April 07, 2021
Thomas Zinzarella ’21 creates film tribute to Providence College baseball
By Vicki-Ann Downing
One hundred years after the founding of the Providence College baseball team, and 22 years after the Friars played their final game in Tallahassee, Fla., Thomas Zinzarella ’21 has created a documentary tribute to the team, ’99: The Final At-Bat.
The 27-minute film focuses on the Friars’ final season in 1999, when they won the BIG EAST championship and qualified for the NCAA tournament. Among those Zinzarella interviewed are former coach Charlie Hickey, former athletic trainer John Rock, now PC senior associate athletic director, and players Marc DesRoches ’99, Dr. Scott Palmieri ’97, and Mike Scott.
Zinzarella, from West Hartford, Conn., has an individualized major in sports media. He created the documentary as part of an independent study last fall with Rev. Kenneth R. Gumbert, O.P., professor of film studies in theatre. The course, Advanced Video Production, required Zinzarella to produce a short film, 8-12 minutes long. He originally thought he would feature former PC baseball players who also starred in the Cape Cod Baseball League.
Zinzarella’s focus began to change after he watched a YouTube video created by Palmieri, now an English professor at Johnson & Wales University.
“I got in touch with him and we talked for an hour,” Zinzarella said. “Then I got a text from Charlie Hickey, who invited me to come to see him at Central Connecticut State University, where he is the head coach. He gave me old media guides and a VHS tape of the BIG EAST championship game in 1999. Oh my God — all these angles and stories, even the Florida State story. The project just started taking off.”
Zinzarella knew he had a bigger story to tell. Baseball was PC’s first varsity sport, established in 1921. It also was one of the most successful, sending many players to the major leagues. The decision to terminate the program, along with men’s golf and men’s tennis, came in October 1998. The College was complying with Title IX, the federal law that requires that college spending on athletics be proportionate to the number of men and women enrolled. With 57% of its population female, PC was spending too much on men’s teams. The Friars played the 1999 season knowing it would be their last.
The change in focus meant taking an incomplete for the course and spending time this semester creating a much longer documentary — but to Zinzarella, it was worth it. The more he looked for information, the faster it came.
Father Gumbert connected him with Rev. Terence Keegan, O.P. ’60, who was executive vice president when the College decision was made (and whose father played at PC with Birdie Tebbetts ’34). Rev. Humbert Kilanowski, O.P., assistant professor of mathematics, who taught Zinzarella in a research course on sabermetrics, also was a resource. Father Humbert was a high school buddy of Friar outfielder Mike Scott.
“Mike Scott talked to me for 90 minutes,” Zinzarella said. “He played two years for PC and transferred; he never got his PC degree. He graduated from UConn, where he was BIG EAST player of the year.”
Zinzarella joined a Facebook group, Animals of Section B, made up of members of the Florida State University fan club. During the NCAA tournament in 1999, the Friars were losing to Jacksonville University in an elimination game in Tallahassee until the Animals began cheering for them. They rallied and won — only to then face Florida State, and lose.
“There were so many more stories I wanted to include,” Zinzarella said. “The film could have gone on for an hour. I was hearing a lot of different sources and perspectives and trying to pull together a conclusion.
“PC archives gave me old 1930s pictures of the team, and I got a lot of black and white footage from the Rhode Island Historical Society,” Zinzarella said. “It’s hard to find footage from 1999 because college games weren’t televised then the way they are today. I was able to get it from ABC-6 because I had an internship there during the fall of my junior year.”
In March, Zinzarella spent 30 hours over three days in a lab in the Feinstein Academic Center, using Adobe Premiere Pro software to put the finishing touches on the documentary, just in time to meet the deadline for making up his incomplete grade.
When he posted the trailer on Twitter, the response was instant and enthusiastic. Zinzarella was most proud that radio broadcaster Lou Merloni ’93, former Friar infielder and Boston Red Sox player, began following him on Twitter. Robert G. Driscoll Jr., the College’s vice president and athletics director, told Zinzarella he would like to show the film in the Ruane Friar Development Center.
“I got a lot of email responses from alumni and staff,” Zinzarella said. “One thing I realized through doing the film was how really important baseball was to the community, and the family that it created. Because it’s gone, the bonds are even stronger now. The people I spoke with are the last people who are attached to it.”
Zinzarella was born in February 1999, the month the Friars started their final season, but he heard stories about the baseball program growing up. His grandfather, Alfred A. Lamy ’53, was a member of the College’s Board of Trustees at the time baseball was eliminated. His mother, Marianne Lamy ’85, and his uncle, Richard Lamy ’81, also are alumni.
“I’ve got family in Providence, too, who didn’t go to PC but would tell me stories about sneaking into the games to watch baseball in the ’40s and ’50s,” Zinzarella said. “We used to joke with my grandfather growing up. He would ask, ‘What’s it going to take for one of my grandchildren to go to PC?’ The answer always was, ‘Bring back the baseball program.’ He was devastated by the decision, as well. He wanted to keep the program alive.”
Baseball didn’t return, but Zinzarella attended PC anyway. He made the decision after attending Alumni & Family Weekend in 2017, during his senior year in high school. The keynote speaker was Doris Burke ’87, ’92G, ’05Hon., basketball analyst for ESPN. Zinzarella talked with Burke after about his hopes for a career in sports media.
“She told me I didn’t have to go to a Syracuse or a Missouri or a Northwestern to do that, I could go to Providence,” Zinzarella said. “Her advice was to get involved early, get behind a microphone, and focus on something in English.”
Zinzarella took her advice to heart. He joined The Cowl sports staff and WDOM radio and remained involved for all four years. This year, he was WDOM sports director. Because of the pandemic, he broadcast men’s basketball and hockey games from his living room, with piped-in background noise. He also is a member of Friars Club and an orientation leader.
During summers at his grandfather’s house on Cape Cod, Zinzarella became involved with the Cape Cod Baseball League. He was the play-by-play broadcaster for the Orleans Firebirds and the Harwich Mariners. Last summer, he planned to fill the same role for the Newport Gulls of the Newport Collegiate Baseball League, but the pandemic canceled the season. The broadcasting jobs brought him experience. To make money, he worked as a golf caddie at courses on Cape Cod and in Rhode Island.
He now is interviewing for jobs in sports media and is willing to work anywhere in the country.
“By doing these films and broadcasting, I’ve become a better storyteller,” Zinzarella said. “I’ve watched every 30 for 30 documentary. Those are some of the best stories being told. People tell me my film feels like that. I love telling really emotional stories, getting the facts straight, and building off that. I’ve gained experience and knowledge and learned so much from PC.”
