On the Way Out series
Vol. 4
Part 3
The
Final
Season
2008–2021
Ilook back on the last decade of my life from time to time. It’s what historians do, I guess. I have had a wonderful non-paying hobby — a 12-year stint as the historian for the 60-and-over Tucson Old Timers, a baseball club which has been around for 54 years and we’re still counting.
My total playing years with the club 14 years. I’m now 76 and on the verge of my final at bats — a wonderful journey…beautiful footprints in time with cleats on.
We meet up at Tucson Udall Park every Monday, Wednesday and Friday and play for the love of the game. We are old, battered and if the drug commission would show up they would probably throw us out of baseball.
On second thought, if the medical officer in charge of such things was over 60, he, or she, may throw up their hands, quickly return to their car and grab their baseball glove. Why they would have one tucked away in the trunk of their car for immediate use would be anyone’s guess?
I’m a few weeks away from relocating to a small town in Colorado, where I will sit by the fire this winter and finish my great American Novel.
I will miss my fellow senior citizens, my teammates — the ones I have taken the field with for a good portion of my life.
Here’s why…
The group of old-timers I shared the diamond with over the years have endless stories to tell of their past deeds…as well as their present condition, for that matter…their injuries, their ups and downs and yes, a few good men have passed on, leaving behind a temporary silence in the dugout as we fittingly mourn their passing.
I wasn’t aware at the onset of my membership, that I had walked smack dab into a goldmine— a writers’ paradise, if you will, especially for an old broken down sportswriter, who a lifetime ago had actually made a living (I say that with a grain of salt…excuse the overused phrase)covering my share of feature articles on athletes from prep stars to the pros.
I have spent ninety percent of my blogging, in the past decade and a half, putting some of my teammates’ shenanigans in print. For many years, I tried to focus on them and not me. After all, the writer is not supposed to be connected to the story…he, or she, is supposed to remain in the background and just report the fake news — I mean, these stories are all true…and nothing but the truth.
Well, maybe I’m guilty of turning an old sandlot baseball player from 60 to 90, for goodness sake, into a Mickey Mantle or a Babe Ruth. Suddenly in my eyes, the old codger who just dribbled a single in the hole between third and short had instead drilled a shot — a two hopper off the 300-feet fence at Udall Park.
What is so amazing about these guys, is their backgrounds. Now that is all true in most cases. I mean prior historians for the club have also posted some amazing stuff…and on further review some have turned out to be a little overboard, like in the club’s first archive book (one of eight volumes and still counting), it was reported that a fellow TOT was a pretty good golfer and actually beat Ben Hogan by one stroke in a tournament on the west side of Tucson. The name matched up but it turns out it wasn’t the same fella.
Let’s by honest. That’s okay. I mean you’re talking about a bunch of old-timers, who instead of sitting on the sofa and watching ESPN are actually out amongst the English (from the movie: The Witness) playing America’s Favorite Pastime. And not just once, but three days a week, all 12 months of the year. A TOTS’ season never ends, the organization just keeps on plugging right into the next year…into the next…and the next.
Look, if you are a member, you can play the rest of your life for seven dollars a month, spend an hour or so at the after-game party every Friday, under the ramada at the park…and say just about anything you want to say and pretty much get away with it. It helps to throw down a couple of brewskis along the way.
It’s what we do year in and year out. To be honest, I wouldn’t want it any other way.
I ventured to the ball park in April of 2008 and joined the club. I was 62 and I actually hit my only home run that month. I thought this is going to be easy.
It’ll be 2022 in a few weeks and I have yet to hit my second.
The TOTS changed my life, or at least steered me in the right direction, anyway. I had a quadruple heart attack on January 2nd of 2008, just three months prior to my first at bat with the organization. Thousands and thousands of at bats later and some 1,400 career hits and I’m still kicking…still trying to run to first base and beat out a slow roller.
But all good things must come to an end. It’s my time to tip my hat and say my final goodbyes.
It may turn out to be one of the toughest things I have ever done.
After all, I write in my sleep. I write at two o’clock in the morning. Maybe after dinner…and within hours after a game — usually a real nail biter that goes down to the seventh inning (we play six innings in the heat of the summer, and seven during the fall, winter and spring).
I can’t stop it. It’s like a rare disease, protruding right out of my finger tips. I’ve burned up three laptops, four smart phones and I’ve had to buy a new desk from time to time.
We have lawyers, financial advisers, accountants, judges, writers and a teddy bear salesman, for goodness sake. We have it all…all walks of life. We have men with not just one degree, but three. Our scorekeeper has degrees from the University of New Hampshire, Yale and the University of Arizona. We have professors who are still working. We have a current professor from the U of A, who just transformed himself to Africa and back. I haven’t a clue what that was all about.
We have veterans…we have men who have built a medical device, we have members who have spent their lifetime working with the underprivileged and wayward kids, we have doctors, nurses (oops, I’m getting carried away…on second thought, yes we do have nurses), we have police officers…maybe a millionaire or two. The list goes on…and on.
Build us a park and we will come. Until then, Udall Park will do just nicely. In the old days it was Himmel Park, then Ft. Lowell Park and now Udall.
The dust never settles. We lose a few good men every now and then. After all, we are not 20-year-old whippersnappers — a saying you have to be old just to know what that means.
Most of the top players are in their 60s and give the 70, 80 and 90-year old players fits on the diamond. Our oldest player, no longer active, but still on the roster, just turned 96! We have benches behind home plate with former players’ names on them. Some day there will be a bench with my name on it. Of course, all the guys would need to reach in their pockets and donate some of that green stuff.
We have a work shed named after our greatest TOTS’ caretaker that ever lived.
Everybody in town knew Chico. He passed on in 2017. The man would single-handidly prepare the field every morning, hours before the first pitch was ever thrown. Everywhere we turned in the dugout we’d see images of players who have left us… and are now in the stands in heaven, looking down on us and giving us a hard time for making an error — both mental and physical.
Of which there are many.
To say I’ll miss all the above would be an understatement.
Photo: The guys call me Pigpen Price, among other things.
