The History of Clarkball

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The Early Years (2006 - 2009)

Little is known about the first Clarkball Tournament back in 2006. For those who were not in attendance it may feel like more of a myth than an actual event. If any photos from that night exist, we’re definitely not aware of them.

Flood lights, mangled plywood, and lawn chairs surrounded the field. It was one last gathering of friends before the end of the summer. No winner was declared because we just played through the night until the last person went home. We just played ball, but the seeds of an idea were born that night.

Founders Clark Thomas and Mike Kuzminski started the game with a bag of dodgeballs and a plastic bat playing against each other and having pitching battles in Thomas‘ parents‘ backyard. Soon they began inviting their friends to play and that’s how Kuzminski coined the name Clarkball… since everyone was coming over to Clark’s house to play ball. After a summer of backyard games the 2006 tournament came to life on a muggy day in late August.

The second year in 2007 will always be remembered for the heavy rain, but it was the first year that we took a swing at building an actual field. it started by building the outfield wall and backstop out of tarps and making it brighter with more flood lights. One of the most unique features of the field was the 15 foot tall tarped wall in left field mimicking Fenway Park. We included food, opening ceremonies, and an announcer’s booth.

As the 3rd year approached, no major additions were made to the field, other than the wall in left got a little higher, the scoreboard was moved to right field, and the iconic “Polish Porch“ was created as a lounge and dining area. It seemed like another quiet year, and then the Warren Times Observer got wind of the event and asked to do an article featuring it, so we invited their sports department to the tournament to play a ceremonial first game against the Jamestown Old Timers in a game dubbed… ”The Legends VS. The Press”. When the article was published a few days later, popularity with the game soared, Headlining the sports section of the newspaper was the 2008 version of going viral.

With momentum on our side for the 2009 tournament we went for a bigger challenge and had businesses from the local community sponsor the tournament. Some of our early sponsors helped us get creative too, with a giant 3D Big Mac for McDonald‘s as a homerun target and a big tire man on the outfield for Warren Tire Center. We played through the rain again, but it was a massive turnout, so big that we knew it had outgrown its original home. 

Starbrick’s Last Call (2011)

This is one of the shortest chapters you will ever read, but after taking a year off in 2010, we came back in 2011 with what was essentially an 8 team invite only tournament. We knew that if we advertised and opened it to the public we would have too many people in the backyard, even back in 2009 there were so many parked cars that the neighbors couldn’t get to their houses. So we kept it small with the vibe of a backyard BBQ and had one last tournament in Starbrick. 

Clarkball The Business (2013 - 2017)

In 2013 Thomas started Clarkball LLC, opened an office in downtown Warren, and grew Clarkball into a profitable event played at city parks. The 2013 event was the first one with multiple fields and a festival vibe with live music, food vendors, and people hanging out all day. Each event had advertising partners and clarkball.com was utilized for marketing and advertising.

Clarkball also came to life in schools, youth programs, and at the local YMCA. In between the big yearly tournament we did many smaller events and worked to promote other local businesses and their events. In 2015 Thomas started PlayBall! The Magazine 

And began speaking about entrepreneurship at schools and career days. 

2017 capped off a great four year run of planning fun events and learning how to run a business. The 2017 tournament was at Betts Park and brought together a diverse group of people. We parked a taco truck next to the left field line and put a stage beyond center field for three punk rock bands to jam into the night. This tournament parlayed into Clarkball’s last event from that era, which was the Warren Wine Walk. We placed wineries or vendors in 15 businesses stretched across the town and had around 300 people go on the walk. 

Along with Clarkball, Thomas always had a day job too, including traveling around the southeast working at college football games and working a lot of larger events in Las Vegas, so Clarkball stopped in 2017. 

Legends Never Die (2024 and beyond)

Fast Forward seven years and here we are. The perfect blend of timing and demand has fueled the revival, and it was a great turn out on October 19 in Tidioute with 12 teams and over 100 players participating. There were also many fans in attendance, swinging down to the field to enjoy the food vendors and fun atmosphere. 

With the first walk off hit in a Clarkball championship game since the 2007 tournament, Bigs walked off as champions in Tidioute. The championship game, between Bigs and The Bomb Squad, started around 5:00 PM and remained close for the entire 6 innings. 

As the sun faded in the sky and shadows crept across the field, Bigs came to bat in the bottom of the 6th. With one out and runners on the corners, Derek Reagle hit a towering fly ball to the wall in left center, scoring Mikey Garrett from 3rd to win the game 7 - 6. 

The team members from Bigs were Mark Crossley, Mikey Garrett, Aidan Morrison, Andrew Morrison, Joe Pellegrino, and Derek Reagle. Andrew Morrison was voted tournament MVP for his elite defense and clutch hitting, while Pellegrino won his 4th career championship (2007, 2009, 2017, 2024).

in some other notable games, Crispy Zyns and MAGA Bombs played a thriller of a first round playoff game. With the score tied after 6 innings, the game was forced into a Blast Off, where each team sent 6 players to the plate, each having one swing to hit a home run. At the end of the blast off, the young Crispy Zyns prevailed, winning 1 - 0 on a lone home run.

The semi final game between Balls Deep and The Bomb Squad was a classic slugfest. The BomB Squad held on to upset the 1 seed after a barrage of home runs in the top of the 6th inning. With the bases loaded, Bomb Squad‘a Adam Paden hit the farthest home run of the day on Thomski Field with a grand slam over the Big Mac in right field. The ball cleared the second fence and landed on Main Street, missing a passing dump truck by a couple feet.