game.''

When one T-ball player asked manager Steve Scheper if they would get a candy snack after the game, he told them, ``I think it's a big salad with mushrooms,'' causing the players to squeal in unison, ``Yuck!''

There are no guarantees what might happen at a T-ball game. In fact, expect the unexpected.

``The biggest problems at Northridge Little League was no bathroom by the T-ball field,'' said former T-ball coach Jeff LaCour. ``We used to lose kids for three innings because they went to the bathroom.''

At Westhills, an umpire refused to penalize the opposing team for batting out of order when a team skipped a batter because the player was sound asleep in the corner of the dugout.

Then there was the time a batter hit the ball off the tee to center field and started running toward the ball rather than to first base. And how about the player who was rounding third, then headed to the dugout after his coach shouted, `Go home!''

T-ball players are better than lawn mowers as they sit in the outfield picking weeds.

Many of the kids are missing their two front teeth, so if they get hit by a ball in the mouth, no trip to the dentist is required. And these kids are resilient.

After being tagged out, a player sat in the dugout crying. ``Come on, you tried hard,'' he was told by an adult. The player quickly stopped crying.

There was a player sprinting down the first-base line as his coach frantically yelled, ``Come on, wheels.''

It can be chaotic in a dugout without the real hero of T-ball games - the team mom. She's the true disciplinarian, the Bob Knight of T-ball. She's responsible for preventing players from running out of the dugout to pet dogs or climbing on top of dugouts.

``You know the rules,'' one team mom told a player.

``No, no, no, no,'' the player replied, sounding like he wanted a $500,000 raise or a Snickers bar.

The memories from T-ball will last a lifetime.

It has been 14 years since Jeff LaCour coached his son, Bryan, in T-ball. Bryan now plays for Stanford. One player he had was Scott Berger, who went on to Granada Hills High and UCLA. Early on, Berger got a bloody nose after being hit by a ball.

LaCour said that Berger's father ``credits that bloody nose for the start of Scott's baseball career.''

And refreshments, too.

MEMO: Deputy Sports Editor Eric Sondheimer's local column appears Tuesdays in the Daily News.

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Photo

Photo: A T-baller swings for the fences at the Northridge L ittle League fields. Players get several live pitches before hitting the ball off the stand.

David Sprague / Daily News