American Legion stars hold reunion
Speros-Gagliano players reunite
Here’s how it worked on the baseball diamonds of Shelby County in the 1960s and ’70s.
“There was American Legion ball — and there was Bill Speros-Tony Gagliano American Legion ball,” said Ross Grimsley, who helped Speros win the American Legion World Series in 1968.
That legacy of excellence — and friendship — brought 140 men who played for the Memphis legend between 1959-77 (with Bill Speros joining as a sponsor in 1963) to Tower Center for a reunion and tribute dinner on July 9.
“I came up here as a young kid from Coldwater, Mississippi, for a tryout — and at every position was the best player I ever saw,” said Donnie Castle, who was a first-round draft pick by the Washington Senators and later spent two decades coaching at Northwest Mississippi Community College.
Paul Gagliano, one of three nephews to play on the Speros teams, organized the weekend along with Lynn Alford. “I had been thinking about it for four years, and we’ve been at the details since last November,” said Gagliano, who went on to Vanderbilt while his brothers Phil and Ralph signed pro contracts, Phil playing a dozen years in the majors.
At one point, Paul asked those who played pro ball to stand up, and nearly two dozen men got out of their chairs (two others, Phil Gagliano and Tucker Ashford, were attending the funeral for Ashford’s mother). Then those who earned college scholarships off the Gagliano squad were asked to stand — and a majority of the room got to their feet.
“He could spot talent, and knew how to develop it,” said Grimsley, a former Frayser High pitcher who was part of another American Legion team that was blended into Speros for
the summer of ’68.
Gagliano’s teams also finished second at the Legion World Series three times, won 18 Legion state titles and three TSSAA high school championships while coaching at CBHS.
“I was from Bartlett, which was the country back then,” said John Scrhoppel, who pitched briefly for the Yankees in 1965. “You got the call to play for Speros, it was like getting called up to the Yankees.”
Grimsley went on to win 124 major league games, and two more in the 1972 World Series with Cincinnati.
Gagliano teams liked to play small ball. Bunts, squeeze plays and his signature, a squeeze bunt scoring two runners from second and third. “Did it all the time,” Paul Gagliano said.
More than a few tales about the fiery Gagliano’s chew-outs for missing a bunt sign were told, usually with a small torrent of laughter.
“He had 17 signs he’d flash, most of ‘em for bunts or steals,” said Jeff Hopkins, a Gagliano alum who went on to coach at the University of Memphis and Collierville High School. “I didn’t have 17, but I had 15 signs I’d flash the same way.”
A silent auction was held in part to raise funds for a memorial marker to be placed at Gagliano Field. “We’re about $1,300 away from the goal, but we’ll get there,” Paul Gagliano said.
Ex-players literally came from halfway around the globe. Rene White finished up a two-year assignment in Bangladesh with Chevron, and flew from there to Houston and Memphis in time to make the event. “Too many friends. Too many memories,” White said.
On the back of Lou Chiozza’s chair was a stillspotless jacket he won as a member of the 1963 runner-up squad, along with a pile of newspaper clippings.
“We flew from Memphis to New York on a (thenbrand-new) 727, bused up to Keene, New Hampshire for the series — and the Memphis papers followed us all the way,” said Chiozza. “When you’re a kid that age, it was incredible.”
Mention was made of the late George Lapides, who wrote often about Speros’ teams during his years with the Memphis Press-Scimitar.
Speros’ daughter, Cindy Pease, said her late father would’ve reveled in the night as well. “He loved sitting and talking baseball with Tony, and being around this talent,” Pease said. “He and I would be in lawn chairs at every game, and it’s how I became a sports fanatic.”
Tony’s son, Tom, never played for his father.
Tom Gagliano, who admitted “it was tough to separate Dad and Coach” with his father, studied for the priesthood, and then went on to a career as a probation officer, a post he still fills at 73. Through the years, he said he has had one bit of coach Gagliano’s philosophy as part of his core values.
“He always looked for the best in a person, and tried to bring it out,” Tom Gagliano said. “So do I.”