I might have been 5 or 6 years old. The ball wasn’t a true Wiffle ball. It was one of those softball-sized plastic balls with about a hundred holes in it. Though my memory is foggy, I know it was in the yard at the First Baptist Church parsonage where we lived in Holt, Missouri. And I remember it as the first pitch I ever threw or tossed to my brother, Robert, who was ready with the plastic bat cocked and waiting to swing. 

It was a line drive (or maybe a soft popup) and it smacked my nose. I’m sure I bawled (there is crying in baseball). I don’t remember the rest of the scenario. But it led to a future with hundreds of Jodie vs. Robert Wiffle ball games, with the actual, regulation-size Wiffle ball, on back-yard and side-yard legendary Wiffle ball fields in the tiny Maries County town of Belle, Missouri. 

No matter that he was seven years older or that I was also much smaller, we were competitive. We played to win. There was maybe a modified rule or two (he only got two outs, not three), but it was serious stuff. Robert called the play-by-play, we both added crowd noise and on occasion, I’d follow the game with a write-up about our exploits. 

I was the Kansas City Royals and Robert was the Orioles, Yankees, Angels, Twins … whichever adversary was trying to take down the Royals. I mimicked Hal McRae’s righty stance and George Brett’s lefty batting stance and swing. (We were both switch hitters.) Whether competing on the Wiffle ball field or at the Strat-O-Matic table, we were immersed in the game that we loved and on paths that would lead to our lifetime vocations: Robert as a sports broadcaster — he became Bob Jackson and, for a while, BJ the DJ — and me as a sportswriter/journalist. 

We took a timeout from life on June 29 to watch our Kansas City Royals play the Cleveland Guardians at The K, with a pregame ceremony to induct Bo Jackson into the Royals Hall of Fame. And when George Brett was introduced to make Bo’s induction official, well, this old baseball soul had a moment. (Again. There is crying in baseball.) 

The day just so happened to come after the final day of big brother Robert/Bob’s working life: He was officially retired from his twenty-five-year career as marketing and promotions director for the University of Central Missouri athletic department. In the twenty-plus years before that, he was The Voice of Jefferson City Jays football (old Hickman fans will remember George Shorthose and Pete Adkins), Lincoln University basketball (anybody remember Harold Robertson?), and then the UCM Mules and Jennies as sports director at KOKO radio in Warrensburg for 18 years. He called the dual NCAA Division II men’s and women’s national basketball championships in 1984. 

Robert/Bob continued as the voice of the baseball Mules through the 2024 Division II World Series, with UCM falling short of the finals. In all, he called 168 NCAA-II baseball postseason games, sixty-four of which were national championship tournament contests — and four national championship games. 

Now I welcome you to the Sports issue of COMO Business Times and COMO Magazine. May you discover something new about COMO and, perhaps, let your muse take you on a soulful trip down memory lane.