COMMUNITY SPOTLIGHT: Local softball players still getting it done in their 70s

MICHELLE NOLAN - THE BELLINGHAM HERALD

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Les Hanson is the softball version of a senior golfer who can shoot his age.

By the time the 73-year-old Ferndale resident finishes playing in three tournaments this month in three states, he will have played more than twice as many games this season as his age.

The only number Hanson really cares about, though, is No. 1.

| COURTESY PHOTO

Hanson, who estimates he has pitched in 135 slowpitch games this year, once again is back playing on the same team with Bellingham residents Jack Hofeditz, 70, and Jim Pope, 71. They're hoping to help win the Major Division championship for the Seattle Seventies during the Huntsman Senior Games in St. George, Utah.

The three buddies played for the Class AAA world champion Richmond (B.C.) Olde Boys in 2000, when they were all in the 65s divison.

Hanson also will play in a 65s tournament in Mesquite, Nev.,for a Wenatchee team before the Huntsman Games event Oct. 12-16. Then they'll head for the World Championships in Phoenix with the Seattle Seventies.

All three men were fans of the Pacific Coast League while growing up in the era before Major League Baseball reached the West Coast a half-century ago.

They all played baseball well in high school and developed a love for the game. They still play hardball, so to speak, when it comes to senior slowpitch.

"Hey, we're going there to win," said Hanson, explaining how general manager Joe Horell's Seattle Seventies is a senior version of a kids' select team. "We're going all out. We have a new name (they were formerly the Eastside Seventies, for whom Hanson also won a world title) and a new team this year. We have outstanding players from all over Northwest Washington."

In fact, the team began the year in the AA division (the lowest ranking) but was promoted to the Major Division (second behind Major Plus). The local threesome helped win tournaments in Wenatchee, Sequim, Shelton and Reno, and finished third in Portland.

Hanson, who played baseball and basketball at Ferndale High, and Hofeditz, an all-state second baseman for Bellingham High in 1956, met Pope after he retired to Bellingham 11 years ago. Pope was still fit following a long career as a physical education teacher in Southern California.

"The first question I asked about Bellingham was, 'Do they have senior softball?' " Pope said, laughing at the memory of his intensity. "I didn't want to be without softball. I've been playing it for 18 years, ever since I got hooked in my 50s."

"I got lucky when Terry Jorgenson (a successful Bellingham softball manager) introduced Jim to me," said Hanson, who formerly fielded his own team. "Terry wanted to know if I could use Jim for a tournament."

Hofeditz, who is retired after working 45 years at Hohl Feed and Seed Co., is the son of Ty Cobb Hofeditz, who was a Bellingham Bells baseball star in the 1940s and 1950s. In fact, he gave Jack the middle name Jerome in honor of 1930s pitching sensation Jerome Hanna "Dizzy" Dean.

Hanson, a retired salesman, has built a keen reputation over four decades of slowpitch as an accurate hurler.

"That's what really counts in slowpitch," he said. "Just don't walk 'em."

Hanson, though, never expected to play slowpitch when he was a fastpitch enthusiast right out of high school, in the days when there were hundreds of fastpitch teams spread around the state.

"I was selling cars in 1967 for Mount Baker Motors, and I sold a car to a fellow I knew from high school," Hanson said. "He asked me if I would come out and play slowpich with him. I asked, 'What kind of game is that?' "

Hanson soon found out he liked it. Now in his 42nd season of slowpitch, Hanson has long since learned to love the game. So has his wife, Anna Marie, who has been married to Les for nearly 55 years and has kept score of far too many games to count.

"Hey, Anna Marie was a tough scorekeeper," Pope said. "She wouldn't give you a hit unless you really earned it."

Hofeditz, who played 20 years of fastpitch during the sport's glory days before switching to slowpitch, still amazes his teammates.

"If Jack doesn't have any blood on him when the game's over, he hasn't been playing," Hanson said.

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Wednesday, Oct. 01, 2008

COMMUNITY SPOTLIGHT: Local softball players still getting it done in their 70s

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