Dennis Mattingly, the man who gave the city a baseball team and in return received the gift of life when people around town raised the tens of thousands of dollars so he could get a life-saving stem-cell transplant, is retiring as general manager after 32 seasons with the Anchorage Bucs.
Mattingly, 62, helped create the team in 1980, when it was called the Cook Inlet Bucs and played in the adult baseball league.
A year later Mattingly helped the Bucs muscle their way into the Alaska Baseball League, and since then they've brought players like Jared Weaver, Jeff Kent and Wally Joyner to town for the summer.
Mattingly's title is general manager, but over the years -- most years, in fact-- he's served as groundskeeper, bus driver, office manager, recruiter and fix-it man. When something broke or was needed at Mulcahy Stadium, it was often Mattingly -- not the city -- who took care of it.
"Dennis is the Bucs," said Gary Lichtenstein, director of baseball operations for the Bucs. "To match his focus and devotion and ability is impossible. He would be on the field some days 20 hours. He would work the field, mow the grass.
"I used to call him McGyver because anything mechanical he would figure out."
But Mattingly can't fix the terminal cancer that is ravaging his immune system and turning his bones brittle.
He was diagnosed with multiple myeloma in 2000 and has since received two stem-cell transplants that helped extend his life. In late 2008, the public went to bat for him and raised more than $150,000 to help pay for the second transplant after Mattingly's insurance was tapped out.
The cancer is again on the attack.
"I started the season with two broken ribs just from coughing," Mattingly said on a recent night at Mulcahy while the Bucs were warming up for a game with the Mat-Su Miners. "I broke one in my sleep."
The cancer is in both of his legs, hindering the mobility of a man who is all about action. Mattingly is a doer, a former Teamster born with dirt under his fingernails, and his health is keeping him from doing everything he used to do at the ballpark.
"It's frustrating. I get really run down, and then I get sicker than hell," he said.
"I told myself I gotta quit, that everybody's gotta walk away from something. I certainly don't want to, but when I can't give it the effort that I think I should, I'm not gonna do it. If I want to come mow the grass, I need to call a couple other people to help.
"If I have to depend on someone else before I can get a project done? It's driving me frickin' crazy."
Mattingly said he's never kept track of the hours he puts in at the ballpark during the summer but said that many times 40 hours a week didn't come close to covering it.
"Sunday morning I'd come here at 8 and didn't get home till after 8 at night," he said. "There was always something more you could get done."
He glanced looked out at Mulcahy's artificial turf infield, which replaced the old grass infield last summer. "That should've been done 20 years ago," he said. "This turf has saved thousands of hours."
Mattingly said he's drawn to the ballpark by the game and the players. "This is what I wanted to do," he said.
Ever the baseball man, Mattingly admits that it's been tough watching the Bucs, who finished 16-20 in league play going into the three-game Mayor's Cup series with the Glacier Pilots, struggle to play .500 ball this season. The Bucs are 21-30 overall. He delivers a concise appraisal of the team: "They're nice kids. They're trying their asses off. But they can't hit."
He loves most those players with the work ethic to always give 100 percent and who are grateful for the chance to play summer ball, whether they're pro prospects or not. He most loved those teams that featured natural leaders who made sure everyone took care of business on the field -- and if the by-product of such teams was pennants and championships, all the better.
Mattingly thinks being around baseball has helped him in his fight. The nature of the sport -- which serves up dozens of failures in every game, whether it's a batter grounding out, a pitcher giving up a hit or a shortstop overthrowing first base -- can teach resiliency that extends beyond the chalked lines.
"This game, if you don't accept failure before you even start playing, you're in trouble," he said. "Here you can be on top of the world one day and be underneath the dirt the next. It teaches you to take what comes. I've been through quite a bit these last several years and I'm not gonna let it get me down because I'm not gonna dwell on things that might go wrong.
"You see guys come in slamming gloves off the wall and kicking (stuff); that's not gonna change anything. Go after it again tomorrow."
Taking over for Mattingly as general manager will be Shawn Maltby, the 37-year-old who has been GM of the Peninsula Oilers for the last six years. The Oilers last week clinched the ABL title and will represent the league this week in the National Baseball Congress World Series in Wichita, Kan.
"He knows the league and has put together a successful program," Lichtenstein said. "So for me, it was the best transition we could make."
Mattingly said he won't be a stranger at the park next year. But if his wife Sandy says she wants to spend the weekend at the cabin or if Dennis wants to chase the July run of reds on the Kenai, they'll have the freedom to go.
"I'm a ballpark rat, no doubt about it, but there's no doubt in my mind I'm doing the right thing by stepping down. Let's get some young blood in," Mattingly said. "This is a young man's game. It's not an old man's game. It's time to walk away."
Reach Beth Bragg at bbragg@adn.com or 257-4335.
By BETH BRAGG
bbragg@adn.com