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Ted Heiser: Who’s on First?

You can call him Attorney Heiser, or Coach Heiser, but on the afternoon of Sunday, Sept. 18, he will be known as Teddy Baseball. That’s because Ted Heiser, who practices law and coaches his children’s sports teams, will be playing in the fourth annual Tri-Town Vintage Baseball Classic sponsored by the historical societies of Essex, Deep River, and Chester. The game takes place at Devitt Field in Deep River.

Teddy Baseball got his nickname when he was a member of a team from the Columbus School of Law at Catholic University of America in Washington, D.C. The team played in a weekend softball tournament for law school squads at the University of Virginia.

The first year the vintage game took place, a local tri-town squad took on a team from New London that played in a vintage league. For the last two years, the games have been round robins featuring teams from Deep River, Chester, and Essex (see “Remember the Name is ‘Base Ball’” on page 10.)

Despite the college nickname, Ted says he hadn’t expected to be a part of the team when Chester Historical Society President Skip Hubbard asked him to play.

“I was surprised when he first called,” Ted recalls.

He has been on the team for the past two years, so he’s used to the equipment that classic baseball players (and please call them ballists) use: a bat longer and thinner than modern ones and a ball made to l9th century specifications.

“It gets softer as it’s hit, and spins in unique ways, kind of like a wobbly cylinder,” Ted says.

Soft, nonetheless, is good in vintage baseball because the players field barehanded without any gloves.

“It’s not painful to catch,” Ted adds.

Nineteenth century rules have even more quirks than l9th century equipment, and there is one in particular that Ted says he always has to keep in mind on the field. A player (a ballist, that is) is out if the ball is caught not only on the fly but also on one bounce.

“I have to remember not to catch the ball in the air. It’s much easier to catch on one bounce,” Ted says.

In the vintage game, Ted has usually played shortstop, but growing up in Essex, playing for his Little League team, the Braves, he was a catcher. His coaches included his own father John Heiser, who is these days a member of the Essex vintage team. The Braves won the league championship when Ted played in the early 1980s and won it again in 2012.

Ted and his father attended the recent championship game. In that contest, one of the Braves’ coaches was Jay Tonks, whose father Dick had been a coach on Ted’s Little League team. According to Tonks, who now captains the Essex vintage squad, John Heiser and his own father Dick will be what he calls “wandering sideline” members of the team that will play this year’s game. The tangle of baseball relationships includes not only Ted’s father but Ted’s mother Judy Heiser as well. Tonks says she was the person who originally asked him to captain the Essex squad. Ted, of course, could not be a candidate because he now lives in Chester.

Ted graduated from Valley Regional and went on to Gettysburg College before attending law school. He spent a year before law school working in Washington, D.C. at the Justice Department as a clerk typist. As he looks back on it, he admits he was not a perfect fit for that job.

“I was a clerk typist even though it was pretty clear I could not type,” he says.

After graduation from law school, Ted spent 10 years in practice in Maryland, and then worked in New Jersey before returning to Connecticut. He is now a founding partner of Sullivan, Heiser and Sweeney in Clinton. Ted’s work includes a large number of employment-related cases as well as medical malpractice. He says the firm also does more litigation than many other firms of its size.

He does not get nervous before appearing in court, describing the work as exciting, but he says that in preparation for his court appearances, both his mirror and his wife, Kate, hear many of his legal arguments.

When not playing in the vintage classic, Ted is a Red Sox fan. He likes their chances this year, but like many a sports commentator, thinks they need to get better production out of their bullpen. And he is high on one of the Red Sox breakout stars of this season.

“I think Mookie Betts is going to have a Hall of fame career,” he predicts.

Geography now separates the Heiser men, with the elder Heiser on the Essex squad and Ted playing for Chester. He forecasts triumph for his side.

“They’re going to win, but I don’t want to predict a blowout,” he says.

Still, he admits, he’d love to see his father get up to bat and get a hit for Essex. His children, he adds, like watching the game, but he thinks dad is not their favorite player.

“It seems like they get a bigger kick out of seeing granddad on the field,” he says.

Tri-Town Vintage Baseball Game

Sunday, Sept. 18 at 2 p.m. at Devitt Field, off Route 154, Deep River. Admission is free; rain date is Sunday, Sept. 25.