One sports success story a year is enough for any family.

The Bednar family did not stop there.

Retired Mars Area High School baseball coach Andy Bednar has been busier with the sport this year than in any season he spent coaching the Planets.

His son, David, gets traded to the Pittsburgh Pirates during the offseason and the family was able to see him pitch in the Bucs' 2021 home opener at PNC Park.

One of the most consistent relief pitchers in the Pirate bullpen, David recently secured his first win in the major leagues. He's got 38 strikeouts in 30 innings pitched this season.

Not bad for a guy who was a 35th-round draft choice by the San Diego Padres.

While getting to PNC Park when he can to watch David pitch, Andy Bednar spent much of this spring hitting the road — or catching a flight — to watch another son, Will, pitch for Mississippi State.

He went 9-1 this season, struck out 15 Texas hitters in the College World Series semifinal round, then tossed six no-hit innings in the CWS title-clinching win over Vanderbilt.

Will was 2-0 in three CWS mound appearances, striking out 26, walking six and allowing only five hits in 18.1 innings pitched. He was named the CWS Most Outstanding Player for his efforts.

His MLB draft stock was pretty high before the College World Series.

It's through the roof now.

While older brother David was in Denver with the Pirates when that final CWS game started, he did not miss Will's performance.

He began watching the game in the clubhouse after the Pirate game. He continued watching it on the bus ride to the airport. He watched the rest of it on the plane flying back to Pittsburgh.

This is a close-knit family, after all.

Their younger sister, Danielle, a shortstop for the Mars softball team, added to the siblings' sports success of 2021 by accepting a scholarship from Saint Francis University earlier this year.

Danielle joined her family in Omaha to watch Will pitch in the College World Series. While doing so, her travel softball team, Team Pennsylvania Sroka, was placing second out of 98 teams at the prestigious Scenic City Summer Showcase in Chattanooga, Tenn.

All of us will remember the spring and summer of 2021 as the time we finally began emerging from the COVID-19 pandemic.

But this family will remember 2021 as a year of transition in a lot of ways.

David is establishing himself as a major league pitcher with closer potential.

Will has thrust his name into the national spotlight and may be a first-round draft choice — certainly in the top three rounds — in a week or so.

Danielle knows where she's extending her academic and softball career.

Good things truly do happen to good people.

John Enrietto is sports editor of the Butler Eagle