Raising kids in an MLB family can be tough logistically, summer break provides relief

It was 2022, and Kansas City Royals pitcher Zack Greinke’s career was winding down. In his age-38 season, Greinke wanted to soak it in.

He wanted his family to experience it all as well, but Greinke faced a problem every baseball family comes across at some point after their kids reach a certain age: What were they going to do about school?

Greinke got lucky. His teammate, Daniel Lynch, was married to a former elementary school teacher. Millie Lynch, who was also a reading specialist, had helped some other families when Daniel was in the minor leagues. The Greinkes, who had a baby and two older boys at the time, enlisted Millie as their traveling teacher that year. She designed a curriculum and bridged the gap after spring training, when Zack and his wife, Emily, pulled their boys out of a traditional school.

“It was an interesting setup,” Lynch recalled this spring, “Where they valued having the kids with them but also really wanted them to be in a learning environment still.”

In a baseball calendar that can span from mid-February to early November, the month of June often brings a sigh of relief for players and their families. The challenges associated with navigating the school year calendar are over, at least for a few months.

“We survived,” Nationals pitcher Derek Law joked last week. Law’s situation in D.C., just four hours away from where his kids go to school in the Pittsburgh area, still enables him to see his family frequently. His wife, Brittany, can load the car up on Friday and drive with their three kids to the nation’s capital before heading back Sunday.

For players who aren’t close to their offseason homes, there are real choices — absent a Millie Lynch.

“Do you pull them and have them be with you homeschooled, or do you keep them in school with their friends and have some normalcy?” Dodgers pitcher Chris Stratton wondered. “It’s a tough decision that a lot of people struggle with.”

Many players, like Stratton, employ a combination of the two. A father of three, Stratton’s two school-aged children go to a public school from August until March. About a week before spring training ends, his wife, Martha Kate, takes over and homeschools them the rest of the way. She stays in contact with the kids’ teachers virtually to make sure they don’t fall behind.

Free agent outfielder Travis Jankowski and his wife, Lindsey, do the same thing with their four children, who are all 6 and under and attend various preschools and part-time programs in the offseason. Lindsey becomes a stay-at-home mom and full-time teacher once the season starts. Their oldest son’s school sends a curriculum and sets up bi-weekly video check-ins to make sure he’s picking up concepts.

“We never want my job to take away from his childhood, so we asked him, ‘Do you want to go to a regular school five days a week and see your friends, knowing that you might not see Dad until the summertime, or do you want to be around Dad more and Mom will be your teacher?’” said Jankowski, who was with the Chicago White Sox and Tampa Bay Rays previously this year.

“It’s tough for baseball players who didn’t grow up with parents in the majors because you don’t know how to navigate it. I think the biggest thing has been letting our child choose, as silly as that sounds, and never letting your job dictate their childhood.”

Stratton, whose parents are both teachers, said initially he and Martha Kate tried to stick to in-person school, but the time apart was too much of a strain. With a third child now approaching school age, they might get a nanny to help, particularly as sports and school activities ramp up in elementary school.

“We’re in Mississippi, and they’ve been so kind and understanding about the schedule,” Stratton said. “I thought we might have to go the private school route (for flexibility), but we were able to stay in the (public) system, which I was happy about.”

Flexibility is key. Even for those who don’t elect to homeschool, there are a lot of moving parts involved in switching states in the middle of the school year, and the ease of that transition depends on players’ location and the ages of their children.

“A lot of contract guys (who know they’ll be with one team for a while) will do multiple schools if they allow it,” said veteran Drew Pomeranz, who has played for more than a half-dozen organizations and is currently with the Chicago Cubs. “But schools are tough now. It’s hard to get into them sometimes. It’s a stressful thing.”

“It’s one of our biggest stressors this year,” Royals pitcher Seth Lugo said this spring, as he and his wife, Amanda, tried to find a school in their Louisiana home that accepted credits from the private school in Kansas City that their son, James, attends.

Then there is the uncertainty surrounding start dates. If dad makes the playoffs, families who want to stay together could miss most of September, October if they’re lucky. Last fall, then-Orioles pitcher John Means and his wife, Caroline, didn’t start their son in preschool until November. Luckily, their Kansas City-area school had worked with several other baseball families before.

“Trying to keep us all together as much as we possibly can is at the top of our priorities,” Caroline said. “We do our best to give him experiences that he may not have in school every single day. We take him to museums, aquariums, different parks, and I think he’s had the privilege of gaining insight and exposure to different cultures as well. … We like to think of it all as just life education. And certainly, we will make sure that he can read and write.”

The Means, who welcomed a daughter this spring, have no plans to homeschool, though Caroline pointed out John, who signed with the Cleveland Guardians this offseason, has teaching experience. The 32-year-old nearly quit baseball and made a LinkedIn page that listed substitute teaching as his job for the winter of 2016.

After considering a major in secondary education, Nationals pitcher Trevor Williams got his degree in history with the hope that he could teach after his baseball career. He’s already putting it to use.

Williams and his wife, Jackie, who have five children, started exclusively homeschooling them about three years ago. Their oldest son just finished third grade. When the Nationals are home, Williams wakes up and spends two-and-a-half hours teaching him before heading to the ballpark. Then his wife takes over while managing their four younger kids. In the offseason, the pair, who split time between Virginia and California, join a co-op with other homeschool families to socialize.

“My wife’s family is all public school teachers,” Williams said. “We don’t have anything against teachers. I have a desire to teach, my wife has a desire to teach, and because of the job I have we are able to do it. Not everyone has the time or the want-to.”

“Some families thrive when the kids are out of the house and they get some time together,” he said. “Our family thrives in chaos, with five kids screaming and yelling.”

Williams, who draws from four different curricula to make his own, said the plan is to homeschool as long as possible. For many players, full-time homeschooling is a way to keep families together while living a crazy baseball schedule. Reds outfielder Austin Hays, who has two young kids, said he and his wife plan to homeschool as long as he’s playing, then transition into a traditional in-person experience.

For now, it’s about managing the chaos and making the most of the opportunities that come with being a professional athlete — or with being married to one.

“Everyone has the idea that being a baseball wife would be this glorious, fabulous lifestyle, and a lot of times that couldn’t be further from the truth,” Jankowski said. “I’m like, ‘Phew it’s not easy what they do.’ Hats off to my wife and all the wives out there who get through the season.”

(Illustration: Kelsea Petersen / The Athletic)