A father’s promise, a son’s legacy and the summer they came full circle
The sun was high over Eck Stadium when Bill Pintard stepped forward to present a trophy bearing his son’s name, the Eric Pintard Most Inspirational Player Award, to a player who had overcome odds of his own.
As the longtime Santa Barbara Foresters manager handed it to outfielder Mic Paul, tears welled in Pintard’s eyes. For the first time since losing Eric more than two decades ago, one of Pintard’s own players was being honored with the award that kept his son’s spirit alive.
“My heart was very full,” Pintard said. “I still get emotional just thinking about it.”
It was a moment that captured what the National Baseball Congress World Series in Wichita has always strived to be: not just a showcase for summer baseball, but a place where stories bigger than the game are honored.
A son who was never supposed to walk again. A bat boy who never forgot. A player who almost lost his career. This summer in Wichita, their stories intertwined — bound by resilience, rare diagnoses and one father’s promise.
He wasn’t supposed to walk again
In 1994, doctors told Bill Pintard that his 21-year-old son Eric had six months to live.
The diagnosis was devastating: an aggressive form of brain cancer. Eric was told he’d never walk again. He was confined to a wheelchair.
But he defied all of it.
Not only did he walk again. He surfed in the Pacific Ocean. He pitched in a Foresters alumni game. He married his high school sweetheart. And most importantly, he built something that would last.
As he underwent treatment, Eric noticed children fighting beside him. He wanted to lift them, so he started the Hugs for Cubs program with the Foresters, aimed at giving young cancer patients joy in the face of fear. For the past 30 years, the Foresters have carried that mission forward with hospital visits, support, outings, encouragement and financial help.
Even after Eric’s death in 2004, more than nine years after his original diagnosis, his spirit remained the team’s cornerstone. Every summer in Wichita, Foresters players would visit local children’s hospitals, doing what Eric started: giving kids a reason to smile.
So when NBC Baseball renamed its annual Most Inspirational Player Award in Eric’s memory, it was a fitting tribute. But until this year, not one of Pintard’s own players had received it.
That changed when Mic Paul stepped forward.
The bat boy who never forgot
Years ago, one of those Foresters visits led the team to a 3-year-old boy named Spencer Olmstead, who was undergoing blood transfusions at Wesley Medical Center for red blood cell anemia.
Spencer’s energy was low. His body was weak. And when a group of ballplayers entered his hospital room, he immediately threw up at their feet.
They came back anyway.
The next summer, in 2003, they returned with gifts. A T-shirt. A hat. A Playstation session. Then they asked Spencer if he’d like to be their bat boy. There’s a picture of him in an oversized Foresters shirt, riding on the shoulders of future MLB player Kevin Frandsen at Lawrence-Dumont Stadium, beaming like he’d just been called up to the majors.
“To me, they were big-leaguers,” Olmstead said. “I didn’t know any different back then. And then they asked me if I wanted to be the bat boy for them, and that was all I ever wanted.”
Those moments didn’t just cheer him up, they changed the course of his life.
Now 26, the Derby High graduate works for the NBC Baseball Foundation as a baseball operations associate. This summer, he helped run the same tournament that once helped rescue a part of him.
“It was such a big part of my childhood,” Olmstead said. “And now I want kids in Wichita and all over Kansas to fall in love with baseball the way I did.”
Linked by something rare
The emotional connection between Pintard, Paul and Olmstead took an even more surreal turn when they realized they shared something else: the same rare condition.
Thoracic Outlet Syndrome, or TOS, occurs when nerves or blood vessels in the upper chest become compressed. Both Paul and Olmstead had their first rib pressing on a vein, which caused blood clots to form.
Olmstead was diagnosed in 2022. Paul, in 2024.
For Paul, one of those clots traveled to his lung, triggering a pulmonary embolism. He spent four days in the ICU. Underwent multiple procedures. He later had his first rib surgically removed. Spent six months on blood thinners.
Baseball became an afterthought.
“The surgery to take out my first rib was pretty extreme,” Paul said. “If they clipped a nerve, I might not have been able to move my arm. So going through that gave me perspective. There are a lot worse things happening to other people.”
He managed a full recovery, returned to LSU this past season. He even played in 25 games and won another national championship with the Tigers.
When NBC Baseball sent out a pre-tournament questionnaire asking players to share any inspirational stories, Paul left his blank. He didn’t want to make it about himself. But when he learned the award was named after Pintard’s son, he changed his mind.
“That really inspired me,” Paul said. “It meant a lot.”
Olmstead, who had been on bed rest during his own recovery, couldn’t believe the parallels.
“I couldn’t imagine playing at a high level like that after going through it,” Olmstead said. “The recovery was so brutal. It’s so cool to see that Mic kept a smile on his face and kept competing. He’s an inspiration.”
The two met at this year’s NBC World Series, where they swapped stories — about surgeries, setbacks, survival — and the unlikely bond they now share.
“It was a really cool moment,” Paul said. “Just to be able to talk about something so rare, that was pretty neat.”
A promise kept
Eric’s story could have ended with his passing.
Instead, it keeps finding new ways to live on — rippling through Wichita every summer, in players such as Paul, in former bat boys like Olmstead and in every Foresters visit to a hospital room that desperately needs hope.
Now, Bill Pintard is building something new: a home in Santa Barbara where families can stay for free while their children receive medical treatment.
The name? Eric’s House.
“I learned so much from my son,” Pintard said. “He lived his life with dignity and honor. Life is full of adversity, and he handled it with such aplomb.”
This story was originally published August 6, 2025 at 6:01 AM.
.jpg)