‘Old Man’ and the league: At 80, Rock Hill ballplayer still finds joy on the diamond

It’s opening night at Miracle Park, under skies lined in a visitor gray.

A crowded blue team stands at attention on the third base line. Folks in red jerseys stand along the first base side. Centered on the infield is a man known by nearly all there — with one hand lifting an American flag, the other fixed to his walker.

An anthem later, and it’s finally time for Larry Ferguson, nicknamed the “Old Man,” to play ball.

Wearing a blue jersey, Ferguson is a third-year second baseman in Rock Hill’s Miracle League. He’s the league’s first all-star, selected by coaches and sent to a national event in Tennessee two years ago.

He’s also 80 years old.

“I hit good last year,” Ferguson told The Herald Wednesday night, just before his Dodgers faced the Red Sox.

Miracle League is a baseball program for people with mental or physical disabilities. Rock Hill’s league started three years ago with the opening of Miracle Park. There are separate leagues for children and adults. Many players like Ferguson wouldn’t get to play in a typical sports league.

“Easily, 80% of our adults,” said park executive director Kylie Carroll. “And that number might be higher.”

For the man who gleefully answers to his nickname, a mental limitation is a relatively small part of what makes him unique.

“It’s that an 80-year-old could come out and play baseball,” said Dodgers coach Brad Brewer.

Still running strong

Ferguson bats sixth for the away team on Wednesday. Brewer offers a preview, starting with the walk-up music.

“It’s usually an Elvis song, and when he gets to the plate he shakes his butt,” Brewer said.

The coach works at a residential center in Fort Mill where Ferguson and several of his teammates live. Ferguson grew up in York and has lived in York County his whole life, either with family or at his own home with help from a caretaker. He moved to the Fort Mill center six years ago.

On cue, Ferguson enters to “Don’t Be Cruel.” He positions his walker in one batter’s box, aimed at first base. Volunteers help him to the opposite box, where Ferguson awaits the pitch.

The bases are loaded.

After the first three batters, the bases are always loaded. Every at bat, but the last of a half inning — those clear the bases as home runs — is a single.

“Everybody hits,” Carroll said. “Everybody scores.”

One volunteer encourages Ferguson while another holds the back of his trademark suspenders. It isn’t clear whether he’s being held up or back. After waving through a couple of pitches, Ferguson singles to the first base side.

Cheering him on is a second-year helper Melissa Inzerillo, on her first night volunteering with a man twice her age.

By the time she looks back at him, Ferguson is gone. He and his walker are running to first.

“I turned around,” Inzerillo later tells him, “and you were gone.”

Second base social club

Ferguson loves having his picture taken. He loves his nickname. Ask him what he likes most about baseball or most anything else about the game, and he points to the team logo on the chest of his jersey. Or the all-star cap he still wears for games. Actually, he loves them, too.

Ferguson has a bit of a Yogi Berra quality to him. Similar to the bygone New York Yankees catcher known for his double-taking “Yogi-isms,” it isn’t always clear at first listen what Ferguson is saying. But he says every word through a smile.

“He’s hysterical,” Inzerillo said. “He’s so full of life, honestly. He has so much fun with this.”

How social is Ferguson? He takes his defensive position each inning without a glove. He chats up volunteers, teammates, baserunners. Those are the moments that stick with players who wait all year for one of two six-week baseball seasons.

“All year long, ‘when are we starting baseball?’ ” Brewer said Ferguson would ask.

That enthusiasm is part of what made Ferguson the league’s inaugural all-star. Teammates, opponents, coaches, announcers, organizers — they all knew and loved him.

“We have lots of memorable folks,” Carroll said. “Larry was our first.”

A ball to the back, and a smile

Rock Hill didn’t have Miracle League four years ago, let alone in the 1940s. Ferguson was born in a different time.

The Dodgers were still in Brooklyn, New York then, three years before Jackie Robinson became the first African American in the modern era to play in Major League Baseball. The St. Louis Browns, who lost in the World Series the year Ferguson was born, wouldn’t become the Baltimore Orioles for another decade. Then there’s the matter of World War II that was happening at the time.

It was a different era for people with disabilities, too. Families back then often were told to consider institutionalizing them, Carroll said. Playing sports wouldn’t have been an option.

”When he was born,” she said, “there was nothing for him.”

Ferguson grew and developed in spite of his disability, held jobs and maintained varying levels of independence. He just never got that experience some boys might take for granted — to play the game he loved.

”The one thing he never got to do is play baseball,” Carroll said.

Considering that, one could forgive him during the second inning at bat, when the booty starts to shake. This time it’s “Hound Dog.” Even a second pitch foul that bounces up and nips Ferguson on the chin can’t take the smile off his face. He turns on the fourth pitch, rolling it down what would be the foul side of the third base line and bouncing it off the league mascot, “Homer.”

This time Ferguson keeps dancing on first. A Red Sox defender joins him. Tae Fields, Pat Finley and Shatinique Futch move Ferguson around the bases with singles before Chequita Hunter drives him in, again, with her own.

One of Ferguson’s highlights on opening night comes in the bottom half, when a Red Sox player sends a ball to center. An errant relay hits Ferguson in the back shoulder, prompting smiles from him, nearby teammates and volunteers.

Joy in the game

Through the magic of scorekeeping, two teams with different numbers of players and no recorded outs end up tied 39-39. It’s getting late.

Ferguson socializes his way through the handshake line. Walking through what’s left of probably 100 fans between the two contests, someone asks Ferguson about the game.

“I hit the ball!” he said.

He’s asked about the chin, after he took one there with a foul ball.

“And my back!” he said, still reliving the defensive play.

It’s just another Miracle League moment. Some nights it’s the interesting choice of walk-up music players pick. Some nights it’s an at-bat that last so long, wheelchair races spring up in the outfield.

“I promise you, you can’t come and not smile,” Carroll said. “There’s joy here.”

Most of all, perhaps, the joy emits from a man born to play the game — no matter how long it took.