Best of the West CA

21rd Annual Best of the West Tournament
Santa Barbara, California
June 1-2, 2013

Location: Elings Park
Entry Fee: $400 – Entry Fee Deadline May 20, 2013
Format: Round Robin into single elimination. 4 game guarantee. Saturday 90minute time limit. Sunday no time limit.
Berth: 1 ISC World Tournament Berth to highest US West finishing team. ASA berths for A-B-C-

Contact: Clyde Bennett- clydebennett50@yahoo.com – 805.895.9007
UIC- Clyde Bennett- clydebennett50@yahoo.com – 805.895.9007
ISC Rep- Chris Santos- jcsantos25@msn.com – 303.419.7332

The Longest Running Men’s Open Tournament in California

The Best of the West tournament was established by longtime fastpitch booster Al Ruegsegger, whose Culver City teams hosted the fabled Long Beach Nitehawks in their heyday. Ruegsegger was in the business of manufacturing baseball uniforms, and also providing them as wardrobe to Hollywood for the string of baseball movies that we have all seen — Field of Dreams, The Natural Bull Durham, A League of their Own. A perfect match for a men’s fastpitch team.

When the Long Beach Nitehawks finally shuttered their operations in the 1980’s after decades of play, it was Ruegsegger and Long Beach sports booster Al Savala who came along and established a top level open team, the Long Beach Painters. (taking its name from the painting business run by Savala). The Painters kept Long Beach on the fastpitch map, competing against the best teams of its day.

The image above is from my old T-shirt from the 2nd Best of the West in 1992

Ruegsegger saw the the Best of the West tournament as a “win-win-win”. First and foremost, it was a way to bring the best teams from the western region to Long Beach for the fans to see play. When the number of open level teams began to dwindle, teams found themselves traveling greater distances to compete, and hosting fewer and fewer home games. Local Long Beach fans would read about players like pitching legend Peter Meredith, of Utah’s Larry Miller Toyota, but didn’t get the opportunity to see them play in person.

Best of the West changed that. Meredith was the headliner on the marquee in those first few years of Best of the West. Meredith was truly larger than life, both in stature and in the pitching circle. Local players — even those not playing in the tournament came out to see him pitch, and to watch teams like his Larry Miller Toyota squad from Salt Lake City, Utah compete. After the games on Saturday, a good portion of that crowd wandered down to a local watering hole, with Meredith standing head and shoulders above the rest of the crowd, piquing the curiosity of locals who knew little about men’s fastpitch. Top flite fastpitch had returned to Long Beach.

The other parts of Ruegsegger’s “win-win-win” formula for Best of the West were focused on the players. For his own team, it was a chance to host some great competition in their own backyard, and do it for the entire weekend, to allow the families and friends to see the team without going on the road with them. And finally, it opened a window on fastpitch’s past, for players to compete on hallowed ground on which the Long Beach Nitehawks had played for decades, enroute to their record 10 ISC World titles. Joe Rodgers Field was “old school”, the way Wrigley Field or Fenway Park are to baseball. There were, of course, shinier, fancier places to play, but none could boast the history of Joe Rodgers Field.

Tournaments come and tournaments go, so when the Long Beach Painters team closed up shop, the future of the Best of the West was uncertain. David Blackburn — a pitcher on Ruegsegger’s Painter team for a number of year stepped forward to keep the tournament alive. It was about the same time that Blackburn was making his mark on the fastpitch world, in bringing streaming audio broadcasts to the International Softball Congress World tournament. Blackburn grew up playing fastpitch – something he continues to do to this day, and gave back to the game by helping to promote it. After seven years, Ruegsegger handed the baton to David Blackburn, who has extended its run for nearly twice that long, taking it to its 20th anniversary this year.

Joe Rodgers Field underwent renovation, and then became more expensive a venue, used more for movie shoots than ballgames.

To keep things rolling along, David Blackburn took the Best of the West tournament on the road. Among its homes were Burbank, CA (1999), Palmdale, CA (2000, 2001, including the first ever streaming audio broadcasts), the new fields built on the Soboba Indian reservation in San Jacinto CA (2002, 2003), and, then later the fields of a remote little town in the California desert called Winchester (2004, 2005)

(Photographer Bob Otto)

Best of the West tournament Director David Blackburn has been at the helm of the longest running Men’s Open tournament in California for 13 of its 20 years, seeing it through some of its leaner years, and back, including last year’s largest field of teams ever. The tournament has been hosted in several different cities over its twenty year run.

(Best of the West tournament director David Blackburn shown at right, also brought streaming audio and video broadcasts to men’s fastpitch)

The earlier years of the Best of the West tournament were preserved through the work of ISC photographer Bob Otto, (shown above).

Since 2006, the tournament has been hosted in Santa Barbara, an beautiful, upscale resort city in sunny Southern California, where it seems to have found a more permanent home, one very popular with players, their families and fans. (2006, 2007, 2008, 2009, 2010)

Beautiful Elings Park ballfields overlooking the Pacific ocean at Santa Barbara, home to the Best of the West tournament

A former teammate of David Blackburn, pitcher Mark Bennett and his father Clyde serve as a “host family” of sorts, reveling in an opportunity to share their little piece of paradise with the fastpitch world once a year. One need go no further than Facebook to see the chatter amongst players and fans, to know that they are looking forward to the weekend in Santa Barbara.