By Richard Like, Hadley
Thank you for the nice article about amateur baseball (July 22 Daily Globe). As an avid Hadley Buttermaker fan,and active supporter, I share many of your thoughts about small-town ball teams and their fans.
Over the years, we have lost many teams representing area towns as our rural population declines and people have so many choices of what to do with their time. Also, many potential players don’t want to commit themselves to being there once or twice every week, unless they are guaranteed that they will play regularly.
Reading the article brought out emotions I had not known existed in me, or had given any thought to. The idea of losing our town team actually brought tears to my eyes. A few hours at a Buttermaker ballgame, or any amateur ballgame, is a few hours with good friends and neighbors, celebrating our rural lifestyle and supporting and caring about each other. It’s way more enjoyable than complaining that there is nowhere to go and nothing to do.
There is rarely a game when some of the conversation doesn’t fade back to days of old and baseball memories. Fond memories revisited by old “regular” ballplayers, “benchsitters” (like myself) and fans who have gone to the games for many, many years.
Once again thank you for writing this article, which puts things in perspective and rekindles some of those memories. Today’s games will be the memories of tomorrow, for years to come.
