Beyond the Byline: Baseball beyond the roller coaster

Back in the days of the old Lower Valley League, the Wyoming League, the Luzerne County League, and later, the Central League, “Mighty Casey” never struck out.

There was always “joy in Mudville,” except Mudville didn’t play in any of those leagues. The teams of those days were from Mocanaqua, Glen Lyon, Hilldale, West Side, Buttonwood, Brookside, and, of course, Plymouth, home of the infamous Orchard Street Nine.

Last week I spent time visiting and talking with Jack Timko, former Plains Township police chief and one of the best pitchers the region has ever seen. His dad, Andrew, played in the real big leagues and one of his best friends, Ron Hunt, also was a major leaguer.

I also talked to John Kashatus, one of the best baseball guys you will ever meet. And I spoke to John Macko, who used to hit softballs for country miles. Macko was also a terrific hardball player.

Unlike the literary character Casey, who fell from hero to goat in Ernest Lawrence Thayer’s poem “Casey at the Bat,” the players of those old Sunday afternoon leagues were, as Timko said, “blood and guts” players.

What does that mean, exactly? Well, it means that these players played hard all the time. They hustled. They hit. They fielded. They pitched. They cared.

This was when baseball was America’s sport. It was the game most embraced and revered by fans of all ages.

As kids, we played baseball all the time. We played on real baseball fields and makeshift diamonds in our neighborhood. We played in schoolyards and on the street. We played hardball, Wiffle Ball, stocking ball and stickball. We played baseball all the time. We even had baseball board games such as Strat-O-Matic.

We listened to games on the radio. We watched games on TV when they were televised. We knew every player’s name, batting average and their uniform number.

So you can understand why I enjoyed standing in Timko’s basement looking at all the photos, posters, clippings and other artifacts he has from baseball over the last 80-plus years. I hope he invites me back to spend more time looking at all he has because it really is an amazing collection.

After talking to Timko I could imagine being at one of the games of the Sans Souci Smilers. My memories of Sans Souci stop at The Bear Cat roller coaster because we never knew there was a baseball field somewhere beyond the big ride.

But I saw the pictures of large crowds, dressed in Sunday best, standing and cheering for the Smilers. I would have loved to have been there with the 1,000-plus watching the Smilers win again.

Or to be at Weinick Park in Glen Lyon to watch the Condors play. Can you imagine what it must have been like? This was hometown pride at its best.

It all got me thinking about those good old days when I realized I once experienced what it must of felt like. Back in 1965-66, Plymouth High School had a great basketball team. We won the District 2 title. It was the end of small-town America for us. The “monster” jointure of Wyoming Valley West began the next year.

But in 1965-66, Plymouth was alive with hometown pride and spirit. Big crowds followed the team and supported us the entire season. It was an awesome feeling to represent the town and wear the school colors.

That’s how it must have felt for the fans of the Sans Souci Smilers or the Glen Lyon Condors and all those other hometown baseball teams. They were faithful people — attending the games on a Sunday afternoon after first attending church in the morning.

They knew the players’ names. They knew their families. They were their neighbors. They were family and friends. The fans were an extension of the teams.

And win or lose, the fans returned every Sunday.

Mighty Casey did strike out, bringing no joy to Mudville.

But in Sans Souci beyond a roller coaster at an amusement park, and on a hill in Glen Lyon, and in towns across Luzerne County, joy was always around.

Because these were hometown boys playing for the hometown teams.

The Little League pledge ends with, “I will play fair and strive to win. But win or lose, I will always do my best.”

That’s how the Smilers and Condors and all those other players on all those other teams approached the game of baseball.

It was for the love of the game and for playing the game they loved.