** Commissioner's Corner - Part IX- The CBA's Roots in Canada **
(by Marc Wasserman, Commissioner of the Cyber Baseball Association {CBA} )

The story of CBA's Quebec gamers (or GMs) and the Dawson division is a very relevent one (a story for the ages) at this time as baseball makes its comeback for a spring in Montreal Canada.  In essense, the CBA is perhaps a microcosm of the fans of baseball in Quebec who called their team Nos Amours (To our Loves in English). The true baseball fan still resides in this Canadian province as it has for well over a century.  Perhaps now they are at home waiting for it to happen again.  Or at least they're home playing Strat-o-matic baseball for leagues such as the CBA or the QSBL {Quebec Strat-o-matic Baseball League}. 

Did you know that baseball's earliest roots date back to Montreal?  We all know about Montreal having the Brooklyn Dodgers farm team including the well documented fervor they greeted Jackie Robinson with when he arrived. But, did you know that  baseball can be traced back to 1838 in Canada?  A version of baseball with 5 bases was played and by 1860, a team in Southwestern Ontario adopted the 'American" rules.  Further, the London Tecumseh's of the International league won the 1877 Championship.  

Thus, "Baseball" is not just American.  It's truly international! However, with the destruction of the Montreal Expos, the Canadian CBA gamers lost their MLB spirit.  But Strat-o-matic kept baseball alive for so many fans in many other ways.  Many of the CBA GM's kept their hopes alive, thus satisfying their baseball addiction for sports by playing Strat-o-matic Baseball. The QSBL league still operates today after about 18 or 19 seasons.  They have a hockey league as well.

The first commissioner of the CBA, Claude Lamarre, and his co-Commissioner, were die hard Montreal Expos fans. Originally they attributed the names of their baseball heroes with the CBA division title names. Our league divisional names are the Carter division, the Rogers, Schmidt, Monday, Parker, and Dawson (this includes three Expos so named).  Key players, with key cards, who were so pride and proud about their baseball performances.  Enduring names reflecting the passion these Expos fans had for their beloved players and team who were a symbol of great competitors. 

But then something happened that threatened to steal the heart and soul from these loyal Expo fans.  Baseball armaggedon we could say, Mr. Lorie came to town.  Personally I do recall in my conversations with our Quebec CBA mates, their sadness as they felt the pending and threatening baseball exodus of THEIR TEAM.  As  years went on and the Expos were being dismantled by Lorie; the fans (include our dear Claude) knew the were getting a raw deal. Thus interest in baseball as a whole started to greatly dimish in Quebec. After all, true fans can only be taken for fools for just so long.  The fans absolutely knew they were being misled.  I swear, our CBA friends from Canada knew something bad was coming for the Expos fans for sometime before it actually was finalized, and it sho'nuf, it did with their pure baseball hearts left bleeding in their batting gloves. 

With tears, the Expo fans including our CBA extended family from Quebec  trudged on in the CBA.  With the foreboding presence of a franchise relocation imminent, some of our CBA players gave up hope and left when MLB baseball in Quebec died.  Our Canadian friends had had enough.  Who could blame them?  Not I!  My pleas were futile as Lorie did the damage according to one GM.  They knew they had to say so long to their dreams of baseball for a time.  Maybe even, say so long to some friends in the CBA because of it.  The GMs in Quebec did say however, that someday they may reconsider and would not forget their close friends and associates from over the years.  The nearly extinguished fire was at least, still barely smoldering.

Then of course, years passed.  The Division which contained most of our Canadian members, Dawson, saw in 2005, one final salute to baseball and to it's past CBA GM's, whose hearts had been broken --  the 2005 Longue Pointe Loggers.  The team that replaced the former commissioner's team, came from out of nowhere from qualifying for the last wildcard spot with a speedy, small ball team.  No power, some pitching and for sure a great underdog.  A team as unlikely to do well as the Expos of that year when they were ripped from their fans.  A little team that could managed by Dennis Concepcion.

Concepcion faced a perennial powerhouse, the Philly Phantastics, who had previously won 120 games in a season. No one gave this lonely Dawson division small ball team a chance against a staff that featured guys like Kevin Brown and Randy Johnson and a lineup that featured one slugger after another.  The CBA press releases at this time were specifically directed to make it sound as if the baseball tradition in Quebec was continuing.  The profiles reported, the pictures images were created to create a whole simulated aura of if a World Series was taking place in Montreal. Thus, there was a lot of yahoogroup mail list chatter amongst the GM's that season in 2005. 

Would it be the final curtain call for baseball in the province?  In a grueling battle with the Phantastics, with all the trimmings and press releases and photoshop photos; that little Longue Pointe Logger team, managed to get an Al Weis /Bill Mazeroski-like performances from little known players.  Although it was an Ichiro homer of all things that outright won the Loggers the last Staub Conference championship til 2013, it was their heroes with names such as Doug "Miracle" Mirabelli, and Brian Jordan who made some of the Expos fans smile, who made the Quebecians smile too.  But sadly still, our commissioner, and a few other members had still left to ponder their baseball fate as the remains of a smoldering ash still held a glimmer.

(Note - below are some photos linked to the 2005 World Series with the Longue-Pointe Loggers ...)
 

So, a little dim light continued to stay on, a faint flicker of hope mostly due to the CBA's use of social media keeping a connection with our league and the game we love. However, we didn't lose all our Expos fans.  One die hard fan was Our Belfast Brawler team manager, Derek Adams, who stayed with us despite the Expos' move.  His love for the game was relived each season in the CBA as well as in face to face games he played with local friends. Expo fan, Dennis Concepcion, who lives in the New York City region, was another broken hearted Expos fan who remained in our league. Dennis owns many interesting pieces of Montreal Expos memorabilia which includes interesting items used in actual games. Dennis was often seen on news clips in support of the Expos when they were uprooted. He stayed with strat-o-matic despite his heartache.

With baseball almost out of the Montreal radar, next to enter into the CBA is the Montreal based baseball fanatic, Doug Brunet who calls his team the Montreal Crows.  Doug took a bare basic expansion team and crafted a perennial playoff contender.  No question about it, Strat kept Doug's baseball mind in the game. The fire wasn't just smoldering with these baseball fanatics, it was burning and has always been a passion.  Dennis, Derek, and Doug are also league officials. I would be hard pressed to find any more knowledgeable baseball / Strat-o-matic people.  CBA also had until last season, The Limoilou Wendigos, who were also in the Dawson division.  They remained in the league despite baseball's exodus from Quebec.  Their GM Jeff, did his best over many years in the league, even though his interest, like the others, fell off a bit as baseball floundered in his area.  Jeff did manage to win 3 CBA World titles in his tenure though.  Still the coals glowed, perhaps a bit stronger than before because the social media revolution then happened...

But then, last year, two more of our former departed Expos fans, our CBA family with a renewed baseball energy connected with us using our social media outlets. They had been following us for some time and then decided to rejoin the CBA. Please don't ask if these former GMs followed the Washington National baseball team as they are not the Expos! We were so thrilled that through Strat-o-matic and our CBA website on-line with our social media league news had reached to our departed former CBA friends that opened up a special communication which ultimately led them back to us.  Long time friends reunited again.  We are in our 2nd season now that Claude Lamarre and Dino Barnabe, both CBA Hall of Famers with distinction, returned and they are back in the swing of things.  Thanks to Strat-o-matic, old friends are new again.

(Note: When Wolfman joined the CBA, he took over the Montreal Royals which was the team run by another Canadian member from Quebec who left the league at the end of 2004. Wolfman was able to guide the Royals to a wild card position in 2005 before he moved the team to Skokie in 2006.)

So if you ask if Baseball is alive in Quebec again, we would answer with a strong "YES".  It is in the form of Strat-o-matic and these fans are now still dreaming.  Do you hear them Bud?  Thank you Claude, Dino, Judy, Doug, JD, for keeping baseball alive in Montreal and Quebec through Strat-o-matic baseball.  With Montreal back in the baseball talk this spring, maybe someone out there will realize that baseball still lives in Montreal. And it's because of Strat-o-matic baseball that baseball wasn't out-right rejected by our gamers.  Perhaps, one day they can see MLB ball again in their home province too and not the exhibition games played by the Toronto Blue Jays there at the end of March.