Elliott: Tucker Zdunich returns to Dawgs, ball departs

“There is not a better feeling in the game than winning the final game of the season.

And conversely, there is probably not a worse feeling than losing when you are a victory away from playing in the championship final.

Tucker Zdunich felt the latter after his Reinhardt Eagles dropped the final two games of the AVISTA NAIA World Series in Lewiston, Id. The Eagles won three straight before losing back-to-back games to the Tennessee Wesleyan Bulldogs. A win in either would have put them in the title game.

No matter now. What was then was then. The page in his diamond book had been turned and he returned home to where he has played the previous 10 years going all the way back to bantam -- the Okotoks Dawgs.”

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Verge: Recent racist message just latest Jackson has had to endure

“Jay Jackson was the same as his teammates growing up in Greenville, South Carolina.

A baseball lover with a big league dream.

But as one of a small number of African Americans to play the game, his journey was different. Throughout his childhood and professional career on the baseball diamond, he’s dealt with injustices his teammates didn’t have to face.

From missed opportunities, to hateful messages ridden with slurs. The path to the top, and even at the top, for the former Blue Jays pitcher who is now in the Minnesota Twins organization, has never been easy.”

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Kennedy: Historic Kendal ballpark a timeless, field of dreams

“When this grey-haired baseball has been walked into Harvey Jackson Memorial Park in the sleepy hamlet of Kendal recently - to see my son’s Kingston Thunder U-18 team play in a tournament – it was, to quote Yogi Berra, “like deja-vu all over again.”

I was a member of the 1972 Kingston Lions junior squad when I first played at the quaint old ballyard. Yet once I stepped down the narrow cement steps of the dugout, 52 years washed away in a flood of memories.

The ballpark in Kendal, 170 km west of Kingston in the Municipality of Clarington, is a throwback to yesteryear. It’s steeped in character and pleasant reminders of a time when baseball was king of summer sports in cities such as Kingston and in rural areas everywhere.”

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