For sale: Championship baseball team

The beauty of independent baseball is anything goes.

Stage a cow-milking contest. Host Double Chin Night presented by a local laser center (“One lucky fan will walk away with one less chin”). Bring in Jerry Mathers (as the Beaver) and Soup Nazi from Seinfeld. Play the first pro game with a computerized strike zone. Distribute foam fingers on Prostate Cancer Awareness Night to encourage checkups. Outfit players in A League of Their Own pink dresses to promote breast cancer awareness.

Promotions can range from goodhearted to downright wacky, often a little of both.

There’s also baseball, and in Sunday’s championship game in the Pacific Association, the only independent league on the West Coast, the San Rafael Pacifics beat the Sonoma Stompers 6-0.

It was a bittersweet celebration for Mike Shapiro, the driving force behind the Pacifics, which he formed in 2012. He’s part owner, president and general manager and has done everything from selling sponsorships to finding host families for the players to dragging the infield to writing game stories for the website.

Shapiro, who helped create the Pacific Association in 2013, is stepping down and leaving the team and league in other people’s hands. Hopefully. It’s not a moneymaking venture as much as a love for the game that provides inexpensive family entertainment and a last chance for many ballplayers who still have the dream.

“I think it’s time for someone else to take a crack of it,” said Shapiro, adding his ownership group has reached a level of exhaustion and is selling the team. “It remains a part of my heart and soul.”

The Pacifics play at cool and cozy Albert Park, built in the 1940s, where this year’s average crowd was 452. It doesn’t sound like much, but nothing else in town generally draws that many attendees.

The league also includes teams in Martinez, Vallejo, Pittsburg and Napa, and it’s vital for San Rafael to stay alive as the founding franchise with the highest attendance and revenues.

The conversations would be difficult if no buyer is found, a scenario no one wants for the team that won the league four times in six years.

Including those with double chins.