Westford's Only Link To The Big Leagues

As the World Series unwinds in St. Louis and Texas, today's "You Asked, Patch Answers" a local baseball question: are there any Major League Baseball players who were born in Westford?

The answer to that question is no, but there is one Major League Baseball player who died in Westford.

Mike Balas, born Mitchell Francis Balaski on May 9, 1910 in Lowell, pitched exactly one game in the Bigs.

That game came on April 27, 1938. The Boston Bees (the name for the Boston Braves during the late 1930s) were losing 10-2 to the Brooklyn Dodgers in the 8th inning and one day Hall of Fame manager Casey Stengel, who was in his first year at the helm in Boston, sent Balas in to take the ball from Dick Errickson.

Brooklyn also had an eventual Hall of Famer of their own in Leo Durocher, who had been playing shortstop, but was taken out earlier in the game.

Balas faced eight batters and had the final four outs of the game, allowing three runs, one of which was earned, giving up three hits without any strikeouts or walks.

While Balas only had one game in the Major Leagues, he had over 200 in an 11-year career in the Minors, pitching for teams in locales ranging from Brockton and Bridgeport to Hartford and Indianapolis.

Despite his professional baseball career, Balas was probably better known as a conscientious objector, the only person in Major League history with that claim.

During World War II, he served a three-year prison sentence for those beliefs, which largely stemmed from his faith as a Jehovah's Witness, a religion he would later practice at a congregation in Chelmsford.

After his release, he raised two children in Westford and was the owner of the Mitchell Balas Construction Company, which constructed a number of homes in Nabnasset.

He died exactly 15 years ago this month and was cremated.

UPDATE: Balas has been the only Major Leaguer to date that has died in Westford, and there's no Major Leaguers that have been born in Westford, but another Major Leaguer lived in Westford.

The first was John Driscoll, a pitcher like Balas, who played for various teams in the 1870s and 1880s before dying in 1886 in Lowell.

Special thanks to the for letting us know!