Blood Brothers Behind Bars

“I’m very proud to have played for such a great team.” – Jimmy Crutchfield, former Negro Leagues player

Over the past 50 years, I have played on a lot of different sports teams. First, there was the Cardinals squad I played on in Little League under the guidance of our manager, Sam Hamill. As a pitcher, I still remember him encouraging me to imitate Robin Roberts with my wind-up. “He used to rock the hitters to sleep,” Coach Hamill would say.

From there, I played one year for the Bankers, a traveling All-Star team, and then three years with the Merchants in the Babe Ruth League. After that, I transitioned to fast-pitch softball, playing for two different church teams over a four-year period.

In 1987, I formed my own softball team named The South Jersey Saints, which eventually became The Saints Prison Ministry. For 24 years, I toured North America with that squad, playing and ministering in hundreds of state and federal prisons. All of those teams were very close knit, but a few of them were even more special.

The men who played alongside me on the Saints team from the late 90’s through 2011 were like blood brothers. We started raising our support as missionary athletes in January, went on a pre-season mission trip to Florida in either February or March, began practicing outdoors in April, and then spent every other Saturday – and many weeknights – playing and ministering together from May 1st through September 30th. We even conducted an 8-day, 7-night “crusade” to places like Michigan, Colorado, Indiana, Ohio, Kentucky, and South Carolina during which we would often play as many as 25 games. Then came a post-season prison trip in October and off-season Bible studies during the winter months.

Some years, our team was so talented that we would win 60 games and only lose five or six against some very tough inmate competition. However, what made us “winners” wasn’t our on-the-field ability… it was our camaraderie that was forged on long bus rides in the wee hours of the morning.

Jimmy Crutchfield described the success of the Pittsburgh Crawfords in similar fashion. “We were a team both on and off the field. We won together and we lost together. We laughed together and we cried together. We cared about each other. How could anything be any better than that?”

My friend, you may not be athletic, but my advice is to find a “team” of like-minded believers on which you can serve God and edify one another. It may be as a member of a mission team, a church committee, or some other outreach. The “who” doesn’t matter as much as the “what” – and the “what” is serving God together.

“As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.” Proverbs 27:17 (BSB)

- Rev. Dale M. Glading, President