THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, May 24, 1996 TAG: 9605220182
SECTION: PORTSMOUTH CURRENTS PAGE: 18 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Sports
SOURCE: Bill Leffler
LENGTH: 55 lines
Never will I look at the flower-covered backstop on the St. Andrew's United Methodist Church baseball field without thinking about Donald Stuck.
Once upon a time it was a state-of-the-art backstop, homemade by a master handyman, for an area Little League team.
It must have been 28 or 29 years ago when this ballfield was constructed on the church property. Trees were bulldozed down, the ball field was diligently marked off and the backstop was constructed along with benches for the players.
It had homemade bases and a unique home plate. And many of Portsmouth's finest young baseball players had their first training on Donald Stuck's creation.
The money for this undertaking came through neighborhood fund-raising. The work was supervised and virtually all done by Stuck.
His two oldest sons were just beginning to play in the Little League at the Minor League level.
I had a special interest because I coached the team. We needed a place to practice and, after we received permission from the church to use the vacant lot it owned, he did most of the work to build the diamond.
Baseball wasn't Stuck's forte. But he became an assistant coach. And when I expressed an idea I had about developing young pitchers once again he came to the rescue.
I thought control was the key to pitching at an early age. Most Minor League teams lose because the pitchers walk too many batters.
I reasoned that if I had some sort of target for pitchers to hit, I could find who were the most accurate. Stuck built a square target that we sat up for every player to throw through. And our team won the league championship because we had the best pitchers.
His three sons all played Little League.
One year I had the privilege of coaching a state championship Senior Little League all-star team. The big reason was the presence of Jimmy Stuck on that team. Since then he has become one of the area's finest umpires.
Jimmy and older brother Brian became two-sport letter winners at Manor High School. Jimmy was picked as the outstanding baseball player in the city and was an All-Southeastern District selection, earning a scholarship to the University of Richmond.
Early Sunday morning a massive heart attack claimed Donald Stuck. It ended a long battle the 68-year-old had with diabetes and nearly four years on a kidney machine.
He donated his body to the Eastern Virginia Medical School for diabetes research.
It's the kind of thing I came to accept as routine for Donald Stuck. He was my next-door neighbor for 40 years. ILLUSTRATION: Staff photo
Flowers have overtaken Stuck's backstop. by CNB