Jason Hart did it all when he was at Fair Grove high school.
“Basketball was my favorite, football was the funnest, and baseball is what I was good at,” said Hart.
Baseball led him to Missouri State where he still holds the Bears record for home runs and RBIs. After a major league playing career, he is now teaching other major leaguers how to hit for the Miami Marlins organization. But Fair Grove will always be home.
“I’m away from my family eight months a year,” said Hart. I want to come home to see them and spend time with them and my girls feel comfortable at Fair Grove.”
Take your child to work day was a summer long event for Hart’s daughters filled with time spent in ballparks, but they prefer watching to playing.
“I tried softball one time, and it was not the move,” said Hart’s daughter Cam.
Cam is currently a junior at Fair Grove and would rather be out on the court playing basketball.
“When I was little I fell in love with it and I haven’t fallen out of love with it,” Cam said. “It just makes me happy to play.”
It turns out Hart’s coaching skills come in handy on the basketball court too.
“He is just always making me go out and shoot, even when I don’t want to,” Cam said. “Just helping me get better.”
While coach Hart cannot make it to all of her games, especially the long postseason runs like last year’s state championship, he always finds a way to support her
“In the morning and then after he will text me good job and just gives me some motivation to move on to the next if I don’t play good,” Cam said.
Besides, Cam’s love of basketball is familiar to her dad.
“She definitely wears her heart on her sleeve,” Hart said. “She definitely shows her emotions , which she is working on. Her passion is to help her teammates be better and I’m just so proud of her for that.”
He looks forward to seeing where her sport takes her, just like baseball did with him.
