
Pure fun and a new sense of community are enjoyed by nearly 200 in the city’s newest official summertime program.
By Ward Lauren / Special to The Malibu Times
The Malibu Coed Adult Softball League, now halfway through its first season, is not only doing well but is “a far bigger success than people thought it would be,” said John Haag, initial promoter and organizer of the popular weekend event.
Nearly 200 men and women of all skills, sizes and age have signed up to play, which has resulted in eight teams-two more than expected-of approximately 20 players per team battling it out in four games every Sunday. The ratio is about 60 percent men to 40 percent women.
“It’s important for the women to come out,” Haag said, “because, according to the rules, you have to have at least five on your team each time or else you forfeit the game.”
Steve Leungsikul, city of Malibu recreation coordinator, echoed Haag’s enthusiastic appraisal of what appears will be a permanent, perennial and official activity of his department.
“It’s definitely going well,” he said. “I just wish it would last longer because when it ends, I know everybody is going to want more.”
The teams and their standings at this point are: “Who Are We Kidding?!” in first place with five wins and no losses; the “Old Sharks” and “Shredders,” tied for second with four wins and one loss each; “Malibu Presbyterian,” in fourth place with three wins, two losses; and “Malibu Health,” “Isotopes,” “Riptides” and “Malibu Wild” all tied for fifth place with one win and four losses.
The season is scheduled to close with the games played on Sept. 10. No playoffs are planned unless there is a tie; the team with the best record at that time will be the league champion. However, because of the overwhelming success of this first season, Leungsikul said, they are looking at the possibility of having a special one-time coed tournament on Oct. 1. This would be completely separate from the current league, with teams being put together from whomever wanted to play.
“It looks like coed adult softball is a permanent function of the Malibu Department of Recreation now,” Leungsikul said, “but I have to admit that without Haag, we wouldn’t have been able to get this going. They [the organizers] did all the recruiting; we just schedule the games and make sure everything goes smoothly.”
Next year, he said, expecting that an even greater number of people will want to play, some different options are being considered. If there are enough players for 12 teams, for example, they could be divided into upper and lower divisions, matching teams of comparable abilities for more balanced competition and thus precluding widely varying win-loss records.
But lopsided scores and sometimes considerably less than professional-level play have had no negative effect on the fun and enthusiasm shared by the players in this initial season, according to a sampling of interviews of participants last week.
“It’s really a fun season,” said Chris Harrer, manager of the second-place Shredders. “Everyone on my team is having a blast.”
Harrer played ball for about 10 years as a youngster and coaches his children in Malibu Little League. “So now it’s my turn to have my kids watch me play,” he said. “And not only is it a lot of fun, I’ve been able to meet a lot of people in Malibu that I’ve never met before.”
Monique Moio-Martin, who plays for Harrer’s team, has lived in Malibu for two years now and works in the Heathercliff office of Coldwell-Banker.
“But it has been a slow start,” she said. “One thing I wanted to do was get involved in the community and start getting to know people who live here. I thought softball would be a good way to start building relationships. When you play softball you get to know people on a different level- it’s teamwork.”
Although she hadn’t played for about 30 years, Moio-Martin is no newcomer to the game. Every year in grade school she made the all-star team in the East Valley Softball League, and was recruited by Birmingham High but was unable to play on the team because of an after-school job.
“So I have to admit that the biggest thing that brings me back is that I’m having so much fun,” she said.
Gary Smith, manager of the Isotopes team, said, “It’s really a nice league, a chance to play with your friends and neighbors, to get out there and have a good time and try not to hurt yourself. I’m 53. Before I had kids I played with a show biz league in the Valley; before that in a rec league in Philadelphia. For a while I didn’t have a shirt without a number on it. And the name of a tavern.
“It’s way overdue here,” Smith added. “I’m glad to see the city doing it.”
Daniel Common, Who Are We Kidding?! manager, said he has played on quite a few teams through the years and felt the league was something the city really needed to do. He and most of his team know each other from working at Pepperdine University, but he also has worked with the city and Malibu Little League, and now the coed league has given him an opportunity to know some of these people better and to meet new people as well.
“It has created a few extra ties, like we have a couple teams we look forward to playing and people we look forward to seeing every week,” he said. “We’re a fun team; we just mess around. But we do have some pretty good athletes. A couple of the girls played in college. We’re one of the youngest teams; we don’t have anyone over forty-five.
“But the main thing is it’s a lot of fun, and you can’t beat the view from the field. Who wouldn’t want to go out and play ball there?”
Holly Perlmutter of the Isotopes grew up playing ball, she said, and has coached girls’ high school softball periodically during the last 10 years.
“Gary Smith is a neighbor of mine and saw me throwing a ball one day and said, ‘Gosh, it looks like you know how to play. I’ve got a team…'” Perlmutter recalled. “And I couldn’t turn him down.”
Perlmutter, whose husband and one-a-half-year-old daughter come out to watch her play, also coaches the JV girls’ soccer team at Malibu High School.
Malibu Health’s David Kohler was completely unfazed by his team’s 1-4 record that qualified them for the four-team tie in last place.
“We just go out, get together with friends and have a lot of fun,” he said. “It’s competitive but it’s not.”
The Malibu Health squad is evenly made up of men and women, he said.
“It’s great. I get to play with my wife and normally I wouldn’t, and the kids love to come out and watch. Then, too, you see people from around the neighborhoods, which helps build a sense of community.”