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HOUGHTON -- There was a time when the late George Brunet and Dan Dobbek were considered rising baseball prospects.
But that wasn't the case in the summer of 1952 when the two met in an American Legion playoff game.
Brunet, who was pitching for the Mohawk American Legion team, was on his way to a long major league career that would include stops with eight teams.
He concentrated on baseball in his youth as a native of New Allouez. He did play some hockey as most of his friends also did in the northend.
Dobbek, an Ontonagon native, played just about every sport at Ontonagon High. He was a standout basketball and football player for the Polar Bears (their nickname) and a leading candidate for the Albert Funke Award.
The award went to the outstanding senior athlete in the Copper Country Conference.
But he found his niche in baseball, where he was a power-hitting outfielder.
It was only fitting the two stars would eventually lock horns.
American Legion ball was big in those days, almost every post sponsoring a team.
The Mohawk Post had almost the entire north part of Houghton County, as well as Keweenaw County, to choose players from.
"That was a time when you found good baseball in every town," the late Merv Klemett of Hancock said in a 2010 interview. "It was probably the high point of baseball locally."
Ontonagon County had plenty of talent. In addition to the town of Ontonagon, there were teams in most of the smaller communities.
Arnie Henderson of Hancock recalled the era.
"That was in the days when there wasn't much else to do but play sports," said Henderson, who was instrumental in later starting Legion ball in Hancock. "We always had a lot of guys ready to play."
Brunet hurled a 2-0 win to lead Mohawk over Ontonagon in the playoff game played in Bruce Crossing. The big lefthander allowed just two hits -- one a double by Dobbek -- and struck out 14 batters.
"He (Brunet) was very fast and threw a really good curve ball," Dobbek would later recall.
Brunet was signed by the Detroit Tigers the following summer after a tryout at Briggs Stadium and began his long career.
More on that later.
Dobbek followed a different path, enrolling at Western Michigan University. Drafted into the Army, he spent two years in the service.
The Washington Senators signed him to a contract and he spent a couple of years in the minor leagues.
His best season came in 1956 when he played for Hobbs, N.M. of the old Southwest League.
He batted .340 at Hobbs, with 27 homers and 144 RBIs.
That earned him a trip to the big leagues where he played for the Minnesota Twins in 1960.
He hit .210 with 10 homers and 30 RBI and put himself on the prospect list with future Twins slugger Bob Allison.
But he suffered a severe arm injury running into a fence in a 1961 game at Kansas City. He was never the same and was traded to Cincinnati. He retired from baseball in 1963.
That was about the time Brunet was gearing up his career with the California Angels.
He posted a 9-11 record with a 2.92 ERA in 1964 and followed that up with respectable seasons the next three years for the lowly Angels.
In the 1967 season, he went 4-0 against the Tigers and actually cost them the pennant with a 6-3 win on the final weekend of the season.
He closed out his big league career with stops in Pittsburgh, Washington and Seattle.
But he found pitching work in the Mexican League and racked up a league record 55 shutouts in six seasons.
Brunet, who died at the age of 56, compiled a losing record in the majors, but posted a respectable 3.62 earned run average.
Dobbek went on to become active in the Senior Olympics Program in Washington, where he lived for many years.
Brunet and Dobbek were both inducted into the U.P. Sports Hall of Fame.