{"id":30509,"date":"2016-09-27T11:18:34","date_gmt":"2016-09-27T18:18:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/?p=30509"},"modified":"2016-09-28T12:18:38","modified_gmt":"2016-09-28T19:18:38","slug":"ralph-trejo-sr-so-cal-bombers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/?p=30509","title":{"rendered":"Ralph Trejo Sr. (So Cal Bombers)"},"content":{"rendered":"

We are sorry hear the report, that Ralph Trejo Sr. has been diagnosed with stage 4 pancreatic cancer. “Sr.” as he was affectionately is probably best remembered in fastball circles for his sponsorship and support of the So Cal Bombers. He did a great deal to support not only the team, but fastball in general. We invite our readers, including former players of Ralph Sr. to post their notes and stories about Sr. in the comments section below.
\n
\nBelow is a story shared with me by one of his former players. Obvious that the players had great love and respect for “Sr.”<\/strong><\/p>\n

\n
\nRalph Trejo: The Man behind the SoCal Bombers<\/strong>
\nThe phone call came in at 7:45am, 15 minutes before game time on Sunday at the Monkton Invitational, a tournament that matched the top 8 teams in the World for fast pitch softball. From a distance I could hear the phone humming as someone passionately came through on the other end. \u201cPut me on speaker phone! Put me on speaker phone!\u201d It was Ralph Trejo, (or Senior as we called him), on the other end screaming at our Manager Kelly McGiffin. \u201cWe\u2019re done! You guys wanna go out and party all night and not win? This is the last tournament for the SoCal Bombers! I\u2019m done spending money on you guys! I could put this money somewhere else! And you tell Porto I don\u2019t wanna talk to him!\u201d<\/p>\n

Even though Porto was listening to the speaker phone, during the rant Senior forgot he was on speaker phone, so at times he was yelling at the team and at other times he was talking like we weren\u2019t even there. It was a common act for the old sponsor. He was completely unfiltered. He would say things to you that most people would never have the guts to say to your face\u2026\u2026and we loved it! And we loved him even more. He was the perfect sponsor for this band of renegades. He wasn\u2019t just the money behind the team\u2026.he was the face of the team, the heart and soul of the team, the engine behind the team and the father of the team. In a way, he and his managers had assembled a team that was a direct reflection of Ralph Trejo Sr. We didn\u2019t care what other people thought. We would say things that may have offended numerous people. We played hard. We knew the game inside and out and we loved the sport of softball with a passion. But most importantly, we loved each other. That was Ralph Trejo Sr.
\nWe went on to win that tournament. It was a rare occasion\u2026not that we won the tournament, but that Senior wasn\u2019t there. We were in the middle of a long stretch of travel weekends to the east coast and he decided to sit this one out. But even though he wasn\u2019t physically there, Ralph Trejo Sr. was always paying attention to the games. Literally 2 minutes after the 3rd out was recorded to win the title, Kelly\u2019s phone rang once again. \u201cPut me on speaker phone!!! I knew it! I knew you guys would win! I knew you could do it! I\u2019m so proud of you guys! I love you guys! See you next weekend!\u201d<\/p>\n

He may not have realized it, but he was a master motivator. The team truly believed Senior would have pulled the plug on us. In a way, I think he was just checking to make sure we still loved the game as much as he did. He wanted to see if we still wanted to win as much as he did. If we still believed in our team as much as he did. So he would always be pushing us with tough love.
\nTough love, brutal honesty, a little bit crazy. That was our sponsor. If you had a rough day or a rough tournament, Senior would let you know right to your face. Sometimes even worse\u2026he would say how bad you were to someone else when you were standing right there\u2026.as if you weren\u2019t standing there. Looking back, I laugh every time I think about it.<\/p>\n

One night at the Boys of Summer tournament before a big game against the Patsy\u2019s from New York I sat on a park bench with Jason Porto, Rob Schick and Tony Peeples.<\/p>\n

\u201cWho\u2019s pitching tonight?\u201d asks Trejo as he walks up to the park bench in the outfield.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going with Peeps\u201d replies Rob Schick.<\/p>\n

\u201cOhhhh no\u2026.it\u2019s gonna be a massacre!\u201d exclaimed the old man. As if Peeps wasn\u2019t sitting right there. You could see the steam coming from Peeps\u2019 head. He got up and stormed off. Absolutely furious, Peeps went out and beat the Patsy\u2019s 3-2.
\nAfter the game I overheard the old man go up to Peeps and tell him, \u201cI knew you could do it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Was this guy an old senile man who just said whatever he felt? Did he not realize Peeps was sitting there at the park bench? Or did he just know that he needed to have Peeps fired up for the game or it was going to be a massacre? At first I just thought he was an old senile man. But after watching and witnessing for years, I think he knew exactly what he was doing. He realized the group he had, and he kept pushing to get the most out of us.<\/p>\n

For all the blow ups and inadvertent trash talk that Senior would have, you always knew he loved you. I remember hitting a homerun and when I crossed home plate, I could see Trejo running to the fence on the side of the dugout. He was smiling from ear to ear, waiting to give me a high five. He was so excited and so proud of me that I couldn\u2019t help but get overly excited myself. You could literally feel his excitement. Most players only get that type of love from a parent\u2026if they\u2019re lucky. We got it from Senior all the time. And it was addicting. Looking back, we loved playing with each other, but we loved playing for Ralph Trejo Sr. even more. His excitement for the game rubbed off on all of us and we couldn\u2019t get enough of it\u2026.we couldn\u2019t get enough of him. We enjoyed his blow ups, we enjoyed his trash talk, we enjoyed his crazy old man moments, and we enjoyed his excitement and love. If you were on the outside looking in, you may have thought we were a dysfunctional family with a dysfunctional old man at the helm. For us, we loved every single bit of it and we loved every single bit of him.<\/p>\n

Love him or hate him, you always knew how Senior felt. The colorful old man behind the SoCal Bombers was often misunderstood\u2026even by his players at times. The one thing that was never misunderstood\u2026how much he cared about us. I can only hope that he knew how much we care about him.
\nSenior,<\/p>\n

Thank you for the great softball, the great memories, and for caring so much about each of us on that team. We love you.
\nThe SoCal Bombers<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We are sorry hear the report, that Ralph Trejo Sr. has been diagnosed with stage 4 pancreatic cancer. “Sr.” as he was affectionately is probably best remembered in fastball circles for his sponsorship and support of the So Cal Bombers. He did a great deal to support not only the team, but fastball in general. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[28,20],"tags":[621,622],"class_list":{"0":"post-30509","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-featured","7":"category-so-cal","8":"tag-ralphtrelosr","9":"tag-sr","10":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30509","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=30509"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30509\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30511,"href":"http:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30509\/revisions\/30511"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=30509"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=30509"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=30509"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}