Utica Blue Sox

New York-Penn League (1977-2001)

Background

The Utica Blue Sox were a long-running entry in the New York-Penn League. The Blue Sox got off to a grim start in 1981. The team was formerly known as the Utica Blue Jays but the Toronto Blue Jays, Utica’s Major League parent club since 1977, pulled out at the end of the 1980 season. The atrocious condition of Utica’s Murnane Field deterred other Major League teams from filling the opening.

Utica’s 1981 owner, Joe Bellino, re-named his team the Utica Blue Sox, which was a call back to an earlier Utica ballclub of the same name that played in the Eastern League from 1944 to 1950. Utica spent the next five summers wandering in the wilderness, unable to attract Major League sponsorship and operating as one of the only independent (non-Major League affiliated) minor league baseball teams in America.

One of those summers is worth exploring a further length here.

1983: Good Enough To Dream

The Utica Blue Sox were the only independent ball club in America in the summer of 1983.  In the 1990’s a rash of wholly independent baseball leagues would spring up all over the United States.  But back in 1983, playing independent ball wasn’t a choice – it was a sentence.  Playing independent meant that no Major League organization was willing to entrust you with their prospects.

Prior to the 1983 season, Boys of Summer author and baseball romantic Roger Kahn bought a controlling interest in the Blue Sox for around $25,000. Kahn got into his Blue Sox adventure with the singular intention of generating material for a book.  In the meantime, his personal notoriety generated considerably national coverage for the 1983 Blue Sox. Even People Magazine got into the act – a magazine that typically showed as much interest in minor league baseball as it did in Utica, New York.

On the field, the Blue Sox were led by 31-year old manager Jim Gattis, himself a veteran of several independent ball clubs of the 1970’s.  Gattis’ team of old and unwanted players surprisingly won the New York-Penn League championship in 1983, adding a little extra drama to Kahn’s book-in-progress.  Nevertheless, none of the 29 players who saw action for the Blue Sox that summer ever made it to the Major Leagues.

Kahn’s book, Good Enough To Dream, came out in 1985 to generally positive reviews.  By then Kahn was out of the business . He had owned the Blue Sox for only the one season. He was a dabbler – unlike many of his fellow stockholders. The ’83 Blue Sox had more than a dozen investors, including many of the men who went on to lead independent baseball movement of the 1990’s: Durham Bulls owner Miles Wolff, actor Bill Murray, New York Yankees minority partner Marv Goldklang and the investor/recruiter Evander Schley. Schley’s Texas Stars Baseball, Inc. specialized in recruiting discarded minor leaguers and selling their contracts back into affiliated baseball. Schley had stocked the Blue Sox with players since 1981 and he helped Gattis assemble the 1983 championship team.

The book reportedly aggravated some of those associated with the Blue Sox and required extensive legal wrangling to make it into print.  1983 manager Jim Gattis told The Los Angeles Times in a 1994 retrospective that he “hated” the book for years, before later making peace with it.

Trivia

A key member of the 1983 Good Enough To Dream team was 29-year old player/coach Barry Moss. The 12-year minor league veteran was the oldest every day player in the New York-Penn League in 1983.  Moss went on to a long and respected career as an scout, manager and recruiter, working alongside Schley in independent leagues.  In the 2011 film adaptation of Moneyball, Moss has a brief speaking role alongside Brad Pitt and Jonah Hill as an Oakland A’s scout identified simply as “Scout Barry”.

Utica Blue Sox Shop

In Memoriam

Manager Ken Brett (Blue Sox ’85) died following a six-year battle with brain cancer on November 18, 2003 at age 55. Los Angeles Times obituary.

Downloads

7-30-1983 Blue Sox vs. Auburn Astros Game Notes

Links

New York-Penn League Media Guides

New York-Penn League Programs

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