SRVGAL is a non-profit softball league that is run by a dedicated group of volunteers both on and off the field. This year we would like to acknowledge one volunteer who has gone above and beyond to continue to improve our league.

It goes without saying that without volunteers these girls would not have a place to play softball. Nearly 200 people contribute their time to give our daughters an experience that they cherish. A place where they make some of their best friends and learn how to work together and rely on each other. In a league of our extraordinary size there are some of us that have to wear many hats and to make it a reality for these kids. Too many parents assume that it’s so easy to schedule 1000 games or find a uniform in 12 different colors with sizes that fit everybody. Our coordinators did a fabulous and thankless job of keeping the season flowing especially in a year where there were so many rain outs that nearly half of the games had to be rescheduled. The Warren’s turned their house into a uniform factory for the second year in a row making sure every girl had a jersey on opening day and then coordinated a division and then coach a team and then went right back to distributing shirts to all the little ones.

Yet in all of this there is one individual who covered so much ground, literally, took care of the Academy, fought for field space from other leagues, rebuilt fields time and time again as Mother Nature swatted away all his work like a nine month old flipping her dinner onto the floor and laughing about it. You have no idea how many actual hours this individual put in with the district, the City Of San Ramon, the City of Danville and myself to make sure these girls had the best possible playing conditions in the valley. He was the weatherman, groundskeeper, gate keeper, instructor, defender, advocate and very good friend to all of these girls.

The two most common phrases uttered into a phone over the last five months were “Hey Siri” and “Hey EJ”. I doubt if there’s a single person in this league that is unfamiliar with those two
letters. I while I want to extend my deepest thanks to all of our volunteers, my commissioner Dan who has worked tirelessly, of course Jan who this league could not survive without, I have to once again give the volunteer of the year to EJ McRae. The only person who the SRVUSD, the City Of San Ramon and the city of Danville all have on speed dial. Yes they have him on speed dial. If that doesn’t say it nothing does. EJ from all of us, thank you so much!