Following is Rick Cabral's induction speech at the 2025 Sacramento Baseball/LaSalle Club Hall of Fame: February 15
I want to thank this Hall of Fame committee for their consideration in voting me in to this illustrious and prestigious baseball body. Kudos to Joe MacNamara and Keith Cherry for their fife work in putting on this event.
I’d also like to thank everyone who came out to support me tonight, including my daughter and her husband, Regina and Jim Jones, plus their son Desi… and my son Alexander and grandson Max Cabral—all the way from Maryland. Pius, I have other family and long-time friends from Christian Brothers here as well
~ ~
As a boy growing up in south Sacramento, I frequently heard the expression “Sacramento is a great baseball town.” I heard it quite often like a Central Valley mantra. And as I’ve grown older-- it’s resonated throughout my lifetime.
In the mid-1950s and early 60s the signs were everywhere. Notably, at the corner of Riverside and Broadway where the Sacramento Solons played home games at Edmonds Field. For a long-time that location was our town’s minor league ballpark.
Or William Land Park, where youth baseball and pick-up games could be found on any one of a half-dozen ballfields starting with Diamond No. One—Joe Duarte Field, which is where I played my Colt League, Christian Brothers high school and Southside American Legion home games. Plus a bunch more.
~ ~ ~
Most kids were inspired by their fathers to play baseball. But mine wasn’t much of a ball player nor did he care much for baseball until I came around. RICHARD CABRAL was an artist, but he signed on to coach a few of my teams and work me out over at the park. And eventually he grew to love the sport.
Just as his father MANUEL—a Portuguese immigrant from the Azores Islands—who turned out a huge Solons fan. I recall one evening ... family gathered in our living room. My grandfather started looking through my stack of baseball cards. He paused after chuckling “Oh… SANDY KOUFAX.” He turned the card toward me and that began my fascination with the left-hander from Los Angeles—who over a five-year period—posted the greatest streak of big league pitching anyone can remember. Point being… Grandpa knew Sandy and passed it on to me.
And, I can’t leave out my mother AILEEN ROGERS who was brought up on the Solons. Her farming family would ride from the Pocket to the ballpark when the gates opened up around the fifth inning just to watch a few innings of “free” Solons baseball as the hot summer nights cooled down. So Richard and Aileen were big supporters of mine from the start.
~ ~ ~
Funny story... on the day of my very first Little League practice with the Giants, my dad drove us to Land Park, past the duck pond and parked near a chain-link backstop. Not a soul was there. He turned to my mother, “You sure you got it right? No one here.”
My dad looked up and saw a couple of boys playing at a diamond further down. He drove up next Diamond No. 2 and walked up to the boys, who stopped for a moment to answer his question. When dad got back in the car, mom asked “Did they know?”
My dad fumed, “Little weisenheimers. I asked if they knew where the Giants were practicing. And one kid goes “Yeah—San Francisco.”
My father drove around the complex and ended up at that same chain-link backstop, where now a half-dozen boys in yellow caps were playing catch. I scrambled out of the car and joined them. That began my first day of Pacific Little League.
Our team the Giants—ended up winning the minors championship. In that title game, we defeated the Rams 12-7. The team celebrated on the field. Then the coach Phil Fougere told us to meet up at Vic’s Ice Cream on Riverside Blvd. Nice way to end the season and my start in Youth Baseball.
~ ~ ~
The following year, I was promoted to the majors by CHARLIE SCHANZ, a former major league pitcher and Solons player in the ‘50s. In those three years our team won the majors title two out of three. So while I played for Charlie, I got a great appreciation for the basic skills, sportsmanship and a ton of fun.
From there I played 3 years in the Land Park Pony & Colt League system, followed by 3 years at Christian Brothers High and Southside American Legion. I got more great coaching from men like: MANUEL PERRY, my uncle, plus Christian Brothers’ coach RON LIMEBERGER and Southside’s skipper, BURT BONOMI.
To show Bonomi's level of coaching... once during a Legion game, Burt saw me on deck warming up my swing. He sensed a side of negativism and asked what was wrong. "I'm not hitting, Coach. Just can't connect with the pitch." Burt replied "Just relax" he said before returning to his third base coaching spot.
"Oh, sure. Easy for you to say," I grumbled while walking to the batter's box. As I dug in the box, I tested his little mantra and reminded myself to "relax." Sure enough, when the pitch came in I socked it into right-center field for a triple. When I met Coach Bonomi at third base, he threw out his arms, smiled and said, "See? Just relax." His advice brought a long-overdue smile to my face. And I was officially out of my batting slump.
~ ~ ~
Around mid-to-late ‘80s Sacramento was in a fervor about bringing pro baseball “back to Sac.”
Coincidentally I began working here in town as the PR director for Connolly Development.
While digging through Ted’s file I found a great story that Mr. Connolly was a former All-Pro lineman for the 49ers. And the story centered on Ted being first NFL player to bring an attorney in for contract negotiations. But it wasn’t done to increase his salary.
See Ted, a real estate salesman, saw that the contract referenced see Addendum “A or Addendum “B” but there was nothing attached to the contract. Ted brought in an attorney who pleaded his case to 49ers management. But they wouldn’t listen and told him “Just sign the contract, Connolly.”
Ted held out. The NFL brass got involved and like the 49ers demanded Connolly stop bucking the system and just sign the damn contract! Finally, the 49ers traded Ted to the Cleveland Browns, where he was part of the offensive line that cleared the way for running back Jim Brown, who that year set the NFL single-season rushing record of 1863 yards.
I wrote the story and Sac Bee editor Bill Conlin liked the piece, massaged it and ran it in his column. It praised Ted Connolly, the professional football trailblazer: the first gridiron player to be represented by a sports agent. It solidified my relationship with Mr. Conlin.
~ ~ ~
Shortly after, I heard someone say the New York Yankees once played in Sacramento. It was against the Solons during 1951 spring training. 1951 marked a pivotal year for the Yanks—it was JOE DIMAGGIO’S final season, and MICKEY MANTLE’S first year with the Yankees.
I researched the story, talked to several locals who attended or even played in the game, including SAM KANELOS senior of Old Ironsides. And then I dove into the news archives where I learned this was the first and only time the New York club played on the West Coast; normally trained in Florida, but that year they switched with another team and worked out in Arizona. Then the club set out for a series of exhibition games in the California, including the one in Sacramento.
The Bee published my story on the front page of Sunday’s sports section. You can read it as it’s up on my web site_ www.RACabral.com/Stories
~ ~ ~
And you can read another feature I penned and published in the Bee: Bustin’ Babes and Larrupin Lous. About the 20-city barnstorming tour in 1927 featuring Babe Ruth and sidekick Lou Gehrig. They led PCL players on Sacramento’s Moreing Field, giving fans a special look at the Yankees “Thumpin’ Twins.” This was the first time they played West of the Mississippi.
~ ~ ~
Fast forward to 2010 and I decided to venture into baseball journalism, I created a web site BASEBALLSACRAMENTO.com, which gave me entre to cover high school, college and pro baseball. Early on, as I was growing the web site BaseballSacramento.com I spent equally as much time developing contacts. One of the very first—and and most helpful—was Don Lyle, the Cleveland scout.
Whenever I called on Don for background on a player, including his draft status, he was good for a combination of insight and humor. Eventually, I enjoyed hanging out with Don on the periphery when he congregated with the other local scouts.
I’d often run into him while covering the same college game at Stanford or UC Berkeley he was scouting.
~ ~ ~
Over the years I had a fun time, sitting in the press box at American River or Sac City College covering the high school playoffs, alongside the Bee’s Joe Davidson. Over those years I watched a dozen prep school boys who later went on to play major league baseball: Fellas such as J.D. DAVIS, ROWDY TELLEZ, DOM NUNEZ of Elk Grove, MAX STASSI (Yuba City) RHYS HOSKINS (Jesuit), SAM LONG (Del campo) and several more.
~ ~ ~
Also during this time, several LaSalle Club HOF members shared their contacts and scrapbooks, including RONNIE KING, HARRY DUNLOP and BERNIE CHURCH, which fueled my knowledge of the Capital City’s early days of baseball.
~ ~ ~
Another person who supported me in spades was ALAN O’CONNOR, also a Hall of Famer. Alan is a famed collector of sports paraphernalia and equipment, and an author.
Over the years, ALAN fed me several juicy feature stories… such as The Longest Home Run Ever Measured featuring the saga of Sacramento Solon Neill Sheridan who hit a titanic blast one hot July night 1953 that the Solons later measured at 613 feet. If you’re wondering… not even BABE RUTH ever hit one that far—that was officially measured!
That story also is accessible at my web site: BASEBALLSACRAMENTO.com/Stories
~ ~ ~
O’Connor also introduced me to big leaguer WALLY WESTLAKE, who played for the Pirates and Indians over his 10-year career. Wally graciously spent hours reminiscing about the 1940s and 50s major league action.
Westlake played in the 1954 World Series for Cleveland. For Game 1, he was sitting in the visitor’s dugout that day at the Polo Grounds when WILLIE MAYS made that sensational over-the-shoulder catch in center field, robbing Vic Wertz of extra bases.
Next day as Wally jogged to his position in right field he noticed the flags were reversed. "That little wind that was blowin' in yesterday, is blowin' out today," Westlake thought to himself. "If Wertz hits that ball today, it's in the center field bleachers." Which could have changed the outcome of the 1954 World Series, which the Giants’ won 4-0 in a series sweep of the Indians.
~ ~ ~
Other people who have earned my gratitude were the college and high school head coaches who granted me their time and those of their players, like the two coaches who are here tonight (Ariola and Stassi).
One in particular was JEFF CARLSON, former head coach of Elk Grove’s baseball team. In the years I covered the Herd, Jeff gave me access in the dugout to better watch and photograph the games that featured many of those future major league players I just listed, including his son DYLAN CARLSON and NICK MADRIGAL.
And that made the experience of covering local baseball one long magical moment for that kid from south Sacramento who learned first-hand why Sacramento always has been – a great baseball town.
Thank you.
END
Comments