Robert Mendoza, a former professional baseball player and San Diego Hall of Champions inductee, is now an Old Mission Beach Athletic Club hall-of-famer.<\/p>\n
Mendoza was honored recently at\u00a0OMBAC’s Over-The-Line championship banquet for having played in more Over-The-Line tournaments than any other player in the history of the game. He started playing in 1957 and continued through this year, missing only two tournaments. During that span, he won six OTL championships as well as many second- and third-place finishes.<\/p>\n
Mendoza, who retired in 2000, was \u201ctruly\u201d surprised to be an OMBAC honoree. \u201cThey gave me a plaque and a shirt that had all the years on the sleeves,\u201d said Mendoza. \u201cIt\u2019s a long-sleeved shirt so it worked. I really didn\u2019t know about it (award), though I knew something was up when my wife, Cordelia, said we were going to have dinner with a couple of guys from OMBAC at some restaurant. I came to find out it was at Mission Beach Ski Club where OMBAC meets for their annual award dinner.\u201d<\/p>\n
Over-The-Line was created more than seven decades ago by a group of OMBAC locals who had gotten together on South Mission Beach to play volleyball. As they waited for a coveted net, they came up with the idea for OTL, which evolved into its own batty sport, with the first OTL tournament held in\u00a01954.<\/p>\n
Today, it\u2019s a San Diego\u00a0summertime tradition. Teams are known for their quirky names, and spectators enjoy attending the\u00a0free\u00a0event for the\u00a0good vibes.<\/p>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/cdn.sdnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/20221130133840\/plaque-1-232x300.jpg\")
OTL games last three or four innings, no one runs bases, and the main goal is to hit the ball \u201cover the line\u201d about 55 feet in front of the batter. It\u2019s all about making the catch or hit at the right moment and anyone can play. You don\u2019t need to be an athlete, or a baseball or softball player.<\/p>\n
Throughout his life, Mendoza has been a standout athlete. A third-generation San Diegan, he graduated in 1956 from Lincoln High where he lettered nine times in three sports: football, baseball, and basketball.<\/p>\n
In 1958, Mendoza was drafted as an outfielder by the Boston Red Sox. He left baseball to continue his education at SDSU after playing 2 1\/2 years for the Red Sox organization.<\/p>\n
Mendoza coached football, baseball, and golf at Morse High School for 30-plus years. He was also part of the first Little League baseball team in San Diego.<\/p>\n
In the 1960s, Mendoza was a Triple A volleyball player in two-man beach volleyball, teaming with Al Scates, the head volleyball coach at UCLA for 48 years. Mendoza played six-man indoor volleyball and won four USAV Volleyball Nationals in the 50-and-Over division.<\/p>\n
Mendoza is a six-time champion of the annual OTL tournament. During 55 years of OTL competition, he missed two tournaments, one because of a knee replacement.<\/p>\n
In 2001, the California Coaches Association honored him with the Dan Fukushima Lifetime Achievement Award. In November 2011, Mendoza was inducted into the San Diego Hall of Champions Breitbard Hall of Fame as a Coaching Legend. \u201cHe is so humble,\u201d said Cordelia of her 84-year-old husband\u2019s longtime athletic prowess.<\/p>\n
Of his OTL chops, Mendoza lamented, \u201cAll those other guys (competitors) that placed (highly), they\u2019re all gone. They were all my buddies.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mendoza continues to be a big fan of the homegrown OTL sport. \u201cIt was a cultural thing, something to go out and do with the guys when they got together,\u201d he said adding it was fun too. \u201cSome of the guys dressed up in costumes and put seaweed all over their bodies.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mendoza said being a minor league baseball player was tough, performing in obscure places like Lexington, Neb., and Waterloo, Iowa. \u201cThe Red Sox farm system wanted to sell my contract to the Pittsburgh Pirates,\u201d he said, prompting him to tell them, \u2018I\u2019m going home.\u2019 I got my teaching credential and I coached for 32 years in San Diego.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t regret anything,\u201d concluded Mendoza. \u201cIt\u2019s all worked out really nice. I just hope to do it for a little longer.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cHe’ll be out there (OTL) again next year,\u201d predicted Cordelia Mendoza.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Robert Mendoza, a former professional baseball player and San Diego Hall of Champions inductee, is now an Old Mission Beach Athletic Club hall-of-famer. Mendoza was honored recently at\u00a0OMBAC’s Over-The-Line championship banquet for having played in more Over-The-Line tournaments than any other player in the history of the game. He started playing in 1957 and continued […]<\/p>","protected":false},"author":840,"featured_media":317326,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_seopress_robots_primary_cat":"11553","_seopress_titles_title":"","_seopress_titles_desc":"Robert Mendoza, a former professional baseball player and San Diego Hall of Champions inductee, is now an Old Mission Beach Athletic Club hall-of-famer.","_seopress_robots_index":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"source_name":"","source_url":"","via_name":"","via_url":"","override_template":"0","override":[{"template":"3","single_blog_custom":"","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"1","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-monocrhome","show_share_counter":"1","show_view_counter":"1","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"Y\/m\/d","show_post_category":"1","show_post_reading_time":"1","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","show_zoom_button":"1","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"1","show_popup_post":"1","number_popup_post":"1","show_author_box":"1","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"0"}],"override_image_size":"0","image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post":"0","trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post":"0","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","sponsored_post_name":"","sponsored_post_url":"","sponsored_post_logo_enable":"0","sponsored_post_logo":"","sponsored_post_desc":"","disable_ad":"0"},"jnews_primary_category":{"id":""},"jnews_social_meta":{"fb_title":"","fb_description":"","fb_image":"","twitter_title":"","twitter_description":"","twitter_image":""},"jnews_override_counter":{"override_view_counter":"0","view_counter_number":"0","override_share_counter":"0","share_counter_number":"0","override_like_counter":"0","like_counter_number":"0","override_dislike_counter":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[11553],"tags":[14700,13533,13532,14701,14699],"class_list":["post-317325","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-mission-beach-ski-club","tag-old-mission-beach-athletic-club","tag-over-the-line","tag-san-diego-hall-of-champions","tag-south-mission-beach"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/317325","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/840"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=317325"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/317325\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/317326"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=317325"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=317325"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/test.sdnews.com\/es\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=317325"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}