Reusse: Those never-say-die Quamba Cubs are finally in the town ball state tournament

QUAMBA, MINN. — Now that the Quamba Cubs have joined the Opole Bears and the Hawley Hawks as first-time qualifiers for the Minnesota Baseball Association’s 2025 state tournament, the amateur baseball principals in this town of 107 residents have been receiving inquiries from various media.

You know what we call those newshounds here at the Minnesota Star Tribune? Front-runners.

We were all over the baseball angle for this woodsy outpost 80 miles north of the Twin Cities way back in 2011.

The only issue with this claim of reporting clairvoyance was the need to offer this greeting to Stan Peterson late on Tuesday morning at the Quamba ballpark:

“Great to see you again, Stan, but what got me and our photographer Jerry Holt up here 14 years ago? We didn’t wake up one morning and say, ‘Dang, we have to get up there and see how those Cubs are doing in Quamba.’ ”

Peterson, the man who revived the Cubs in 1990 after their quarter-century in hibernation, raised a couple of possible sources for having sent along the story suggestion back then. And then I suggested another:

“The late, great Luther Dorr and I were tight. Luther was a town ball guy, not that far away in Princeton. Stan, I’m going to credit Luther for this baseball bromance we’re having.”

Back in 2011, he named the Oslin twins, Howard and Harold, and the Telander brothers, Kenny and Johnny, and rattled off the rest of the lineup from 50 years earlier — outstanding teams that just never could get over the final hump to join what was then a less-generous field in number of teams for a state tournament.

The Cubs folded in this tiny burg in 1966. The baseball field became overgrown. Peterson was out of the area for a decade-plus. When he returned in 1988, the Mora school district had gotten the field back in a playable condition to temporarily house its high school team.

This brought back the baseball images of Stan’s youth, and he became dedicated to reviving the Cubs. Peterson would not be deterred, even when the old lights he was bringing in from Sandstone High School cost a mint to be transplanted — and Stan’s “nest egg” became scrambled with a sizable loan.

The Cubs were also mostly ... let’s say, noncompetitive. There even was an 89-game losing streak over three seasons in the ’90s.

“We ended it against our archrival, Mora, and a good pitcher,” Peterson said. “I never believed in barking at the other team. But I do remember looking over and the losing pitcher ... he just fired his glove against the dugout wall.”

“Then Luke contacted me and said, ‘I might want to give it a try as manager,’ ” Peterson said. “He got people involved, and then they got more people involved.”

That would be Luke Athey Sr., a baseball man dedicated to not taking credit for anything — except perhaps teammate Luke Athey Jr.

Jesse Steiner and Brandon Schmidt have been spectacular in organizing fundraisers. Cathy Steiner and Darline Campbell are wonders at running the concession stands.

The volunteers are the heroes to Luke Sr., along with the players.

Most heroic right now is James Oslin — of the generations of ballplaying Oslins — who pitched three straight shutouts to get the Cubs through the regional and into their first state tournament.

“It is tremendous,” Peterson said. “One of the best things ever in our little town.”

Stan the Quamba Man was standing in the infield. He gazed toward center field, smiled and said: “See that split tree out there behind the fence? When I was a young kid, the scoreboard hung from there, and I was out there, putting up the numbers.