MSBL World Series practice at Udall yesterday...
Plus, acknowledging some Tucson MSBL Hall of Famers…
And a replay of the Carl and Pigpen story…
This story begins in the 1960s when you could buy a Rawlings baseball mitt for less than twenty bucks.
And now, for the rest of the story...
Carl Schwanbeck, 77, and Danny "Pigpen" Price, 79, are baseball junkies. These two codgers have been around the game of baseball since both were knee-high to a grasshopper in height, and they had barely enough meat on their bones to keep from being blown away by a tumbling tumbleweed.
They both ended up in Arizona and quickly discovered the difference between a dust devil and a tumbleweed.
Let's start with Carl.
He bounced around as a young fella. Talk about baseball; Carl was born in Williamsport, Pa. -- the land of the Little League World Series. "I didn't even like baseball then," Carl recalls. "I was probably the worst player and always sat at the end of the bench."
Things changed for little Carl when he ended up in Marietta, Georgia, about 20 miles northwest of Atlanta. There, he started to pick up the game of baseball. When he moved to Monroeville, Ohio, Carl had become good enough to play high school ball.
Somewhere along the way, he picked up a first baseman's mitt. "I even hit a home run in a regional game," Carl said. "The opposing pitcher had struck out 15 of us, but we still won the game, and I got my homer."
Next stop: Kent State. He passed on playing baseball at Kent State but did get his degree. This was in 1968, and the starting battery for Kent State was Steve Stone and Thurman Munson. That alone convinced Carl that he wasn't quite ready for a college baseball career.
Fast-forward to Tucson. After many years of service at Raytheon, Carl retired from the workforce and joined the Tucson Men's Senior Baseball League.
By 2012, Carl was now a tall and experienced lefty first baseman in his mid-60s. He had made a name for himself and played on many Tucson MSBL teams—18-and-over, up to 38-and-over, and 45-and-over. In 2015, the league honored Carl by inducting him into the Tucson MSBL Hall of Fame.
At 77, Carl has become a "semi-rookie" on the 60-and-over Tucson Old Timers. He has not officially joined the club but has logged in a few games when needed.
When you're a Tucson MSBL Hall of Famer and can still play the game. Why not?
"My heart is still with the Tucson MSBL," Carl said. "It worked for me. I was the oldest in the league. My manager then was Rick Bitzer (now 69) and a member of the TOTS."
When you're a Tucson MSBL Hall of Famer and can still play the game. Why not?
"I have some eyesight issues and the normal aches and pains, but I can still play," says Schwanbeck.
As for yours truly, I was a career .250 hitter in college, and now, at 79, things haven't changed much in 60 years. I'm currently in a hitting slump. "I can't hit my way out of a paper bag right now,"
"But back in the day," Pigpen recalls. I wasn't too bad."
After "having trouble with the curve" in high school at Tucson Catalina (Class of 1963), I picked up a sports writing gig as the sports publicist at Eastern Arizona College in Thatcher.
"In 1965, I made the college baseball team and played second base," Price said. "My only claim to fame: We played a doubleheader at home against Arizona State (freshmen) Sun Devils. We, of course, were called the Gila Monsters, but we won't go there. After all, Scottsdale Community College, one of our opponents, was called the Artichokes, for goodness sake.
"At any rate, I'm at second base in the second game of a doubleheader. There were two outs, and a young speed demon named Reggie Jackson was on first base for ASU. He runs. Our catcher, Cliff Martin, who went on to a long coaching career at a high school in Paradise Valley, just outside the downtown Phoenix area, made a beautiful throw on the money. Jackson, barely 19 years old at the time, begins his slide with spikes high in the air and, of course, spikes the heck out of me, and I drop the ball....end of the story," said Pigpen.
After a 30-year career in the airline industry, I became a sportswriter in the Phoenix area from 1990 to 2001. I played fast-pitch softball in Utah, Nebraska, Phoenix, and Tucson when I could get away from work.
In 1997, I hooked up with Carl Schwanbeck for the first time. We were members of the 1997 National Senior Olympics baseball team, which beat a Maryland team in the championship game at Hi Corbett Field. Carl was the first-sacker, I played second base, and the shortstop was Bud Warnke, another Tucson MSBL Hall of Famer and a former baseball coach at Tucson Amphitheater High School.
And here we are in 2024, and the baseball junkies are still at it.
The Tucson area is full of ball players who have played in the Tucson MSBL since 1989. Many are in the Hall of Fame and play for the 60-and-over Old Pueblo Club at Santa Rita Park. A few have played for the 60-and-over Arizona Rattlers at Mission Manor Park. At Udall Park, where the TOTS and the 60-and-over Tucson Aces play, Ernesto "Doc" Escala, now 72, pitches for the TOTS. He was inducted into the Tucson MSBL Hall of Fame in 2008.
In fact, it's easy to connect the dots with the best ball players of the past with the Tucson MSBL Hall of Famers. Men like Gary Williams, Jim "Cowboy" Grace, Joe Jimenez, Herb McReynolds, Mark Sewell, Mark Stevens, Jim Stone, Charlie Riesgo, Don Holp, Steve Badart, Robin Badart, Mike Gray, Vic Acuna and Ted Abel.
And the list goes on...
Jesus Felix, Arnold Mares, Jose Pico, Jim Baugher, Lou Russo, Gasper Limon and Dave Bies.
I'm sorry. I'm sure I still need to include a few names. But Schwanbeck and Pigpen Price (me) have likely played for or against many of the players above.
Take, for instance, Dave "Diamond" Bies, who played for 23 years in the Tucson MSBL and passed away in 2017 at the age of 53.
According to Schwanbeck, who had known Bies since the first day he joined the league. "Dave was well-liked. I enjoyed the traditional hand slap at the end of the game, and he always had something friendly to say," Carl added.
Many of the Hall of Famers are legends; some are still putting on their spikes, grabbing their gloves, and heading back on the field.
Which brings us back to those two baseball junkies again. Wouldn't you know it, but Carl and Pigpen met again in 2012. Price played, alongside his 48-year-old son, Michael, on Robin Badart's Blackbirds, while Carl was with the Phillies in the Tucson MSBL.
Until then, Carl was the oldest player in the league. Pigpen, in 2012, took over the role as the most senior, at least for a few months. "It wasn't too long, I recall. "I was taken out at second base at mid-season by a 40-year-old runner, much like the young Jackson speedster who did the same in 1965."
So where do the two baseball junkies go from here?
We both showed up at Udall Park yesterday morning. Carl sat in the dugout while the 65-and-over and 70-and-over MSBL World Series-bound players from Tucson held a practice game, preparing for the series in Phoenix, which is scheduled for October 13 through November 2.
I went 0-2 in the practice game, but I'm still chomping at the bit to head to Phoenix with the rest of the TOTS players and participate in my 17th MSBL World Series.
