The Ann Arbor Travelers

One sunny day in June of 1957, Kenny Scodeller pounded on my front door.  I answered and he said.  “Get your baseball glove, you’re going to work!”  Ken was a local celebrity on Miner Street and one of the funniest people I ever met.  He was a great athlete at St. Thomas, graduating in 1956.  Now he was a starter on Western Michigan’s baseball team and had aspirations to play pro ball. 

I was in awe.  What did this superstar have in mind for his ten year old neighbor?  Ken said, “I am playing center field for the Ann Arbor Travelers and we need a batboy.  We are practicing at West Park in 15 minutes and you are going with me to start a new career.”  I grabbed my mitt and we started the three block trek to the baseball diamond at West.

The Travelers are a great Ann Arbor story.  Three Ann Arborites formed a semi professional baseball team to compete in the Michigan region of the National Baseball Congress.  Russ McCalla was the principal owner and Head Coach.  Dick Hager was part time second baseman and full time assistant coach, and John Dudley was the business manager.         

All three simply loved baseball.  They wanted to field a team of very talented players that could entertain the Ann Arbor fans two or three times a week during the summer at West Park.  And the players were very good.  There were young players like Kenny and Pete Donovich, on their way up in the baseball world.  Playing college ball or looking for an opportunity to sign a minor league contract.  There were veterans who had played at the double A and triple A level and just wanted to stay in the game a little longer.  It was a great mix of people.  Farmers, factory workers, business executives, college kids and a Doctor.  Some young, some old but all had outstanding baseball skills.  All were equal on the team and they were only interested in playing and winning baseball games.  In the fifties and sixties, the Travelers were the best baseball team in town, including the University of Michigan.

The fans responded with a loyal group of 100 to 200 people for most of the home games.

“Semi pro” is probably a bad description for the Travelers.  No one sold tickets to the home games.  We passed the hat for donations from the fans.  The team would earn prize money for finishing high in the State Tournament and for doing well in the National Tournament in Wichita Kansas if they won the State.  None of the players were actually paid but the owners covered all of the equipment expenditures and most of the travel expenses. Financially, it was a losing enterprise for the three owners.

Why the strange team name?  John Dudley came up with the name because we really had to travel to find opponents.  We played Peterson Tire in Mansfield Ohio, Sullivans Furniture in Grand Rapids. We played teams in Vermontville Michigan, Ionia Michigan, Battle Creek, Kalamazoo and Tecumseh Ontario.  We played the Jackson prison team. Obviously we only played them on their field.  Always a home game for them and they always had a loud boisterous crowd for support.   On a short trip, we played a team in Wyandotte.  They had a high school kid in left field named Willie Horton.  He hit two 400 foot home runs to beat us.

Coach McCalla explained my duties at the first practice.  He said, “You are fully in charge of the bats.”  Big responsibility for a ten year old.  Before the season started, each player selected a couple of bats that suited their swings.  Each game we set up a bat rack in front of the dugout.  We had about 25 bats.  Mostly Louisville Sluggers with a few Adirondacks.  Both bat makers would model the bats after the ones actually used by major league players.  Nellie Fox had a huge handle and a medium barrel.  Mickey Mantle had a thin handle and huge barrel. Harmon Killebrew had a 36 inch bat that weighed about eighty pounds. I carefully set them up so that the players could easily identify them when they were moving to the on deck circle.  Russ said, “Two things are very important here.  Never set the bats up with the handles crossed and never start to put the bats back in the bag before the last out of the game. Either of those two situations will guarantee that we lose the contest.  When someone hits the ball, you need to go up and retrieve the bat without getting involved in the play.  You are also in charge of foul balls.  This isn’t the majors and I can’t afford to toss out a new ball every time someone fouls one off.”  Foul ball responsibility trumped bat retrieval responsibilities.  When one went in to the stands or the weeds I had to bring it back.  Coach said that he needed to get me a uniform.  What number did I want?  I asked for 37 which was the number for my favorite center fielder, Jimmy Piersall.

In game conditions, this job required your full attention.  In fact, on the “danger scale”, being a batboy in the fifties was right up there with bull fighting and capping oil well fires.  I stationed myself just outside the on deck circle.  I needed to be sure that the on deck batter didn’t conk me when he was warming up.  I had to watch every pitch because occasionally someone would send a line drive foul ball straight at me. If it was a pop foul, the catcher or first baseman could run me through the backstop.  In addition, I had to pay close attention to the play on the field to make sure that I would not be run over or smacked by a throw to home plate when I was collecting the bat.

We had a lot of colorful players on the team.  The most passionate player was Denny Fitzgerald.  Denny played third base or catcher. He was the last University of Michigan football player to play without a face mask.  Fitz was a great role model for everyone.  Everything he did was at full throttle.  He was a letterman on Michigan’s wrestling team. He was a marine. He chased every foul ball with the same ferocity as his 99 yard Rose Bowl kickoff return. 

George Pratt was an outstanding pitcher for many years.  George had an incredible technique for dropping down a bunt.  He was always the last batter in the lineup.  As the pitcher, everyone assumed he would not swing at a few pitches in hopes of getting on base with a walk.  For the first pitch, he would stand in the batter’s box holding the bat on his shoulder with one hand.  His left hand was down at his side, nowhere near the bat.  The fielders relaxed knowing that George was going to take the first pitch.  The pitcher simply threw a strike down the middle of the plate.  With one hand, George would drop the bat and often hit the pitch with a perfect bunt.  This took incredible eye hand coordination but George could do it.  The defense was flat footed and if the ball was out of reach for the catcher, he would easily scamper to first base.    

Jim Miller was another player with a very unusual talent.  Jim was truly ambidextrous and he was a pitcher.  On some occasions, he would pitch to the right handed hitters with his right hand and the left handed hitters with his left hand.  One Saturday, we were short of pitchers.  Jim pitched a double header.  The first game he threw with his right hand and won.  The second he threw with his left hand and won.

Our nemesis in Michigan was Sullivans Furniture.  They had talent.  A couple of their guys were on the Detroit Tigers taxi squad.  Usually, the squad members were called up to play a game or two in the majors every year.  They were that good. The NBC State Tournament was a double elimination event.  Half the time we were playing Sullivans for the title. 

One year we were playing the dreaded Furniture team for the State Championship.  A trip to the National Championship in Wichita was on the line.  Sullivans had a four run lead after eight innings.  If they retired us in the top of the ninth, they were the champs.  Unbelievably, before we went to bat, I noticed that they had put their bats back in the bat bag, anticipating that the game was over.  Coach McCalla noticed this as well and said to me “We can’t lose. Just watch!”.  Exactly as the coach predicted, we rallied for six runs and shut down Sullivans in the bottom of the ninth.  “Never incur the curse of early bat bagging!”

So spring is coming to Michigan again.  I wish I could resume my batboy duties for the Travelers one more time.  The revitalized baseball diamond at West Park isn’t much different than the original field. I’m sure that there are a dozen players today as enthusiastic and talented as the group we fielded in the 50’s. What could be better than spending a spring day with twelve people who simply love to play baseball?  I might be a little slow in running down the foul balls but I could do everything else without getting hurt.  I spent a great five years with the team.  No doubt they taught me a lot about baseball that few ten year olds would ever learn.  More importantly, they showed me that following your passion is one of the best things you can do in life.