The rain has been making puddles all morning on the baseball diamond at Portage Park. It’s 10 AM and there’s a lull in the storm, but this doesn’t look like a good Sunday to play ball. The Chicago Lite Seniors 12-inch softball team has seen a lot of rain outs, so they’re prepared. Out come the players from their midsize luxury cars. Out come the folding beach chairs. Out come the cigars. The 13 men who showed up want to play, but a pulled muscle means more at 60 than at 16.
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From 1949 to 1963 14 of the 29 men on this team played together as the Kolski-Boosters Semi-Pro Baseball Team, a traveling team that won ten league titles and the 1954 Illinois state title. That year they also placed seventh in the national semipro tournament, held in Wichita, Kansas. At the same time they were playing 16-inch softball, amassing 1,270 wins and only 170 losses, winning dozens of league titles and the 1958 state title.
Mozdzierz manages the team with Tom Hoffman, 67, who’s arguing in the parking lot with Leo Twarowski, 70, about the rules in another softball league in which they play on different teams. Twarowski says Hoffman’s team tried to break the rules by using unqualified pinch runners. Ted Hoffman, 62, is trying to calm down his brother.
“It’s not your problem, so shut your mouth,” Tom says. “He comes over here and starts talking, and I’m just over here–I got a beef, and I’m gonna defend it.”
“I went to church yesterday,” Parker says.
“So you didn’t go to the track?” Parker asks.
“That’s because you’ve been taking me to the track all the time–I’ve been sitting down all the time!” Parker says.
