“At the end of the practice, I was so impressed with him that I said, ‘I’m going to give you my Alex not because of what I think you’ll teach him about baseball but for what I think you’ll teach him about life,’ ” Johnson, a lawyer, recalled. “And it’s one of the best decisions I’ve ever made.”

Other parents told me that if they urged their kids to watch this documentary or read that book, they’d probably get resistance. But if “Coach Steve” does it, the kids fall in line.

Although the room in which he screened “4 Little Girls” lacked air-conditioning and quickly became a sauna, the kids sat still: no complaints, no whispering to one another, just an occasional gasp when a brutal image or heartbreaking interview came along.

Even more remarkably, given their age and our era, not one of them sneaked a peek at a smartphone. They know better. Bandura bans electronics during practices and games, and there’s a no-electronics rule for the three-week tour. If the kids need to send emails or call home, they can use one of his devices.

“You’ve got to see the world,” Mo’ne explained, adding that she and her teammates can’t do that if they’re looking down, into gadgets, and not up. “You have to see it with your own eyes.”

She’s getting a big, heady glimpse of it.

And we’ll know exactly what she could have done with her life, because she’s positioned to do it. She’s primed to fulfill that potential. She and her teammates have been given more than bats, cleats and the promise of an epic summer.

They’ve been given a sense of mission and a set of wings.