Toms Moore & Giffen at it again

BJ Alums received this email from Beacon Journal newsroom retiree Tom Moore, in his seventh year of publishing a daily newspaper for the Roy Hobbs Baseball World Series for older players run by former BJ sports editor Tom Giffen in Fort Myers, Florida:

Here's a little something about the series.

Another year -- the 22th for the Rob Hobbs World Series in Ft. Myers. Our theme this year for the amateur baseball tournament is, what else, but Catch 22.

(In a different photo) former BJ Sports Editor Tom Giffen takes a shot of a father and son who play in the series.

And former BJ staffer Tom Moore will do the interview for "The Inside Pitch," the newsletter published most days with game results and other good stuff to keep the 191 baseball teams informed.

In the photo at right, Tom is with Akron brothers Larnie and John Martin.

The series is divided into age divisions---youngest group is 28-plus and oldest is 70-plus.

Several teams from Akron are taking part and they usually make a good showing.

And Moore says snapping a picture of Giffen snapping a picture is just fair play, since Giffen did the same to Moore last year.

Got a photo of me and my "bodyguards" coming. They are (brothers) Larnie and John Martin from Akron, umpires and members of the Hobbs staff. Real nice guys.

Giffen, now 61, in 1990 formed a four-team league of adult men playing out of Akron. The next year the league grew to 11 teams and joined Roy Hobbs Baseball, which was owned by Ron Monks of California. In 1992 Monks sold Roy Hobbs Baseball to Giffen and his wife, Ellen.

For several years, Giffen ran Roy Hobbs Baseball out of his basement and continued to work at the Beacon Journal. In the mid-1990s, as the organization brought in more and more teams, Giffen resigned from the BJ to work full time at his business.

Roy Hobbs is the fictional hero of Bernard Malamud's novel, “The Natural,” and the movie starring Robert Redford as Hobbs.

Richmond, Virginia native Tom Moore, 79, interviews, photographs and publishes a daily newspaper for the tournament that draws teams from around the United States, Germany and Russia. Tom and wife Dot have four children, including three daughters who were copygirls at the BJ.

Click on the headline for dozens of photos of Tom Moore and Tom Giffen at the Roy Hobbs Baseball World Series complex in Fort Myers, Florida. The games are played on the same Lee County fields that the Boston Red Sox use for their spring training.