2025 70+ Central

Chicago North TSP Fire 10, Sacramento Tribe 3

Submitted by Dan Gooris, manager

The 2025 edition of the Chicago Fire 70’s faced some adversity during pool play. Bob Buffa, one of our starting pitchers/infielders, had to stay back home with a medical issue, and our field general behind the plate, Ron Oates, broke his hand during a play at the plate on Wednesday. Despite these two setbacks, we were still able to finish pool play with a 3-2 record.

We were fortunate to add another solid catcher, Gary May, and a solid pitching staff under the leadership of Bart Zeller. Tom Pomatto gave us several big game innings on a knee that was scheduled to be replaced one month after his final pitch in the championship game. Other pitchers of note during the week were Dan Drake, Larry Yoho, Dave Fairman, and Jack Hay.

Our defense was strong with George Karas and Dan Moss picking up their game to cover the loss of Buffa, in addition to Dennis Fischer in center field, who made the game-saving catch on a shot with bases loaded in an 11-10 nail-biter against Red Deer.

On offense, our big hitters were Joel Polakoff .666, Dan Moss .500, Mark Sena .476, and Dennis Fischer .450.

Coaching quality baseball players who are also great teammates makes my job easy. The beauty of the game is that you can bring 16 veteran Fire players to Arizona, add seven new faces, and from our first game on, we played as a team.