By Megan Lambert (The Cascade) – Email
Print Edition: May 20, 2015
Aaron Levy is known to many as the voice of CIVL Radio, UFV’s campus station. But what some students might — somehow — not know is that Levy is a long-time baseball afficianado, and graciously agreed to share some of his experiences as a player on the community slo-pitch scene.
So, you have a baseball team!
I play on a couple of baseball teams, yes.
What are they called?
One is called the Brew Jays because we drink beer. Instead of a Maple Leaf on the Brew Jays sign, there’s a mug of beer, a frosty mug of beer. I also play on the poorly named Raw Dogs. The Raw Dogs is a mixed-league team, men and women, and then the Brew Jays is only men. This is slo-pitch, so it’s not fastball where you wind up, and it’s not softball, and it’s not hardball. It’s the lowest level of competition. There’s several divisions in both mixed and men, so you can go from A to E, and we are in E in both divisions. I’m the pitcher.
How long have you been doing it for?
Slo-pitch, this is my third season in Abbotsford, but I’ve been playing baseball since I was like, five.
How did your team do last season? How’s it doing this season?
Well, this season we’re like third and fourth! We came back from behind last week. We’re okay. We’re literally one of the worst teams in the division, but this year we’re winning! We’re at third and fourth and we only won five games last year, so we’re way ahead. We’re a better team this year. I think there are 20 games.
There are lots of UFV students on this team, right?
There are a few! A bunch of former UFV students.
Do you have to be really physically active to play?
No. Some people are really out of shape and they play all the time. It’s baseball, first of all! Second of all, it’s the lowest division of [slo-pitch]. Third of all, we’re not competitive.
Do you have team jerseys?
Yeah, we got new ones this year! Super cool. Powder-blue. Just like old-school regular Blue Jays uniforms, except it’s the Brew Jays. So I’ll wear it to a Blue Jays game and hopefully people will compliment my awesome team’s jersey.
You don’t think that would step on anyone’s toes as far as legal issues go?
No, we don’t have any money! We’re just a bunch of guys getting drunk and printing T-shirts, you know what I mean? What are they going to do, cease and desist? “You’re spending too much money on community, on this brand that’s not making you anything back!” I’m not worried.
What do you think this does for community engagement?
It’s a fun time! It’s held at Exhibition Park — it’s an all-weekend thing, so you run into people from all over town. A big thing in the community is Abbotsford Slo-pitch. People like it here. I know a lot of people from outside of UFV, and then a lot of people there I see at UFV later on. A lot of people like it here, so there’s crossover. I’d like to see more.
