The Fish that flew

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This article was published 08/05/2022 (1370 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Who says an expansion team has to suck? The 1994 Winnipeg Goldeyes, a team built from scratch, certainly didn’t.

Twenty-eight years later, it almost feels as though the Goldeyes are a new team again. They have rebranded and will play their home-opener Friday evening at Shaw Park to begin the 2022 American Association season. It’s a home opener that’s been a long time coming.

This spring and summer will be the Goldeyes’ first full campaign in Winnipeg since 2019. Owing to the COVID-19 pandemic, they have been road warriors, playing the 2020 shortened season out of Newman Outdoor Field in Fargo, N.D., and most of the 2021 season in Jackson, Tenn. before returning to Winnipeg last August.

In honour of the imminent return of the boys of summer — whose arrival marks the defeat of the longest and most relentless winter in recent memory — here’s a look at when they entertained Winnipeggers with independent hardball action for the first time: the inaugural and highly successful 1994 campaign.

The Northern League was founded in 1993 by Miles Wolff and had six teams: the Duluth-Superior Dukes, Saint Paul Saints, Sioux City Explorers, Sioux Falls Canaries, Rochester Aces, and Thunder Bay Whiskey Jacks.

Five of the teams were fairly successful in attracting fans. However, the Aces — despite reaching the Northern League championship — struggled to get butts in seats, with just 50,803 fans coming through the turnstiles through 36 home dates (an average of 1,411 per game.)

Winnipeg, meanwhile, was pretty much a two-sport town, having the Winnipeg Jets 1.0 and Winnipeg Blue Bombers. There hadn’t been professional baseball in the city in more than two decades, ever since the Winnipeg Whips — a Triple-A affiliate of the Montreal Expos — played a pair of unsuccessful seasons at Winnipeg Stadium in 1970 and 1971.

But businessman Sam Katz, long before he was Winnipeg’s mayor, had baseball on the brain and thought Winnipeg could use another warm-weather team.

In late August, 1993, Katz attended a sold-out game between the Saints and Aces at St. Paul Municipal Stadium and “was very impressed with the product and fan response,” he told the Free Press’ Scott Taylor.

“I’m going to call Miles Wolff and find out exactly what the terms for obtaining a franchise are,” Katz said, adding he would talk to the only Canadian team, the Whiskey Jacks, to know how much it would cost to operate a Canadian team.

Katz, at the time, was the owner of the Winnipeg Thunder basketball team and the president of the National Basketball League in which it played (the league folded in 1994.) He had been eager to expand into baseball, and unsuccessfully pursued a membership in the Triple-A, MLB-affiliated Pacific Coast League for four years, Taylor reported.

Before the Whips, there was another Winnipeg Goldeyes team. The original Goldeyes were a member of the first Northern League from 1954 to 1964 and acted as a minor-league affiliate of the St. Louis Cardinals. They won three league championships.

Wolff said his league coveted Winnipeg as a franchise site. He visited the city in September 1993 and told the Free Press “when the old Northern League was establishing itself… as one of the best minor-league operations in baseball, Winnipeg was one of the flagship franchises. That’s why we still want Winnipeg in the league. For a year and a half, I’ve made it clear that Winnipeg is a desired city.”

On Oct. 29, 1993, Katz confirmed he had completed negotiations to acquire a team. Winnipeg would replace the Aces and become the second Canadian club in the six-team loop.

Now the team needed a name. The Free Press conducted a name-the-team contest that received more than 5,000 entries, and the organization settled on the Goldeyes, in homage to 1950s/60s incarnation.

The 80-game, 1994 Northern League season began on June 7. The team featured three former Aces; pitchers Jeff Bittiger and Craig Bishop and right-fielder Steve Dailey.

Dailey is now 52 and a private hitting instructor who lives near Seattle, Wash.

He played for the Aces in 1993, but was chosen in the dispersal draft by the Dukes. He got off to a slow start in Duluth-Superior, then the Goldeyes traded for him.

“I was stinking it up terribly in Duluth,” he said in an interview, batting only .129.

The Goldeyes’ manager was familiar with Dailey, and knew Dailey’s bat would come around. Doug Simunic, a mustachioed 38-year-old former minor-league catcher, managed the Aces the season before.

“For me, Doug was great,” Dailey said. “The dynamic in Duluth versus the dynamic in Winnipeg for me as a player, personally, was different.”

Dailey explained he was “supposed to be the guy” in Duluth and was hitting in the third spot.

“There wasn’t as much talent in Duluth compared to Winnipeg,” he said. “So when I got to Winnipeg, I was like ‘alright, sweet, you just slide me right back into the five-hole or the four hole or wherever,’ but I had talent around me. It made the pressure immediately alleviate, because there’s other guys that could produce.”

“I couldn’t hit my way out of a wet paper bag with Duluth, but I told (Simunic) ‘I’ve always hit. I’m going to hit,’ but for it to happen that quickly —like immediately, the first game — I was all of a sudden feeling good and the rest is history.” He recalled his exact average: .340.

Simunic was tasked with building the roster, with Katz telling the Free Press “he’s definitely a player’s manager. The players just love him. Last year (with the Aces) he did anything he had to, whether it was drive the bus, make sandwiches, whatever he had to do for his players.”

While modern-day Goldeyes fans may not remember Simunic as the team’s first manager, they’ll certainly remember him as the large-and-in-charge bench boss of the Fargo-Moorhead Redhawks, the Goldeyes’ biggest Northern League —and American Association — rival.

After two years in Winnipeg, Simunic managed the Redhawks from 1996 to 2017. He and then-Goldeyes hitting coach Tom Vaeth once got into a fistfight at home plate in Winnipeg.

Like the Whips, Simunic’s crew had to play on Maroons Road at Winnipeg Stadium; there was no baseball-specific park.

The ball diamond, with the home plate and backstop area shoehorned into one corner of the CFL stadium’s north end zone, had odd dimensions. The left-field fence was only 290 feet away, due to the east side bleachers being just beyond it, but a 30-foot net was erected above the wall to extend the playing field.

Mickey Steen, a long-time and recognizable Goldeyes fan to anyone who’s sat in section E of Shaw Park, said “left field was so short, the left fielder just went out and stood about six feet in front of the fence.”

Current Goldeyes’ general manager Andrew Collier has been the GM for 21 years, but in 1994, was 24 years old and working in the ticketing department.

“A lot of would-be fly balls ended up being home runs,” he recalled.

The short porch was the first thing that came to Dailey’s mind when asked.

“A very strange design,” he said. “It did take away a little bit from the quality of the game. Honestly, probably 75 per cent of the home run balls hit out to left field… wouldn’t have gone out on a regular field.”

“I am very proud I did put one into the upper deck,” he said, off of a knuckleball pitch. “I know that would have gone out in any ballpark in the world.”

The right-field fence wasn’t nearly as hitter-friendly, 345 feet away, while dead-centre field was 395 feet away. The only dirt was around the bases, mound, and home plate; the rest of the surface was AstroTurf, leading to odd bounces. The Goldeyes’ “dugout” was on the first-base side, under the stands.

“Sam Katz will admit one thing and he’d like to get all the complaints out of the way right at the start,” the Scott Taylor wrote in the Free Press before the season started. “The ballpark sucks.”

“The first thing we have to do is make the entertainment so good, we take the emphasis away from the ballpark,” Katz said. “We have to make it so much fun that people forget about the place.”

Quentin Erhardt, now a longtime Goldeyes fan, got behind the team right away.

“I was excited about seeing live professional baseball,” he said in a Facebook message. “Growing up, I always had an interest in junior and minor pro sports, not just the majors. So I knew I had to get to as many games as possible. It was always exciting.”

While the game was going on, the odd stadium “wasn’t really anything I noticed,” he continued. “Apart from seeing the faded football (yard) line numbers in the outfield! But that gave it that minor-league feel, just like the train going by (Shaw Park) today. It’s all part of the game.”

Steen recalled going to the home opener — which attracted nearly 15,000 fans — and seeing someone who would rise up the organization depth chart in the years to follow.

“I went to the first game and I still laugh as parking was $5 and the game ticket was $3,” he said. “The gentleman selling tickets in the booth was none other than a guy from Portage la Prairie, none other than Andrew Collier, now GM of the Goldeyes.”

Collier was working at IBM before the season, but had always been a huge baseball fan; his dad took him and his brother on MLB road trips every summer.

He was golfing with Katz and Taylor in April, 1994, and on the 14th hole, finally mustered up the courage to ask Katz for a job.

“By June, I was working for the team,” he said. “When I started, I pretty much did everything that was needed to do.”

In the first half of the season, the Goldeyes — who Simunic described as a group of “guys who kind of got cheated out of their career or guys who were given up on by an organization” — didn’t fare too well.

While Simunic recruited a few experienced players, most were relative unknowns in their early-to-mid-20s. In the first half of the season, they posted a 16-24 record, second-worst in the league.

But the Northern League season format — which was split into two halves, with the best team of each half making the championship series — gave the team hope. They came together in the second half, finishing first with a 27-13 record and clinching a championship berth.

Dailey credits Jim Wilson — the 33-year-old first baseman who had played more than 1,000 games in the minor leagues — as a key reason for the turnaround. Wilson hit cleanup, one spot ahead of Dailey.

“A veteran guy in the middle of the lineup… he was a massive guy, not very fast, but he hit the s—- out of the ball,” Dailey said. “I used to tease him — either you’re stealing my RBIs or when I hit an extra-base hit, I can’t take an extra base hit because you’re too slow and right in front of me!”

“Quiet veteran with a kick-ass sense of humour. Didn’t say a lot but I would just study his movements, I’d study his preparation.”

Dailey led the team In home runs with 14 and batting average at .340, while Darryl Brinkley led the team with 44 RBI. On the mound, Bittiger led the team with nine wins and a tidy 3.05 earned run average, while relief pitcher Todd Marion led the team with 36 appearances and seven saves.

The affordable and fun brand of baseball quickly resonated with Winnipeggers. They attracted 212,571 fans in the regular season, an average of over 5,000 per game.

“The fans back then were indeed true Goldeyes fans,” Steen said. “The attendance was always pretty good. It was a great baseball atmosphere.”

“There was a lot of support for the team, it was the first year so there was a lot of buzz around it,” Dailey agreed.

“It was more of a community-based team and that’s the beauty of independent baseball, I think fan connect with (players) a more realistic level… back then, it was way more intimate.”

One teen girl, who sat behind the Goldeyes’ dugout with a friend and always waved to Dailey, made him a Goldeyes-themed beaded necklace, with the beads spelling out the name “Steve.”

“She handed it to me about midway through the season and I thanked her for it. And I wore it every day. Every day,” Dailey said. “I would come into the dugout and point to my neck when I would see her and she would just smile.”

How often is that happening in a double-A game, triple-A game, or especially at a major league ballpark?”

In the championship series, the Goldeyes had to tangle with the Sioux City Explorers, who finished the season 52-28.

The series started in Iowa, and the Goldeyes won Game 1, 5-3, in nail-biting fashion. Brinkley’s two-run, two-out eight-inning double broke a 3-3 tie.

The next night, the Goldeyes took a 2-0 series lead, clobbering the home team 16-1.

The series shifted to Winnipeg for Game 3. The Explorers, with their “backs literally against the short-left field wall,” as Randy Turner wrote, staved off elimination with a 6-3 victory.

The next night, Sept. 9, was Game 4 and another chance for the Goldeyes to claim championship glory.

By the bottom of the fourth, the game was tied 1-1. The Goldeyes loaded the bases, and Dann Bilardello — the 35-year-old catcher who played 382 games in the majors — came up to the plate and hit a grand slam to left-centre field.

“When you see the veteran behind the plate and truly one of the voices in our locker room hit a grand slam in the championship series to put you up to four runs, if anyone cares, that uplifts you…” Dailey said. “It was a really cool thing.”

Collier said he remembers it like it was yesterday — it was his 25th birthday.

“As soon as Dann Bilardello hit the grand slam, I knew we were going to win,” he said.

Leading 8-1 in the top of the ninth with two out, Marion struck out Lance Robbins to cement the championship. Marion dropped to his knees, arms raised to the sky in jubilation. The celebration was on.

“I was in the production tunnel when the last out was made and all the players and staff rushed the field,” Collier said. “There was plenty of champagne and beer being sprayed. A memorable moment for sure.”

“That championship, for me, exorcised a massive demon,” Dailey said.

In 1990, Dailey explained, he was a sophomore playing for Oklahoma State. In a college national title game against Georgia, with his team losing 2-1, he struck out to end the game.

Three years later, it happened again.

“In fact, I struck out to end the Northern League championship in ’93,” he exclaimed. “True story.”

The catcher for the St. Paul Saints in that game even told Dailey that a fastball was coming on a 1-2 count with two outs in the bottom of the ninth, but Dailey still came up empty.

“It was up in the zone and I swung out my ass and I missed it,” he laughed.

Dailey described finally being on the right side of a championship as a “a massive monkey off my back” and being happy “like a pig in mud” in right field when they’d built up a good lead.

“After two championships where I’m the last out striking out, I’m like ‘here it comes we’re about to get one,” he said.

The front of the Free Press sports section the next day was dedicated to the unlikely championship, with the headline reading “Fish Fantastic!”

“Improbable. Impossible. Unbelievable,” Scott Taylor wrote. “Last night, while Major League Baseball slept, a little ball team on the prairies provided the thrills the big shots are too greedy to provide… Last night, on a warm September evening on the plastic grass, the team that started from scratch blew the prohibited favourites out of the water.”

“This just feels so good,” Katz told the Free Press in the aftermath. “I knew it would feel good, but I didn’t know it would feel this good.”

“With that final out, the stadium went ballistic,” Erhardt recalled. “And I knew we were onto something special with baseball in the ‘Peg.”

Dailey remembers hugging his girlfriend Keeley on the field and celebrating at an Exchange District bar after the game. The Explorers also showed up to have drinks with the victors.

A lot has changed in Winnipeg since 1994, but the Goldeyes remain a part of the local sports landscape nearly 30 years later. They moved to a brand-new jewel of a ballpark in 1999. They became members of the American Association in 2011 after the Northern League folded. Katz and company, under manager Rick Forney, have captured three more championships. They’ve weathered a pandemic and survived two years in exile.

Collier said that longevity says a lot about Goldeyes fans.

“Hats off to the fans for sticking with us these past two years, and to Sam Katz for keeping the team going during a season on the road in 2020 and most of the year away from Winnipeg (in 2021), he said. “The fans are what keep us going. I can’t say enough good things about them.”

While a few Goldeyes have gone on to major league careers, Dailey never caught the attention of a Major League organization. He admitted that is still a tough pill for him to swallow, because his numbers were good and he was young.

He played winter ball in Hilo, Hi., in 1995, but then hung up his cleats, not wanting to delay starting a career any longer. He and Keeley got married, and he took a job with Louisville Slugger.

The couple will celebrate their 27th anniversary this October and have two daughters in their early 20s.

While Dailey hasn’t been back to Winnipeg since, nor does he follow the Goldeyes anymore, he holds the season he spent with the team close to his heart. He still has his championship ring and corresponds to this day with his homestay host, Julie Bubnick, and her son.

“She is an angel, like an angel of the highest degree,” Dailey said. “I can’t imagine there’s a player who would ever say anything negative about her and her family.”

“I loved Winnipeg,” he summed up. “My entire experience in Winnipeg — I wouldn’t trade it for any other experience… I cherished it. There is no other way to describe it.”

declan.schroeder@winnipegfreepress.com