HCAW rouwt om clubman Ray, decennialang een vertrouwd gezicht

Days after his grandchildren threw HCAW’s first ball of the season in his name, the Bussum club was mourning Ray, a man who had spent decades inside the ropes, behind the plate and along the line. He had been too unwell to come to the game himself, but the timing made the loss hit even harder: HCAW had just marked a festive opening moment for him through the next generation of his family.

The club’s farewell, signed by Huub Baaij, makes clear that Ray was not a distant supporter but part of the club’s working core. HCAW remembered him as a team-mate, coach, umpire and supporter, someone who had been woven into the club culture for so long that his absence felt like losing a piece of the place itself. Baaij wrote that he had known Ray for years and recalled that, in the mid-1970s, Ray was already in his youth team. According to the club, Ray kept playing until illness limited him.

That long connection ran through more than one role. HCAW said Ray began coaching at a young age, and in 1981 he was ready the moment coach Jeff Archer decided the club needed a mascot. Archer had a bear suit bought at Witbaard in Hilversum, Alfred Cop debuted as the first version, and soon after a brown version followed. Ray stepped into that suit and took over the role, another sign of how naturally he moved between the visible and invisible jobs that keep an amateur club alive.

His voice became part of the sound of HCAW games. The club said Ray could always be heard clearly with his trademark cries of ‘HCAW-tje’ and ‘Hit-em’, and described him as possibly the greatest supporter of them all. That is the kind of presence clubs remember: not only the people on the scoresheet, but the ones who coach, umpire, cheer, dress up, and show up year after year until everyone knows their rhythm by heart.

HCAW itself is built on that same mix of sport and belonging. The Bussum club says baseball was already being played there before the Second World War, and that the first official club under the name HC’38 was founded in 1938. Today HCAW plays in the hoofdklasse and presents itself as a family club where sportiviteit and gezelligheid matter. Ray’s death is a personal loss, but it is also a reminder of how much Dutch amateur baseball depends on people whose names are not always on the lineup card, yet whose work holds the club together. Ria, the children and the grandchildren were invited to share memories, and that is exactly how Ray’s place at HCAW will endure.