The 1982 Perfect Season
The story Joe McDermott's former players tell the most isn't about the pitching or the defense or the five Catholic League championships he won across his 31 seasons at Father Judge. It's about the MVP trophy that got broken into pieces on the bus ride home from Erny Field on a drab, gray May afternoon in 1982.
Father Judge had just finished off a perfect 18-0 Catholic League season — 16-0 in the regular season with an 8.1 average run margin, then 2-0 in the playoffs — with a 6-1 championship win over Archbishop Carroll. Senior pitcher and first baseman Pat Waninger had just been named championship MVP after throwing a four-hitter with six strikeouts, his ninth consecutive win of the season. His ERA for the year: 0.80. His hits allowed: 39 in 61 innings. His record: 9-0 as a pitcher who didn't consider himself a pitcher.
Like always, the guys played great defense behind me. Anyone could have pitched for this team.
Then came the bus ride.
We were celebrating pretty hard on the bus back to Judge and the trophy kind of fell apart. I was left with the cup and the man, but the other eight to 10 pieces were on the floor. Jim Gallo, one of our subs, saw what happened and yelled, 'Why don't you share that?' That's what I did. We're riding through the streets and kids are hanging out windows waving pieces of trophy.
By the time the Crusaders pulled into Father Judge on Solly Avenue, the only parts of the Catholic League baseball MVP trophy still together were the cup and "the man trying to bat." The other eight to 10 pieces had been passed to kids along the route. Waninger kept the batter and the cup. His teammates still tell the story 40 years later.
