Dec Baseball Newsletter

8/9/2019 Dec Baseball Newsletter

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Emil Powell, Mistress of Ceremonies at the AnnualBalboa High School Awards luncheon, said, And

now I would like to present the Merit Awards to ourfinal honoree, and welcome him into our schools Hall of

Fame, Clarence Grider. Clarence Grider Balboa Hall ofFame, wait a minute whats going on here? Clarence Grider

went to Lowell High School and is in their schools Hall of

Fame for his athletic achievements in basketball and baseballand now is admitted into their prestigious group that on thisday saw no less than 12 other great athletes and scholasticcontributors to the school during their days.This school function is like no other tribute to former studentsand athletes of any school in San Francisco and for that mat-ter anywhere in the Bay Area. The Hall of Merit awards wentto Granville DeMerritt (43), Josephine Muisiano Hughes(43), Michele Mayers Kinkaid (77), James Prescott (61),

Robert Skinner (40), Danny Perez and Preston CowboyWorthy for their contributions to community service, as in-

structors or public service.The Hall of Fame induction went to the following athletes;Don Harvey (66), Byron Macrenato (89), Robert

McDonald (90),

Antonine Snei-

gro, (88), Barry

Abelson(54),and Joey Amato.Grider was lastand presentedwith the BalboaSports Supporter.Clarence got in-

volved in theschools baseball

program throughhis long-timefriend coach EdNeviuswhen hesaw how the base-ball team couldnt

practice or at least take hitting practice on days that rained.So he came up with a solution of putting a lasting tarp overthe batting cage so that at least the players could hit everyday. It wasnt an inexpensive proposition but as he said dur-

ing his acceptance talk, Ive been fortunate in my life to

have had some financial success and I saw the need and tookcare of it.Lets go back in time to the mid-1950s when baseball andfootball ruled as the premier sports to play in high school.Basketball was on the cusp of becoming the most recognizedsport in the Bay Area with the great USF teams led by Bill

Russell and KC Jones and two National NCAA titles. Bas-ketball was a sport whereby you could stereotype a playerwith his height. If you were over 63 you were a big man

and the center, if you were 6-62, you were a forward andif you were 59 and under you were a scrappy guard. You

wore those skimpy uniforms that looked like you were play-ing in your underwear with a shirt that had spaghetti straps tohold it up.Clarence Grider at 65 was a big man, and big man he was,

completely dominating the prep AAA league from his fresh-man year in 1952 to 55. He glided up and down the courtwith majestic beauty putting up his patented Hook Shot.Back in the day the big men didnt slam dunk or shoot jump-

ers, they generally swooped across the center of the key get-ting a pass from the scrappy guard and lofted an over-the-head hook shot into the basket. At that time there were sev-eral great college hook shot shooters such as Bob HooksHoberg, of the U of Washington, Bob McKeen of Cal, Russ

Lawler , Stanford, Ken Sears, Santa Clara and of courseRussell of USF. They were All-Americans at one time duringtheir college careers but none was better than that big man

from Lowell HS.We asked Fred Glosser, former Lincoln HS basketball playerduring Griders heyday of what he thought of him as a player.

He was unbelievable from 15 feet and in and had the ability

to shoot with both hands, said Glosser. You couldnt col-

lapse on him because he would take that hook shot right overyou. Lowell won the league in 1954-55, but we beat them by20 points and we finished about 5th in the league. Our coachcame up with a new play to screen and roll on the baselineand send guys to the basket for lay-ups. The new offense

surprised Lowell and they couldnt figure it out.Grider absolutely dominated every aspect of the game forfour years, making All-City 1953-55; Player of the Year in1954-55; All-Northern California 1953-55; holds the recordfor scoring and was Dell All-American Magazine first teamalong with Wilt Chamberlain.

He was recruited by the toptwenty-five universities inthe country, even had achance to play with the NewYork Knicks. He settled onOregon State University andbegan his college career

there. He even was a goodbaseball pitcher but as someof the guys like to teasehim, Yeah Grider was

good, and when he got onthe mound, 14 guys went to

December 2014

Bring Your gifts for TOYS FOR TOTS

MERRY CHRISTMAS & HAPPY NEW YEAR TO ALL!

Grider with daughter Robin andJoe Rodriguez

Grider being presented with the Hall of Meritplaque from presenter Leroy Miranda.


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the on-deck circle to hit.But fate has a way to turn life around and suchwas the case for Clarence. An unfortunate ac-cident at Oregon State caused him to lose to thesite of his right eye and there went his basket-ball career before it even got started. It wasdevastating and he had some up and downtimes but righted himself to finish his educationby attending City College and then getting ateaching credential from San Francisco State

University in 1967. He taught for more than 30years in the S,F. Unified School District untilhe retired in the late 1990s.

He was married for 41 years to his wife Juttawho passed in 2003 and they had two children,Mark and daughter Robin. Hes been a mem-

ber of the Old Timers for 18 years.

Member Information

Its too bad the government doesnt handle

elections the way Rich Ford conductedthe nominations for next years Board of

Directors. Talk about fast if you blinked youmissed out, but despite his propensity for get-

ting the ball rolling the following people werenominated and thevoting was closed onthe election. Vice-President, JohnMcCarthy, Treas-urer, Ken Mooney,Membership, GaryBader,Secretary,Rich Murphy, andSergeant-at-Arms,Joe Marino. Posi-tions for Board of

Director positionsare still open and thismonth will be thefinal chance to have your name put up for aspot on the January ballot. Those running are:Cliff Righetti, Bob Hagler, Ray McDonald,

Frank Brady, Vince Belli, Nick Poppin, Dave

Longa, Mel Maloney, and Bill DeMatteiLast months meeting, which was held on Vet-

erans Day, was exactly 73 years since the OldTimers met at Seals Stadium when 100 menjoined the Association on that Veterans' Day.This month five new members were sworn in

and became members and they shown in theabove photo. Rudy Rodriguez, graduatedfrom Balboa and played baseball and semi-probaseball for many years. Rich Huddlestonalso a Bal graduate was a baseball player plushes a regular with the Old Timers golf club.

Bob Ford, is Richs brother and another native

San Franciscan and he too is a regular with thegolf group. Michael Bross, is member Rogersson, who works as a Recreation Director for theCity of San Francisco and is also an NCAAbaseball umpire. The final new member isTerry Norton,another San Franciscan is aretired teacher having taught at Terra Nova formany years.President John LeTourneau asked McCarthy

to address the group about the progress of hisbout with cancer. McCarthy was very emphaticabout how important it was for him to receivecards and well wishes from members of theAssociation during a time when he was reallydown and how it lifted his spirits and will tobeat the cancer.

TOYS FOR TOTS DRIVEThe annual drive for the Toys for Tots programsponsored by the San Francisco Fire Depart-ment is on and gifts are needed. There will betwo barrels provided for members to bring

gifts. The toys or gifts do not have to bewrapped. Or if youwish you can make acash donation to chair-man Leo Martinez inlieu of a toy. The ruleof thumb is that for atwenty dollar bill youcan go into any drugstore and get up to threesmall toys for thesedeserving children atChristmas time. Solets show what we are

made of and fill thosebarrels for the TOYSFOR TOTS drive.

We have a couple of men that are on the recov-ery list and it would be nice for them to hearfrom you. They are Joe Smith, 2674-19th Ave-nue, SF, 94116 and Frank Williams, 7 Hearth-stone Court, San Rafael, 94903. Joe has a can-cer issue and Frank had a stroke recently and iscurrently in a rehab center in San Francisco.

Board of Directors Notes--

Mark your calendar for two upcoming events tobe held next month. The first is the Annual Bill

OBrien & Gene Gaviglio Awards Golf Ban-quet to be held on January 9, at Nicks Rock-

away Beach beginning with cocktails at 5:30pm with dinner to be served at 7:00 pm. Thecost is $35 and includes a choice of entre

Board of Directors

PresidentJohn LeTourneauVice President

Len GrilliTreasurer

Ken MooneySecretary

Rich Murphy

Membership

Gary BaderSergeant-at-Arms

Art White

DirectorsFrank Brady-Ron CastroBob Fife - Cliff RighettiBob Hagler - Joe MarinoCon Maloney -John McCarthy

Best wishes to the OldTimers for 2014

Rich BlackburnArt Citron - Nick CannuliMel Canevaro - Brian KearneyDon Dennehy - Al McCarthyDan Jacobsmeyer

New Members L-R Rudy Rodriguez, Rich Hud-

dleston, Bob Ford, Michael Bross and TerryNorton were sworn it last month.


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and wine served with dinner. If you would like to attend callRich Ford at 650-873-1144.The 17th Annual Bob Lagomarsino Crab Feed will be held onFriday January 23 at the Janet Pomroy Center. The cost is$60 per person and includes all the crab you can eat, pasta,salad, bread, desert and wine. Complimentary cocktails willbe served from 6-7 pm followed by dinner at 7:00. If youwould like to attend contact Gary Bader at 415-731-8027.Kris Kimball announced that the Old Timers website is start-ing to take shape after the Board approved to create one. The

website will contain several different links including history,photos, newsletter, events calendar and member listing. Thisis not a one-man job and consequently Kris will need helpfrom the membership. Anyone having information on any ofthe items listed above can give them to John McCarthy to becopied. All information or documents will be returned to theowners once they have been scanned into the various links.Pictures and stories about members are really important soplease look through your scrape book collections to see whatyou have.One item we dont have after 73 years is an official logo for

the Association. So all you artists out there put your creativeideas together and lets come up with a logo. The Associa-

tion was established in 1941 if you want to use a number as

part of the logo. And we are looking for any information onsemi-pro baseball if you have anything we can borrow.Speaking of which your Board of Directors is starting to gearup for the 75th Celebration of the establishment of the Asso-ciation.

Bull Pen Chatter

The Bell Game fund raiser for Lincoln and Washingtonhigh schools netted $400 for each school. The organiz-

ers expected slightly more of a turn-out but were pleased to have made aprofit for both schools. *****Happy Birthday greetings are in

order for two of our oldest mem-bers. Turning 96 years old lastmonth was Bill Difu, who barelylooks 65. Way to go Bill! And, notto out-done by a year behind wasRugger Ardizoia who turned 95.Rugger is the oldest living formerYankee player and the 17th longestliving former Major League player.

The oldest is Mike Sandlock, 99 years old was a catcher forthe Braves, Dodgers and Pirates. Others that we can relate to

are Bobby Doerr, 97, Chuck Stevens 97, (The Rifleman),Monte Irvin, 96, former Seals pitcher, Steve Nagy 96 andSeals outfielder Neill Sheridan 93.Linda Pereira of the San Jose Giants has been named therecipient of the 49th annual Larry MacPhail Award for thetop promotional effort in minor league baseball. Its the first

the Giants have won the award and only the second time for aCalifornia League team. What a story this woman is as shestarted working for the Giants as a high school student doingmenial jobs and has hung in there to become one of the most

recognized females in baseball.*****Thanks to Emily Pow-ell for this one. TheExcelsior Playgroundon Madrid & RussiaStreets is noted for twotruly San Franciscolandmarks. One is thesign to the entrance of

the playground that dedicates it to Julius Bud De Meyerand the second is a mural on the wall of the playground dedi-cated to Hall of Famer Joe Cronin. DeMeyer as many of youwho grew up in the Excelsior District was one of the great

guys that kids looked up to in those days. He was the play-ground director, helped you with the sport you were playingor sponsored teams to play on. He was just a wonderful man

that did so manythings for the com-munity and neverlooked for anycredit doing thesethings.The Joe Croninmural on the wallof the playing fieldhas not been de-

faced after all theseyears and is a tribute to one the greatest players of San Fran-cisco baseball history. Cronin was born and raised in theExcelsior District, went to Mission High School and gradu-ated from Sacred Heart to play baseball. He was inductedinto the baseball Hall of Fame in 1956.

*****If you ever played in the Eureka Valley Softball League theyare having their 54th Reunion on Saturday December 6, at theEureka Valley Playground Recreation Center. The cost is$20 and the evening will begin with a social hour to mingle

Thanks Old Timers

Your Monthly NewsletterIs a great Read.

Anonymous Donor

Best Wishes

To All

San Francisco Old Timers

The Grider Family

Rugger Ardizoia


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Alumni Of

Balboa RiordanGeorge Petty Clyde KrusinskiRon Taylor Sacred HeartBud Williams Brian KearneyFrank Williams Tom TaylorSupports the Old Timers Association

Congratulations to the S.F. Old

Timers Baseball Association

The Marino Pieretti Group

In memorary of Bob Tobener

Dante Santora - Frank Strazzullo

and see old friends, a dance from 8:00-10:00 pm and theawards presentation from 10-10:30 pm. This years awardswill go to Linda & Frances Flores for their years of helpingthe recreation directors and children at the park. The JohnNutting Sportsmanship Award goes to Rich Morales and theRon Johnson Perpetual Award to Jim Hay and James Flores.Its a fun night and if you would like to attend contact Tony

Zervas at 95 Rudden Ave., SF, 94112.

Poppin & Scramaglia Honored

at Benedetti Awards Dinner

It was a throwback night at the 39th Annual DanteBenedetti Awards dinner at the South City Elks Club lastmonth. More than 150 people turned out to meet with

friends and honor bothNick Poppin and JackScramaglia for theirachievements in base-ball and contributionsto the Pieretti and OldTimer groups.But thats where it

stopped...because thewonderful evening

evolved into an old SanFrancisco neighborhoodgathering minus onlythe politicians. The

Italians were shouting and waving their hands in the air, theIrishman were trying to get another drink at the bar, theSlovenians were trying to find their wives and Mexicanswalking around saying I dont got to show you no stinkin

badge.

MC Ken Ditothought being nostaligic and relating to pasthonorees would set the tone of the dinner...wrong the audi-ence talked wondering what the guy at the microphone was

talking about, about half the men cant hear as was evidentwhen Dito acknowledged McCarthy about his bout with can-cer and some guy had to prop him up to wave to the peoplebecause he didnt hear his name.

The women looked beautiful and sat very dutifully trying tofigure out what Scramaglia was talking about. He is a typicalItalian grandfather type these days and was only missing avest, the little black cigar, a bottle of red wine and politics totalk about. Jackie made the mistake of saying, I dont have a

script, Im going to talk right off the top of my head. An

hour and 40 minutes later when we were in 1949 someoneyelled out Give him the Hook!Poppin on the other hand was very eloquent using his Excel-sior and Balboa education to belt out praise to everyone in theworld that ever said hello to him. It brought tears of joy toeyes or laughter whatever you choose. We could have chosesides and had a ball game it was that kind of atmosphere.And then to end the evening there was a scene from God Fa-ther I when the council ire came out and thanked the family

and the ring kissing began.

Of course Im being facetious but from the standpoint of re-

porting what went on there is no way to describe the joy andhappiness the night held for everyone in attendance. PresentPieretti Group leader, Dave Longa, who takes some heat fordoing too much on his own did a masterful job in pulling theevening together. The only thing he needs to do is make sureevery speaker, including Italians, get five minutes to talkabout their life. You cant say enough about Don Benedetti

thanking the group for turning out to support a dinner that heand his brother Dante started 39 years ago as a way to raisemoney for the Hanna Boys Center and the Salisian BoysClub. Longa also paid a nice tribute to the nine people we

lost this year and most importantly one of the lead peopleBob Tobener. Next years' honorees were announced as

Ernie Golding and Billy Jones will be honored at the 40thdinner. Both men are excellent choices to be recognized.

So lets get somewhat serious and tell you about the two

honorees. Nick Poppin was born and raised in the NoeValley and Excelsior Districts of SanFrancisco. He attended Denman Jr.High and Balboa High School. Hewas Senior Class president and playedbaseball and football, earning All-Cityhonors in baseball. Upon graduation

Nick joined the Air Force and wasstationed in Japan where he playedbaseball for the base team. The high-light of his 3-year career was pitchingin the Pacific Air Force Tournament.The biggest highlight of his life waswhen he met Mieko, his wife of 54years as they were married in the USEmbassy in 1960. He is an active

member of the Marino Pieretti Group and the SF Old Timers

Nick Poppin & Jack Scramaglia

Nick in 1956 pitchingfor Balboa HS.


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Vince Tudoni - Jim McCoyLeo Martinez - Bill DeMatieJim OConnor

Skip McKinneyGeorge Schnapp

Association and served as the 72nd president .He is currently the president of the Old TimeAthletes Association.Jack Scramaglia is also a native San Franciscanhaving grown up in the Inner Sunset Districtattending Catholic schools,

including St. Ignatius where he starred in base-ball for four years. Jack was an All-City playerfor three years, was the outstanding player inthe 1955 Examiner All-Star game and won thetrip to New York City to play in the Hearstgame. After high school he attended MenloCollege and USF to play for Dutch Anderson.He became the first native San Franciscan tosign a professional contract with the SF Giantsand did so in 1958. He played for three yearsand was the Rookie of the Year in the Cal StateLeague. After baseball he went back to schooland received his teaching credential and taughtin the SF Unified School District for 35 yearsbefore retiring in 1998. He is an active memberof the Old Timers, Pieretti Group and Old TimeAthletes Association and is a member of the SF

Prep Hall of Fame.

Cavalli a Hit at the OTA Dinner

Gary Cavalli didnt disappoint anyone as the

speaker at the Fall dinner meeting in October.He started his career atStanford in 1973, whenthe sports informationstaff numbered five peo-ple that today there aremore than hundredsemployed with farreaching responsibili-

ties. The question isWhat happened to

Sports in the past 40 years? Gary was one ofthe people on the committee to hire Bill Walshfor the head coaching job in 1976. The coachs

annual salary was $40,000. Today such indi-viduals earn more than 5 million dollars. Inci-dentally, when they were interviewing Walshhe put his feet up on a table and the chair tippedover and he fell on the floor. Apparently thatmove got him the job!Another reason and probably the biggestchange in sports where it was when Cavallistarted at Stanford are the TV contracts andsponsorships heighten the competition of sports

on TV. NFL football is ridiculous on howmuch money is made off Sunday games. Gameseven of the World Series was viewed by 10million people and thats not a drop in the

bucket to what college football draws money-wise.TV rights are the major reason why players getsuch outrageous salaries and has little to dowith ticket sales. Cavalli is now part of thehoopla himself as hes the director of the Foster

Farms Bowl that will be played at Levi Stadiumnext month as part of the college bowls.

Pieretti Group News

The Pieretti Group met at Bertoluccis last

month and it looks like that was the final time.The restaurant serves wonderful food but justdoesnt have the facilities to accommodate a

group of 100 people and has no banquet facili-ties so it appears the Dominics at Oyster Pointand Nicks Rockaway Beach will be the meet-

ing places from here on out. The Decembermeeting is set for the 17th and will be a tributeto Hanna Boys Center in Sonoma. Last monthtwo men received their Green Jackets as permonthly tradition. The first fellow was Tony

Boyadzis, who was

presented by JoeMarino. Tony is aBalboa HS grad andhas been a regular inthe Pieretti for a fewyears. The otherfellow getting aGreen Jacket turnsout to be someonespecial. His name isJoe Lavin andwhen he received

his jacket he did something very special on the

back with this message,Dante Benedetti, Mar-ino Pieretti, Truly great men who gave their

best to Baseballs youth. Quite a lovely tributeto both of these men who really did lots for theyouth of San Francisco. Tom has been a long-

Jack Scramaglia shown here getting a hit while in highschool in 1955. Jack was a virtual hitting machine atall levels of ball he played.

Tony Boyadzis


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Newsletter Editor: John McCarthyTo provide information call or email.

Cell Phone 209-470-1103Or

Email: [email protected]

250 Montgomery StreetSuite 200San Francisco, CA 94104415-543-8500\1-800443-2227

FormerlyHolt & Collins

time sup-porter of thePierettiGroup andknew bothmen well.

Mark yourcalendar forDecember17 at Nicks Rockaway Beach for the

final luncheon of the year. Lunch willbe a Christmas atmosphere and the menumight be Osso Buco. This luncheon willfill up rapidly so if you want to attendcontact Dave Longa at 650-892-9996 tomake a reservation.

Member Passes Away

Long-time Old Timer member and Pier-etti Group supporter, Mel Chiarenzapassed away on November 21 peacefully

at his home inNovato. Mel wasa native San Fran-ciscan having at-tended Marina Jr.High and GalileoHigh Schoolwhere he once

held the high jumprecord. He was afan of the Giants

and 49ers and at-tended many of their games. He was 80years old.

What Da Ya Mean Safe...

This picture appeared in the OaklandTribune in April, 1947. Umpire BobCarter made a close call that decidedthe championship of the Oakland Trib-une Tournament, when he called a run-ner safe at home plate giving a Berts

Golden Gloves a 5 to 4 victory overMoffat Manteca. Arguing the call werePete Longa (Daves Dad), Sam French

and Gene Bryant. Moments later mem-

bers of both teams clashed and the po-lice department took the field to quietthem. Pete Longa was quite a playerand once in a game he pointed his bat tothe outfield fence and said, This one is

for my son. Then he hit one out...true

story.Bad Parrot

A young man received a parrot as a gift.The parrot had a bad attitude and aneven worse vocabulary. Every word outof the birds mouth was rude, obnoxious

and laced with profanity. The man triedand tried to change the birds attitude by

constantly saying only polite words,playing soft music and anything else hecould think of to clean up the birds

vocabulary.Finally, he was fed up and yelled at theparrot. The parrot yelled back. Heshook the parrot and the parrot got an-grier and even more rude. In despera-tion, he threw up his hand, grabbed thebird and put him in the freezer.For a few minutes the parrot squawkedand kicked and screamed. Then sud-denly there was total quiet. Not a peep

was heard for over a minute. Fearingthat he hurt the parrot the young manquickly opened the door to the freezer.The parrot calmly stepped out onto hisoutstretched arms and said I believe I

may have offended you with my rudelanguage and actions. Im sincerely

remorseful for my inappropriate trans-gressions and I fully intend to do every-thing I can to correct my rude and unfor-givable behavior.

The young man was stunned at thechange in the birds attitude. As he was

about to ask the parrot what had madesuch a dramatic change in his behaviorthe bird spoke-up, very softly, May Iask what the turkey did?

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

Mel Chiarenza

Joe Lavin

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Dec Baseball Newsletter