When you hear Bob Bellizzi’s name, perhaps the first words that come to mind are compassionate, mentor, teacher, and, of course, baseball.
Perhaps you knew him as a teacher at Albany High School, or as founder and coach of St. Rose’s baseball team, or as Bob Bellizzi of Bob Bellizzi’s Grand Slam Baseball Camp. Located in Delmar, the baseball camp celebrates its 15th anniversary this summer.
It is part of the legacy that Bob Bellizzi, the camp’s founder, left behind after he died from leukemia in May of 2006. In addition to starting and running his summer camp, he taught social sciences at Albany High School and founded, coached and managed St. Rose’s baseball team until his death.
Throughout all of his endeavors, he consistently provided unwavering mentorship, support and a strong sense of community for his students, baseball players and colleagues.
Ask anyone who had the opportunity to work with Bellizzi, and they’ll attest to this statement. Bellizzi’s Grand Slam Baseball Camp stands as an example of the work he did and how he made his impact on thosewith whom he surrounded himself.
The staff of the camp consists of players from the St. Rose baseball team, Bellizzi’s family, and campers-turned-baseball coaches (including two of Bellizzi’s sons).
Alongside Kim Bellizzi, wife of the late Bob Bellizzi, are Rich Seebode and Aaron Haacker, both of whom are schoolteachers. Seebode and Haacker played for St. Rose while Bellizzi was coaching, and went on to coach for St. Rose before pursuing careers in education.
I’ve been working at the camp since a year after Bob started itsince 1994. I’ve played for Coach Bellizzi and I coached with him. I’ve been with the camp basically since the start,` says Seebode.
Seebode isn’t the only one who’s been working with the camp since its inception. Bellizzi’s son, Robbie Bellizzi, a student and baseball player at St. Rose, started attending the camp as a camper at age four. Now, at age 20, he works there as a counselor.
`They’ve cut their teeth on this,` says Kim Bellizzi of Robby and her two other sons, Michael and Alex, who are also involved with the camp`Alex still attends as a camper and Michael works there as a counselor.
Many of his baseball players from St. Rose work at the camp each summer. According to Casey O’Connor, the St. Rose baseball team’s current coach, the camp employs about 10 to 12 players each summer both past and present.
It seems like once players had the chance to work with Bellizzi, they took advantage of as many opportunities as they could to continue doing so. Casey O’Connor, for instance, worked with Bellizzi as a baseball player on his team, a coach at the summer camp, and as a coach with him at St. Rose. O’Connor took over the team after Bellizzi’s death.
`We’re a very tight family, even to this day,` says Casey O’Connor.
`I took the job and I was very appreciative to keep his legacy going. All the coaches on my staff are graduates of the college of St. Rose and all played in the program. We tried to keep the [program going] because it was something that was so good and so special`we tried to keep it as close to what it’s been as we can,` says O’Connor.
O’Connor began working with Bellizzi in 1994, and worked with him straight through until his passing. O’Connor reminisced about his time spent with Bellizzi and how he was more than just a coach.
`He signed on and took great interest in his players, and actually many players responded to him almost like a second father,` says O’Connor.
He was understanding when it was appropriate (if his players made a mistake or two on or off the field), but he was direct and strict when he had to be.
Bellizzi knew baseball well and taught it well, but maybe what made the biggest impact on Bellizzi’s players was how he taught them about interacting with one another and the world. He was loyal`he always made sure the members of his team had a fair shot at their future. O’Connor tries to remember these values that Bellizzi instilled in him when working with his own players and when working on his own coaching style.
`There are 412 people who came through the baseball system and nobody has a negative thing to say about [Bellizzi],` says O’Connor.
Bellizzi used these same values when working with his campers.
In the last years of Bellizzi’s life it was physically difficult for him to participate as much as he did in the beginning with both his camp and baseball team (amongst the other programs he ran). Confined to a wheelchair, he would enter the gym where his baseball players were practicing, bring it into the highest gear, and chase his players around. He always tried to have a good attitude about life.
Bellizzi’s Grand Slam camp is geared towards children aged 6 to 15. Considered a summer day camp, it’s run out of the Elm Avenue Park in Delmar from 9 p.m. to 3 p.m. Monday through Friday, and each session is five days long. The first session starts Monday, July 7. The camp will run straight through for the following six weeks. Campers can sign up for as many sessions as they’d like. Some campers have attended Bellizzi’s Grand Slam Baseball Camp for all six weeks straight.
`We do some light instruction with the kids, but mostly we focus on [them] having a positive and fun experience,` says Kim Bellizzi, who helps run the camp.
Campers are broken up into small groups during the day, mostly by age. During the morning they work on a particular baseball skill, and then in the afternoon they eat lunch in the pool complex, take a dip, and return to the field for a game of baseball or a contest, which encourages light-hearted competitiveness.
After Bellizzi’s death, his family and those he worked with him closely decided to keep the camp going along with the St. Rose baseball team, which he started with no baseball field and no uniforms.
`He had the idea that he was going to start a team and through a lot of hard work, sweat and adversity, he did that,` says O’Connor. It seems that Bellizzi put a lot of sweat and hard work into everything he did, from starting his baseball team at St. Rose to starting his baseball camp in Delmar.
While a strong knowledge of the game of baseball and strong skills are necessary to play on the St. Rose team, anyone can participate in the camp.
`Even for the kids who weren’t so much the baseball type, they went there because their friends were going and they knew they could have a good time,` says O’Connor.
`Coach Bellizzi was such a big figure and had such a big name, (parents) often sent their kids there as more of a summer camp experience. It was a good time and it was a fun time. I wish I had the time to do it now,` says O’Connnor.
Above all, Kim Bellizzi emphasized that the camp is a positive and nurturing experience for the campers`just as all of Bellizzi’s efforts were for his students and players.
For information on Bob Bellizzi’s Grand Slam Baseball Camp, call 439-0695. There’s no deadline for signing up and the camp is co-ed. Sessions run from Monday, July 7 through Sunday, Aug. 10 for players ages 6 through 15, and the cost is $225 per week. “