Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, August 18, 1993 TAG: 9308180028
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B1 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE: Jack Bogaczyk
DATELINE: LENGTH: Medium
Pros are paid to play. NABA players pay to play. Diamonds are these boys' best friends.
The NABA, founded nine years ago in San Diego, has arrived in Roanoke. It seems that's long overdue, considering the response the director of the association's local chapter received when he ran an advertisement in this newspaper for players and managers.
Roanoke's Randall Holley built it; they're coming.
Some ready-made teams phoned. Another 72 unattached players showed up for tryouts. Holley, a Franklin County native who is a computer programmer for Structural Software Co., has 15 teams from the Roanoke Valley, Blacksburg, Covington and Lynchburg in three divisions. Each will play a 12-game schedule beginning Aug. 29.
The Roanoke NABA league inherited a few teams from the unaffiliated Virginia Adult Baseball League, which has presented Holley with more than a few preseason problems - like explaining the VABL, with some unpaid bills, is no kin to the NABA.
The NABA has sprouted in more than 100 U.S. cities since 1984, and Roanoke's chapter in the third in the state, joining those in Lynchburg and Virginia Beach. It really is a grass-roots league, and the premise for its founding can be located down memory lane.
Remember the days when boys and men who played baseball in high school and college moved on to play Sunday afternoons for town teams or in industrial or church leagues? When those leagues folded, those players were left with softball, mostly slowpitch.
"Since we've run the ad, I've gotten calls every day," Holley said. "I come home and listen to my messages and return them. The players are pretty much all the same. After they played baseball in high school or college, they miss the game. Maybe they're tired of softball. I'm surprised at the response."
A player pays $65 a season in the NABA. That buys a T-shirt and $3,000 of accident and health insurance. All other equipment and uniform pieces are furnished by the player. Each team is responsible for its own bats and catchers' gear. The league rents fields or makes a maintenance or equipment donation for use of a diamond.
Holley, 28, never played at Franklin County High School or Elon College, although he did live across the dorm hallway from Colorado Rockies pitcher Greg Harris. Holley was attracted by a newspaper advertisement, and he called NABA national director Mike Micheli in San Diego. After three or four more conversations and some paperwork, Holley became the NABA local chapter's Kenesaw Mountain Landis.
"I did this because I just enjoy the game," Holley said.
He oversees two leagues - recreational and advanced - for players age 18-29 and another division for those 30-65. Yes, you can be a paying member of both the NABA and AARP.
After this year's late-starting season, the clubs will start a 24-game season next April. If you missed signups, you've missed the NABA player draft. If you want to play, put your name on Holley's answering machine. New players will be added to a replacement pool for those who are injured or quit.
The NABA has a budget it uses in leagues across the nation. Of the player fees collected, one-fourth of the pot goes to rent fields. Another 18 percent goes to the national organizing office in San Diego, 16 percent for insurance. Holley's 7.5 percent commission as Roanoke director is part of the 10.5 percent that is used for administration on the local level.
The NABA certainly doesn't appear to be a fly-by-night operation, and not just because it will play on Sunday afternoons.
by CNB