BlueSox boosters enjoy reunion years after baseball team’s final game
They were formed to help a baseball franchise succeed.
They succeeded by helping each other.
The Butler BlueSox Booster Club — an organization of nearly 100 members that fed the team after home games, assisted in organizing host families for the players and helped set up ballpark promotions from 2011 through 2018 — enjoyed a reunion Friday evening at Natili’s North in Butler.
About 30 members showed up for the event, organized by BlueSox boosters Terry Steighner and Judy Wadding.
“I’ve missed these people ... such a nice group of people,” Wadding said. “I just wanted to see them again.”
The original Butler BlueSox, a summer collegiate team, came to town for the 2009 season. Leo Trich was the original owner before selling the team a couple of years after to a local ownership group headed by attorney William “Wink” Robinson.
The BlueSox competed in the Prospect League, comprised of teams in West Virginia, Ohio, Indiana and Illinois. The league still exists today, though the BlueSox folded after the 2018 season due to financial concerns.
Butler kept the BlueSox name and a new team was formed to compete in the Tri-State Collegiate League, a more localized setup. The boosters have not been a part of that organization.
But they remember the Prospect League’s BlueSox.
“We played in the league championship series in 2017 (losing two games to one) and packed Pullman Park,” BlueSox boosters president Larry Sassone recalled. “The team played one more year, and it was over.
“That void has never been filled.”
LaDonna Young, who served as treasurer of the BlueSox Boosters, agreed.
“For years, we were together, seemingly every other night during the summer in that ballpark,” she said. “We became a family. We tailgated, did cookouts, steak fry, a lot of things together. Then, just like that, it was gone.
“It’s like having your child go away to college and never come home. I haven’t been back to Pullman Park since. I can’t bring myself to go there.”
Steighner said it still hurts “to even drive by the ballpark. Losing the BlueSox was like a death in the family. That’s how much this meant to me.”
Many of the BlueSox booster members also served as host families, giving the collegiate players a home to live in during the summer season. Young’s father, Ronald Campbell, now 90, was part of a host family himself.
“Those boys were like grandsons to him,” Young said. “He traveled to their road games, too. Most of the players gave him shirts from the colleges they played for. He still wears those shirts today.
“The families of these players appreciated us as much as we enjoyed hosting the kids. They see their sons go off for the summer to live with a family they don’t even know. With our boosters group, they were being taken care of by a village, not just a family. I think the players’ parents were always thankful for that.”
The BlueSox Boosters offered towels, mugs and shirts to people who joined their organization. Their fundraisers included golf outings and a Christmas cookie exchange.
“I remember storing 10,000 cookies in our garage,” Steighner said, laughing.
The Boosters organized a bobblehead night featuring the team mascot, Babe The Ox, among other promotional giveaways to fans.
“We were just a bunch of people who wanted to help out,” Sassone said. “We knew the BlueSox were good for Butler. We all felt that way, and it didn’t take us long to become a family.”
Kevan Smith and David Bednar are former BlueSox players who reached the major leagues. Ryan Fitzgerald, a former BlueSox shortstop, was recently called up by the Kansas City Royals.
Sassone proudly displayed a Ryan Fitzgerald bobblehead from the season the latter played for Worcester, Mass., in the Boston Red Sox minor league system.
“The players haven’t forgotten us, and we haven’t forgotten them,” Sassone said. “Many of those guys still keep in touch with their host families here. Bonds were formed that will last a lifetime.”
And the BlueSox Boosters haven’t forgotten each other.
“I remember the steak fry at the end of the season ... It was a fun group, just a good time,” Wadding said.
