Pony League champs celebrate 50th anniversary
Take me out to the ball game
Take me out to the crowd.
Buy me some peanuts and Cracker Jack
I don’t care if I ever get back,
‘Cause it’s root, root, root
For the home team.
If they don’t win it’s a shame.
For it’s one, two, three strikes
You’re out
At the old ball game.
“Take me out to the ball game”
By Charles Sercombe
Fifty years ago this summer, Hamtramck had baseball fever.
No, it wasn’t the Detroit Tigers that residents here were crazy about.
It was the city’s Pony League team that was handpicked to represent Hamtramck in the Pony League World Series held in Pennsylvania.
The year was 1961, just two years after Hamtramck won the Little League World Series.
Many of the same kids from the Little League team were off once again to represent Hamtramck.
And once again, our boys came back as world champs.
This weekend, the National Pony League office will commemorate the 50th anniversary of that 1961 win in-between World Series games in Washington, Pennsylvania. Only two of the players will be able to make it: Stan Nalepa and Alan Shulgon.
Baseball isn’t quite the sport is once was around here. Fifty years ago, though, it was everything. In fact, Hamtramck had been a powerhouse in sports for many years back then: on the football gridiron, the tennis courts, in basketball and on the baseball diamond.
Heck, if there had been a hockey team, Hamtramck would have likely excelled in that too.
For a boy in Hamtramck in the 1950s and 1960s, it was no easy thing to get on a baseball team and be able to play all the time. The competition was tough.
Nalepa remembers being consumed with the game from the moment he got up in the morning to the moment he flopped on bed to go to sleep at night.
“Besides my marriage and the birth of my kids, baseball was number one,” he said. “I loved it.”
Stan was 13 at the time of the World Series, and he played just a few innings in it. He made one standout play, though, that helped his teammates pull ahead to victory.
It’s a funny story.
Stan was up to bat, and it was important for him to move up the runner on base. The coach took him aside before he went to the plate and told him “use your head.”
Now, the way Stan tells it, that could have meant for him to be careful at what he swung at, or literally, “use your head” – heh-heh, wink-wink.
Yes, Stan used his head all right. He dipped his head forward into a pitch — and boink! — got beaned in the helmet.
The coach took him out and let Shulgon run in Stan’s place. You know, to make sure Stan was OK.
Shulgon remembers that season as a “long, hard grind.”
“It took a lot of discipline,” he said.
Compared to today, Shulgon said, there is no comparison to how the game is played. Back then, there was no rule that forces today’s coaches to make sure every kid plays in every game.
“You’d go out there to win,” Shulgon said. “Today, it’s become goody two-shoes.”
Some of the Pony League players went on to play professional ball. Probably the most well-known player of that era was Art “Pinky” Deras. He not only threw no-hitters, he could mash the ball as a batter.
Consider these stats:
Pitching-wise, he had an 18-0 record that included 16 shutouts and 10 no-hitters.
He struck out 298 batters.
As a batter, he had a .641 average, hit 33 home runs and knocked in 112 runs.
That was when Deras was in Little League.
Those stats will never be surpassed because today’s Little League rules curtail how many innings pitchers can pitch, besides a bunch of other new rules. That means Deras’ record will remain immortal.
Deras’ accomplishments are so outstanding that a documentary has been made about him called: “The Legend of Pinky Deras.”
It will be shown on Aug. 27 on Major League Baseball’s cable TV channel. The time of the showing isn’t known yet, but it will be air sometime in the afternoon.
Deras eventually went on to play in the Major Leagues, and then after baseball he became a police officer for Warren.
Locally, he’s still remembered and revered. Last week, city officials and others gathered at the corner of Dan and Jos. Campau for the unveiling of a street marker honoring Deras.
It reads: “Art ‘Pinky’ Deras Way, The greatest Little Leaguer there ever was.”
Indeed. Indeed.
9 Responses to Pony League champs celebrate 50th anniversary
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Lynn Hall
March 23, 2015 at 7:37 pm
Hamtramck pony league. I remember that team well.
In 1964 or 1965 … if memory serves me well … I played in a tournament against your boys. I pitched a 1 hitter in the 1st round & hit the winning single. I got carried off on my teams shoulders. We lost the next round & your boys defeated us in the finals.
I played in the Detroit Joe Koppe pony league.
Played out of Patton Park.
Hamtramck was a very polished team.Solid at all positions. I hope they won it all. Back then – baseball was king. We lived & breathed baseball 24/7.
Frank Rodriguez
June 22, 2018 at 1:17 pm
I was the pitcher for Southside Pony league that pitched against Art Deras. We both pitched 9 innings to a 1 to 1 draw. We would have won the game in seven innings but an error in the 6th inning allowed a run to score for a 1 to. 1 tie!
Rob
October 24, 2018 at 8:02 pm
Hamtramck beat our Bridgeport, CT team 2 to 1. I started at 2nd base for Bridgeport. Art Deras outdualed Brian Shannon. We were loaded with talent also. Jack Kvancz went on to star in basketball at Boston College. Dave Bike , our catcher, was all New England in basketball and signed with the Detroit Tigers. Deras was dominant due to his size and strength. Great memories! Rob Cockfield
Rob
October 24, 2018 at 8:05 pm
Frank I think you beat Bridgeport, Ct to get to the finals. I played 2nd base for Bridgeport. You pitched for San Antonio. Right? Rob Cockfield
Mario ruiz
June 19, 2023 at 5:52 am
Poney world series national City roster name’s of players.
David Wolfe
August 28, 2023 at 1:15 pm
Our Pony/Colt all-star team played Hamtramck in Maumee, Ohio in the regionals Deras shut us out and hit a home run. We lost 1 – 0. He had beaten us in a Little League regional final in Birmingham, Michigan two years earlier. A royal pain for us, but some great memories nevertheless. Deras was amazing. He didn’t play pro ball. He played in the Cardinals farm system for a while. But legendary.
Frank Rodriguez
April 15, 2024 at 8:52 pm
Rob your right south side Pony League beat Brigetport 5 to 1 . I pitched against a pitcher named George Mackey, Frank Rodriguez. That year I won 19 games and lost 1.
Bob Mueller
August 17, 2024 at 11:44 am
In 1961, our team from Oak Park-River Forest Illinois, who won the 1960 Pony League World series played Hamtramck, the winner of the 1959 Little league World Series. In 1960 we played a normal double elimination tournament, but in 1961 the tournament changed it’s format and they put our two teams in a 2 out of 3 match so one of the defending champion were eliminated. We had the fortune to face ‘Pinky” in our first game. He was all we read about in the articles prior to the game. We did hit two home runs against him but we ended up losing in extra innings. In a side note, I can remember the first time we saw Art “pinky” Deras was we entered the college where everyone stayed and he was sitting in a chair smoking a corn cobb pipe, very intimadating. Great memories and he always comes up in our reunions when the three of us 13-year-olds in 1960, talk about the 1960 championship. By the way, he “ONLY” hit a couple of triples against us, no home runs. It was an honor to face him !
Bob Mueller
October 21, 2024 at 5:14 am
In 1961, our Pony League team from Oak Park-River Forest, Illinois, faced Hamtramck at the World Series in Washington, Pennsylvania, The previous year, 1960, we were the winners of the Pony League World Series. In 1960, we p-layed in a normal double elimination tournament with a winners and losers bracket. We lost our first game to West Covina, California 5 to 4. We kept winning in the losers bracket and eventually we played West Covina for the championship and beat them by the same score of 5 to 4. In 1961, Pony changed the format of play and we had to play Hamtramck in a best of three game playoff. Hamtramck won the 1959 Little league tournament and Oak Park-River Forest won the 1960 Pony League World Series championship. This way one of the World Series champions would be eliminated from this 2 out of 3 series. We had to face Art “Pinky” Deras in the first game and he was everything that we had read about him in the many articles about him dominating every year he played baseball. I can still remember arriving at the hotel/dorms we stayed at in Washington, Pennsylvania and there sitting in a chair was Pinky smoking a corn cob pipe. It was very intimidating ! We lost to Hamtramck in extra innings as our pitcher, Bob Sabatino, was just as dominating as Pinky. My best friend, Tom Williams and I were LUCKY enough to hit home runs to keep the game close but we lost in extra innings. The next game we opened up to go ahead in the first inning 3 to 0. I think we woke up the beasts as they scored the next 13 or so runs and we lost by the slaughter rule. We HELD Pinky to two triples in that game but no home runs. When I looked back at the scores for the rest of the World series I think the teams that played Hamtramck after us were either shut out or scored 1 run. It was an honor to face the “legend” and have great memories from some 63 years later.