Slo-Pitch inventors honoured
Wall of famer Ernie Reinhart and Anthony Badovinac, son of wall of famer Emil (Sonny) Badovinac. Photo by: BERNIE PUCHALSKI
Fifty years ago, Ernie Reinhart walked into Sonny’s Badovinac’s office and came out with an idea that would change the sporting landscape in Niagara Falls and across Canada.
Reinhart and Badovinac were long-time friends who grew close through sports so it was no surprise baseball was the topic of conversation that day.
Reinhart tells the story that Badovinac had a white piece of paper with the numbers one to four listed on it.
“Sonny asked me if we knew enough guys — and we knew every guy in the city at the time — to play baseball,” Reinhart recalled. “I told him I didn’t see it. We’re not teenagers anymore so he kind of pushed the paper aside and we talked about other things.”
Badovinac then told Reinhart about a sport he had heard about from his brother who just came back from Florida.
“He said he saw some old guys playing this game and they tossed the ball to the batter. It was like a eureka moment.
“I said, ‘That’s it.’ ”
Reinhart said what appealed to him was the fact the game was designed to put the ball in play.
“It took the emphasis off the pitcher. I said it was a winner and we filled six numbers up,” Reinhart said.
The next order of business was to find a name for this new hybrid of softball and baseball.
“We had baseball, fastball and softball and I was trying to come up with something different. The word toss struck me so I said, ‘Let’s call it slo-pitch.’ “I could have called it toss pitch and we’ll take this thing across Canada,” Reinhart said.
The two knew they had a winner but had no idea slo-pitch would turn out to be so popular.
“It caught on like wildfire,” Reinhart said. “I thought if this takes off I’m going to register the name and I did so. I owned the name Slo-Pitch Canada for 30 years.
“It was the No. 1 recreational sport in Canada.”
Reinhart and the late Badovinac, who passed away in 2010, were honoured over the weekend when they were inducted into the City of Niagara Falls Sports Wall of Fame in the builder’s category.
“It’s huge,” Reinhart said.
Reinhart said he was recently watching a documentary on boxer Sugar Ray Leonard and compared their induction into Leonard’s gold medal at the 1976 Olympics.
“Leonard said nothing, not the money, not the great fights he had, nothing, was as important to him as the Olympic gold. That was how I felt about getting on the wall. That was our gold,” Reinhart said.
Emil’s son, Anthony Badovinac, felt his father would have appreciated seeing his name and picture on the wall at the Gale Centre.
“I think he would be happy,” he said.
Anthony remembers how much slo-pitch was a part of his father’s life.
“It took off to where he was taking teams to the all-Ontario’s every year and over the years going to the world championships in Virginia,” he said. “He dedicated years of his life to it.”
And in the days before e-mails and the internet, that meant endless phone calls and letters.
“It was hours and hours. Any town we’d go to we would get a phone book so if he found out someone had a team or an association, he’d call them,” Anthony said. “We would be stuffing envelopes and mailing all these teams and waiting for responses for tournaments.
“It was amazing was he and Ernie accomplished with pen and paper.”
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