13 Hundreds take part THEY CERTAINLY WILL COME
By MILOS BLAGOJEVIC Special to The Daily Press
MID-CITY — On paper, there’s nothing special about the Buffos.
They’re 1-0 this season, with their victory coming against Dirty Dozen in a tiebreaker on Aug. 2, following a first-game bye.
But it’s not the stats or the numbers that make the Buffos — one of dozens of teams playing softball in Santa Monica — unique. The Buffos, or Big Ugly F****** Fat Old Slobs, have been playing in Santa Monica’s adult softball league since 1972.
That was 34 years ago. Richard Nixon was in his first term as president as the Watergate scandal began to unfold, “The Price is Right” debuted on CBS, and newborn Shaquille O’Neal was roughly six feet shorter.
“Obviously, we enjoy playing in Santa Monica and it’s just a natural thing to do, to sign up for the leagues,” said Buffos’ coach and player Mike Bell, 56.“We understand how the league works, we keep going and we always wonder when we’re going to quit.”
The Buffos are just one of hundreds of teams taking part in Santa Monica’s rich and expansive adult sports program, which has been around since the mid-1960s.
The program features softball, basketball and volleyball, with plans to add soccer and a softball seniors league in the near future, according to Ray Fitzpatrick, the city’s community sports program supervisor for the last 24 years.
As for Bell’s squad, well, they just feature too much intrigue to quit just yet.
Founded in 1972 as Bell’s Auto Service — taking a sponsorship from Bell’s father’s shop on Pico Boulevard — by Bell and four fellow Santa Monica College students, the team has only featured its R-rated name since 1982.
“We lost our sponsorship in 1982 and somebody had a dog by the name of Buffo,” said Bell, a former logistics manager in the aerospace industry.“We made what it stands for — it somehow evolved into meaning something.”
Today, the team members include police-men, private businessmen and an ex-middle school principal, with five of the original members — including Bell — still on the current roster.
But another reason giving the players pause before hanging up their cleats is more practical — they got game. The Buffos have won a league championship in every decade since the team’s inception, with the latest title coming in 2005.
“We don’t have a win-at-all-costs attitude, so we could’ve actually won more championships,” said Bell, whose team currently plays in the Wednesday Men's “C-” Softball League. “With that philosophy, you wouldn’t last 24 years.
“You have to keep things in perspective, remember you’re playing with friends. We’re here to have fun.”
Close to 2,000 participants take part in the city’s recreation leagues on a weekly basis. Games are staged daily at Memorial Park’s softball fields and inside its 10,000-square foot gymnasium. For a minimal fee specific to each sport, Santa Monica residents can test their team’s strength against other local competition.
“Any time you create a place for the people to take their leisure time and have a great recreational experience, it’s good for the community,” Fitzpatrick said. “The last survey we put out, we got a 99.5 percent total rating, which is excellent.”
Fitzpatrick said that between 330 and 350 adult sports teams take part each year, with the teams being put in leagues based on skill level. Leagues range from the highest skill level of an “A” team to the lowest skill set, which is “D-.”
“We’re pretty user-friendly,” said Fitzpatrick. “We don’t do a lot of what I call ‘fitting the round hole with the square peg.’ We don’t have a formula in which we try and fit teams into. We don’t care how good or bad they are. We have some leagues with seven teams, some with nine. It takes time to balance leagues out.
“When we do that, it’s a better recreation experience.”
Fitzpatrick said that Santa Monica has become renowned throughout the area for its rich rec leagues, which have grown considerably under his tenure as program supervisor. With just 10 co-ed softball teams when he began in 1982, the Santa Monica leagues now feature 80. The men’s league has swelled from 42 teams to more than 110. As for the women’s league, Santa Monica is the only city on the Westside that even offers such a league.
“Most of the leagues have doubled or tripled in the time I’ve been here,” said Fitzpatrick.“There’s fathers and sons playing together, fathers and daughters, husbands and wives... that’s what’s going on out there. It’s a nice aspect of the leagues’ successes.”
Registration for the leagues are continuous, but they do fill up quickly, according to Fitzpatrick. Softball can be played throughout the year,with up to three seasons being offered.
Softball begins in the summer and costs $330 for a co-ed or women’s team to register and $350 for a men’s team to register. Basketball, a spring sport, costs $250 and volleyball, which costs $200 per team, begins in the fall.
“The league fees help offset the cost of the program,” Fitzpatrick said. “We go around and survey other cities, see what they’re charging, and determine our rates like that, trying to keep ours in the comparable amount.
Fitzpatrick added that the programs bring in $110,000 annually.
But no sport, whether professional or recreational, would be complete without officiating.
Fitzpatrick said that independent contractors furnish referees and umpires to the program, with softball umpires getting paid $30 per game, volleyball officials getting $24 per game and basketball officials getting $20 per game. Basketball is the only sport that features two officials per game.
“We want people to come out and have a recreational experience,” Fitzpatrick said. “The last thing we want is for you to go away thinking about the officials.
“We want you to leave thinking about the game, and if you leave thinking about the officials, we’re failing in providing a good recreational experience.”
For more information on Santa Monica’s community sports, go to www.santamonicasports.com, or call Fitzpatrick at (310) 458-2244. (Staff Writer Michael J. Tittinger contributed to the reporting of this story.)
Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on August 12, 2006. Read the original PDF.