FEATURE

The () Life of Reilly The Intercounty Baseball League’s -run king hopes to one day trade his bat for a firefighter’s axe

By Phil Andrews dozens of baseball jerseys – from an array Scapinello, a lifelong resident of PHOTOGRAPHY BY ALISHA TOWNSEND of teams and different leagues – form a who works as a medical administrator in auren Scapinello’s home has an inter- multi-coloured, hanging curtain. Student Services at Conestoga College’s esting spare bedroom – particularly “It’s in the back room. So, it’s OK there,” Doon Campus, met her husband-to-be in for someone who didn’t grow up with says Scapinello, 36. “It’s wonderful – as 2005. It happened when she tagged along any significant interest in baseball. long as he keeps it there, it’s fine.” with her best friend to the home of that LFramed jerseys of former Major League “He” is Scapinello’s husband. That’s Sean chum’s boyfriend. The boyfriend was a Baseball legends Pete Rose and Jose Reilly. housemate of Reilly’s and a fellow member Canseco dominate one wall of this If you’re unfamiliar with the name, put it of that year’s Guelph Royals team in the basement room. Another has racked this way: Reilly is the Intercounty Baseball Intercounty League. wooden bats on display. They adorn a spot League’s version of Babe Ruth. Except Reilly, who turns 41 in June, looks back beside a plaque – fashioned in the shape of unlike the rotund Ruth, this home-run with amusement at how the game he is a home plate. champ – the Intercounty League’s all-time married to played into him finding the Another wall features framed and leader – is a chiselled Bunyan of a man. woman he married – a spouse who is not a mounted newspaper articles about an In fact, given his long, multi-location fanatical follower of his sport. Intercounty Baseball League player. Shelves impact on the semi-pro league’s records, “Lauren really doesn’t know much about of game-marked balls set off another. Many maybe a better metaphor would be Crash the game of baseball,” he says. “But she of the red-stitched leather spheres have Davis, the fictional minor-league home-run learns. And, she’s a good sport.” wood-grain-patterned paint tattoos left by king played by Kevin Costner in the She certainly is. Since they met – the bats. baseball cult film “Bull Durham.” couple married in 2011 – Scapinello has In a corner are two wooden cubicles that Last season, playing for the Kitchener variously supported her partner’s passion appear wrested from a baseball locker Panthers, Reilly was the Intercounty to play and to star in the Intercounty loop. room. Clustered at the foot of those stalls League’s most valuable player for the fourth It is a commitment she has upheld even as is a thicket of bats – some labelled with time since 2011. And, earlier this year, he Reilly left Guelph to play in Barrie, then dates and game details. At the forefront is a was listed as one of the Intercounty’s 100 Toronto, then, for the past four years, in gleaming, unmarked, gold-plated bat. all-time greats in celebration of the league’s Kitchener. That doesn’t even get to the closet, where centennial anniversary. “Since the beginning, it’s always been

Sean Reilly holds a baseball bat and a firefighter’s axe as he poses on the front porch of his Guelph home with his wife, Lauren, son, Aiden, and daughter, Ryenn. Reilly, the Intercounty Baseball League’s home-run king, will play for the Guelph Royals this season while pursuing his other passion – a career as a firefighter.

108 GRAND MAY I JUNE 2018 MAY I JUNE 2018 GRAND 109 baseball,” she says. “It’s something I sort happy. If he’s had a stressful day, he’ll go to minor-league seasons with the Twins farm He dropped pitching to play every keep going and going, and I found that of adapted to – because it wasn’t actually baseball and he feels better. club in Fort Myers, Florida. The experience day and to return to batting. That was GREATEST OF ALL-TIME? as I got in better shape I was performing a sport that I was interested in at the “And I also love what he’s bringing began poorly with an elbow injury to his something he had enjoyed prior to going better on the baseball field. You know, I Sean Reilly can make a claim to be beginning.” about baseball to our son. I can see him throwing arm – before he even pitched in pro, with some success, but little power. just wanted to push myself to see how far the greatest player in the 99-year Scapinello admits it has been “trying” at sometimes coaching him and that’s always his first pro game – and went on to include His hitting picked up, though he wasn’t a history of the Intercounty Baseball I could get. And, you know, that’s when a times to support Reilly’s commitment to the been Sean’s sort of dream – to bring his kids plenty of times when, Reilly says, “life slugger. League. Below are some of his career few of the records kind of came tumbling game, especially since the arrival of their out or start coaching them. In the future, pretty much sucked.” In 2004, he was part of the Guelph statistics to back up that argument. down.” children, Aiden, 6, and Ryenn, who will if he’s not a player, he’ll be in a coaching He points out that he was a teenager with Royals when the team won the Intercounty His all-time Intercounty rank in each Reilly says he started working out six days turn two in the middle of May. Scapinello position. So, I feel like it’s always going to a job – baseball – and competing against championship, a win Reilly describes as category is in parenthesis. a week – twice a day – and planning and says her family helps out “a ton” with the be in our lives.” men, often with a lot more bulk and experi- “awesome” and “amazing.” Yet, within a Reilly career totals preparing healthy meals, a week ahead of time. kids when baseball demands call Reilly ence. Plus, he was a long way from his year, he was pondering an early exit from Home runs – 177 (1) “I also grew up. I matured,” he says, away. eilly almost retired about 13 years ago. Hamilton-area home and support network. the league. Hits – 882 (1) adding that the arrival of kids and day-job However, the whole baseball thing is man- That would have ended a career that Reilly returned to Canada and accepted “I just felt sluggish. I kind of wasn’t really Runs Batted In – 719 (1) demands have seen him cut back on his Doubles – 147 (1) ageable, she says. It comes with a schedule. began in earnest when he was drafted an invitation to come out for the Hamilton into it,” he says. “Then, I made a choice.” workout regimen and strict eating routine. R Walks – 340 (3) Calendars can be developed. Planning by ’s Minnesota club in the Intercounty League the next The choice was to follow the example Games played – 695 (4) He even allows himself a bit of McDonald’s can help make the season – as well as the Twins in 1995. He was a back then summer. and guidance of a Guelph teammate – Kyle and “the odd slice of pizza.” workout-saturated off-season – go more and, at six-feet, 180 pounds, a “skinny The experience revived his love for the Leon, who was, in the words of Reilly: Other key stats These days, he says, he probably “only” League MVP awards – 2011, 2013, smoothly. rail,” he says. Those days are over. He’s sport. It also delivered a locker-room lift “really into fitness and nutrition.” The men gets to the gym three to five times a week. 2015, 2017 She’s also quick to point out that baseball since morphed into a ripped bodybuilder- from peers he had more in common with started going to the gym together and Reilly First team all-star selections – 12 Dave teBoekhorst, who has played with gives to the household as well. esque figure carrying about 230 pounds. and an attachment to the teamwork and started to see a difference. League batting titles – 2015, 2017 and managed Reilly for several years – and “I couldn’t imagine life without baseball Sometimes more. camaraderie he found in the venerable, “When you start seeing those results, it Seasons played – 20 will do so again, in Guelph this summer – now,” she says. “Baseball just makes (Sean) The big-league dream fizzled after two elite, baseball circuit. kind of motivates you,” he says. “And you Source: Herb Morell, IBL statistician says Reilly has made huge sacrifices over a

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110 GRAND MAY I JUNE 2018 MAY I JUNE 2018 GRAND 111 20-year career. few of Reilly’s old Royals jerseys TeBoekhorst says it’s not just the commit- hang among those in the closet of his ment to a workout regimen, but also the A below-ground baseball bedroom. Also summer vacation time and other family visible is one of the caps he wore when he time given over to baseball. played for the club. Its brilliant blue has “Your summers are sacrificed. When a faded to dull. It’s stained. It looks shrunken lot of guys are jumping on the Sea-doo to sizes too small to fit his head. And, yet, and going to the cottage, that’s our bread it’s a valued artifact. and butter time for going to the ballpark,” Reilly can see the end of his playing teBoekhorst says. days – the end of adding record-breaking souvenirs and trophies to his trove of such eilly is proud of his “man cave.” He items. says every house he’s lived in has “I love being around the guys in the locker Rhad one. And when he speaks of the room,” he says. “When it’s all said and cave in the home where he and Scapinello done, that’s probably going to be the part reside, in Guelph’s south end, he’s not that I miss the most. I mean, those relation- speaking of its baseball grotto/display ships you build and those memories, those case of a spare bedroom. He’s speaking of are some of the best memories of my life.” another basement space – a rustic, Texas- Scapinello says she worries about when styled saloon, a bar replete with mounted Reilly walks away from playing in the Sean Reilly, then a Kitchener Panther, celebrates a Sean Reilly played four award-winning seasons with longhorns. Intercounty League. 2015 home run as he rounds the bases. the , cementing his place among But that’s not the only noteworthy décor. “I feel like he would miss it tremendously. PHOTO BY ANNIE SAKKAB the best players in Intercounty League history. Just as prominent is a firefighter axe and I’d worry about his mental health a little helmet displayed large on its focal wall. landing a full-time firefighting job could bit. You know what I mean – like that’s his “Right now, my focus is on firefighting,” do what decades of Intercounty League ownership regime has built the foundation love,” she says. says Reilly, who is pursuing a career in the opponents have failed to do: knock him out for a robust team reboot in 2018. It has “He’s always got to be part of some kind field with the same, well, fire, that he has of the game. brought in several ex-Royals stars as players of team. I know that when the IBL does given for years to baseball. He may have to interrupt his baseball and teBoekhorst to manage – all individuals end and he does start coaching his son or He has taken courses to be licensed to schedule this season on a few occasions with Guelph connections – to try to revive something like that, he’ll definitely also find drive fire trucks. He has taken specialized as he says he recently signed on with the the franchise. some men’s league or something to play in, medical classes and courses in the craft of Puslinch Fire and Rescue Service. This “This year is a little bit different,” says Reilly. which I’m happy for him to do.” firefighting itself. In 2015, he graduated involves being on call and available to “I want to win a championship. . . . The last Until then, the family will look forward to from the Texas A & M Fire Engineering respond to emergencies as needed but he time I won a championship was 2004 with hearing from Reilly’s full-time fire depart- Program in College Station. hopes to be able to tweak that schedule to Guelph. That’s a feeling I’m not ever going to ment applications and ponder what the “For me, it’s a natural progression from limit the loss of baseball time. forget. I would love to do that again – espe- ninth of his long baseball career baseball to firefighting because they’re so So, as he finds a way to swing fire duty cially here. So, I mean, it’s going to be a tough might hold. similar when it comes to the locker room and swing a bat as often as the schedules road and obviously I’m just glad to be part of “You know, hopefully we’ll get those and the teamwork. So, I’m really hoping of the dream job and the baseball worlds getting this team back on track.” fans back and give us the support that that that works out,” says Reilly, who permit, the Intercounty League’s greatest Scapinello is looking forward to this we used to have,” Reilly says. “When I currently works as an electrical apprentice. batter is also facing reality. summer and getting out to more games. It first came into the league, Guelph used That followed an almost 10-year stint as “I haven’t said it officially. But, playing- will be easier now that their youngest child to be a place to be. I remember when I a Sleeman Breweries employee, including wise, there’s a good chance that this will is a bit older, she says, and with Reilly’s was with Hamilton and we would come years as a beer-keg delivery driver. be my last year. If this unique opportunity home games being, well, close to home – into Guelph, there would be 2,000 people “I would love for him to become a with Guelph didn’t come up this year, I for a change. there. That atmosphere was electric, and firefighter,” says Scapinello. “He’s got such don’t even know if I would be playing this “I actually enjoy the fact that he’s back it just seemed to slowly wear down year a passion for it, and I know he would do a summer,” says Reilly. (playing) in Guelph so people can know after year. fantastic job. We’re crossing our fingers and The Guelph “opportunity” is at once his skill level and how good of a player “I’m confident that with getting those old hoping that will come true soon.” simple and complicated. A year after the he is. I feel like not enough people in this players back that the fans are going to start The husband and wife appreciate that Royals club folded in mid-season, a new community know about it,” she says. to come back again.”

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