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Boston Globe
03-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Boston Globe
Joe DePugh, baseball player who was immortalized in Bruce Springsteen's ‘Glory Days,' dies at 75
'Bruce lost this big game for us one year,' DePugh told The Palm Beach Post in 2011. 'We stuck him out in right field all the time, where you think he's out of harm's way. But this important game, we had a bunch of guys missing, and we had to play him.' Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up In the last inning, Saddie dropped an easy fly ball. Advertisement 'Actually, it hit him on the head,' DePugh said, 'and we lost the game.' They remained friends in high school, bonding over their turbulent home lives and their distant, alcoholic fathers. After graduation, Saddie took off to play rock 'n' roll in bars and nightclubs. Joe, who excelled at multiple sports, tried out for the Los Angeles Dodgers but wound up playing basketball at King's College in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania. In 1973, when they had been out of touch for years, these two boyhood friends bumped into each other at the Headliner, a roadside bar in Neptune, near the Jersey Shore. Springsteen was walking in; DePugh was walking out. Advertisement 'We were 24 years old, and he was just hitting it big in the music industry,' DePugh told the Wilkes-Barre newspaper The Times Leader in 2011. 'We went back in and started talking about grade school, the nuns we had, Little League and high school.' Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band opened for Bonnie Raitt at the Harvard Square Theatre on May 9, 1974. Barry Schneier, Boston Globe Afterward, they drifted apart again: Springsteen, to worldwide fame; DePugh, to a vagabond life as a contractor, splitting his time between South Florida and Stowe, Vermont. 'He was a rolling stone,' DePugh's brother said. 'He didn't really live anywhere for any length of time.' Wherever he went, DePugh told stories of his friendship with Springsteen and the night they reunited at the bar. In 1984, the Boss released 'Born in the U.S.A.,' his seventh album. The fourth song on Side 2 was 'Glory Days.' Scott Wright, a friend of DePugh's in Vermont, heard it on the radio. 'He told me, 'Springsteen has a new album out, and there's a song on there about you,'' DePugh told The New York Times in 2011. ''It's exactly the story you told me.'' DePugh didn't believe him, so Wright called the radio station and requested the song. Half an hour later, the DJ came on and said, 'This is going out to Scotty Wright up in Stowe, Vermont,' DePugh recalled on the public radio show 'Only a Game' in 2011. 'This is the new Springsteen song, 'Glory Days,' and apparently it's about a friend of Scott's.' A guitar strummed. Then Saddie sang: I had a friend was a big baseball player back in high school He could throw that speedball by you, make you look like a fool, boy Advertisement Saw him the other night at this roadside bar, I was walking in, he was walking out We went back inside, sat down, had a few drinks, but all he kept talking about was Glory Days DePugh was floored. 'I knew immediately it was about me,' he told The Times Leader. 'It described exactly what happened that night.' DePugh was like a lot of characters in Springsteen's songs: wounded by loss and disappointments, but also resolute, and certainly never hopeless. Joseph Francis DePugh was born on Aug. 8, 1949, in Yonkers New York, the eldest of five boys. His father, Joseph, was frequently absent. His mother, Joan (Campbell) DePugh, a typist and clerk for the state of New Jersey, died of cancer in 1969. 'We didn't have much, but, like Bruce, we had enough,' Paul DePugh said in an interview. 'We always had a roof over our heads. But after my mother died, everything went to hell.' Joe became the legal guardian of his younger brothers, who were shuffled between foster homes. He went on to graduate from King's College with a degree in English and worked as a substitute teacher before starting a contracting company. He made a good enough living as a contractor to shuttle back and forth between Florida and Vermont. His marriage to Nancy Saunders in 1987 ended in divorce. For years, there was debate among his Freehold buddies about who the real 'speedball pitcher' in the song was, but DePugh always insisted it was him. In 2004, Springsteen gave DePugh and other friends in Freehold tickets to a concert at Giants Stadium in the Meadowlands. 'Before he sang 'Glory Days,'' DePugh told The Times Leader, 'Bruce yelled into the microphone, 'Joe D., are you out there?'' Advertisement The following year, their mutual friend Don Norkus got them together for lunch at an Italian restaurant in Red Bank, New Jersey. 'Bruce pulls in and I point at him and he points at me, and that's when the hugging started,' DePugh told The New York Times. They reconnected again a few years later at a restaurant in Freehold. 'He said, 'Always remember, I love you,' not like some corny Budweiser commercial, but a real sentimental thing,' DePugh said. 'I was dumbfounded. I said, 'Thanks, Saddie.'' Last week, after DePugh died, Saddie posted a statement on his website. 'Just a moment to mark the passing of Freehold native and ballplayer Joe DePugh,' it said. 'He was a good friend when I needed one. 'He could throw that speedball by you, make you look like a fool.'…Glory Days my friend.' This article originally appeared in
New York Times
02-04-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Times
Joe DePugh, Speedball Pitcher in Springsteen's ‘Glory Days,' Dies at 75
Joe DePugh, the Little League teammate of Bruce Springsteen who inspired that rocker's hit song 'Glory Days,' a rousing, bittersweet anthem to their hardscrabble childhoods in Freehold, N.J., where time passed by 'in the wink of a young girl's eye,' died on Friday in West Palm Beach, Fla. He was 75. The cause of death, in a hospice facility, was metastatic prostate cancer, his brother Paul said. In the early 1960s, before Mr. Springsteen became the Boss, he was a clumsy baseball player whose athletic abilities were so sad that Joe, the team's star pitcher, gave him the nickname Saddie. 'Bruce lost this big game for us one year,' Mr. DePugh told The Palm Beach Post in 2011. 'We stuck him out in right field all the time, where you think he's out of harm's way. But this important game, we had a bunch of guys missing, and we had to play him.' In the last inning, Saddie dropped an easy fly ball. 'Actually, it hit him on the head,' Mr. DePugh said, 'and we lost the game.' They remained friends in high school, bonding over their turbulent home lives and their distant, alcoholic fathers. After graduation, Saddie took off to play rock 'n' roll in bars and nightclubs. Joe, who excelled at multiple sports, tried out for the Los Angeles Dodgers but wound up playing basketball at King's College in Wilkes-Barre, Pa. In 1973, when they had been out of touch for years, these two boyhood friends bumped into each other at the Headliner, a roadside bar in Neptune, near the Jersey Shore. Mr. Springsteen was walking in; Mr. DePugh was walking out. 'We were 24 years old, and he was just hitting it big in the music industry,' Mr. DePugh told the Wilkes-Barre newspaper The Times Leader in 2011. 'We went back in and started talking about grade school, the nuns we had, Little League and high school.' Afterward, they drifted apart again: Mr. Springsteen, to worldwide fame; Mr. DePugh, to a vagabond life as a contractor, splitting his time between South Florida and Stowe, Vt. 'He was a rolling stone,' Mr. DePugh's brother said. 'He didn't really live anywhere for any length of time.' Wherever he went, Mr. DePugh told stories of his friendship with Mr. Springsteen and the night they reunited at the bar. In 1984, the Boss released 'Born in the U.S.A.,' his seventh album. The fourth song on Side 2 was 'Glory Days.' Scott Wright, a friend of Mr. DePugh's in Vermont, heard it on the radio. 'He told me, 'Springsteen has a new album out, and there's a song on there about you,'' Mr. DePugh told The New York Times in 2011. ''It's exactly the story you told me.'' Mr. DePugh didn't believe him, so Mr. Wright called the radio station and requested the song. Half an hour later, the D.J. came on and said, 'This is going out to Scotty Wright up in Stowe, Vermont,' Mr. DePugh recalled on the public radio show 'Only a Game' in 2011. 'This is the new Springsteen song, 'Glory Days,' and apparently it's about a friend of Scott's.' A guitar strummed. Then Saddie sang: Mr. DePugh was floored. 'I knew immediately it was about me,' he told The Times Leader. 'It described exactly what happened that night.' Mr. DePugh was like a lot of characters in Mr. Springsteen's songs: wounded by loss and disappointments, but also resolute, and certainly never hopeless. Joseph Francis DePugh was born on Aug. 8, 1949, in Yonkers N.Y., the eldest of five boys. His father, Joseph, was frequently absent. His mother, Joan (Campbell) DePugh, a typist and clerk for the state of New Jersey, died of cancer in 1969. 'We didn't have much, but, like Bruce, we had enough,' Paul DePugh said in an interview. 'We always had a roof over our heads. But after my mother died, everything went to hell.' Joe became the legal guardian of his younger brothers, who were shuffled between foster homes. He went on to graduate from King's College with a degree in English and worked as a substitute teacher before starting a contracting company. He made a good enough living as a contractor to shuttle back and forth between Florida and Vermont. His marriage to Nancy Saunders in 1987 ended in divorce. For years, there was debate among his Freehold buddies about who the real 'speedball pitcher' in the song was, but Mr. DePugh always insisted it was him. In 2004, Mr. Springsteen gave Mr. DePugh and other friends in Freehold tickets to a concert at Giants Stadium in the Meadowlands. 'Before he sang 'Glory Days,'' Mr. DePugh told The Times Leader, 'Bruce yelled into the microphone, 'Joe D., are you out there?'' The following year, their mutual friend Don Norkus got them together for lunch at an Italian restaurant in Red Bank, N.J. 'Bruce pulls in and I point at him and he points at me, and that's when the hugging started,' Mr. DePugh told The New York Times. They reconnected again a few years later at a restaurant in Freehold. 'He said, 'Always remember, I love you,' not like some corny Budweiser commercial, but a real sentimental thing,' Mr. DePugh said. 'I was dumbfounded. I said, 'Thanks, Saddie.'' Last week, after Mr. DePugh died, Saddie posted a statement on his website. 'Just a moment to mark the passing of Freehold native and ballplayer Joe DePugh,' it said. 'He was a good friend when I needed one. 'He could throw that speedball by you, make you look like a fool.'…Glory Days my friend.'
USA Today
02-04-2025
- Entertainment
- USA Today
Bruce Springsteen pays tribute to Joe DePugh, 'Glory Days' inspiration
Bruce Springsteen pays tribute to Joe DePugh, 'Glory Days' inspiration Show Caption Hide Caption Bruce Springsteen's wife Patti Scialfa reveals cancer diagnosis Longtime E Street Band member and wife of Bruce Springsteen, Patti Scialfa, revealed she was diagnosed with multiple myeloma in 2018. He was walking out and Bruce Springsteen was walking in. Joe DePugh, the Freehold, New Jersey native who inspired Springsteen's hit 'Glory Days' after a chance encounter in their shared hometown, has passed away. He was 75. DePugh died after a bout with cancer, Rich Kane, a friend and long-time Freehold Borough teacher told the Asbury Park Press. 'Just a moment to mark the passing of Freehold native and ballplayer Joe DePugh,' Springsteen wrote in a post to his Instagram Sunday. 'He was a good friend when I needed one. 'He could throw that speedball by you, make you look like a fool' …. Glory Days my friend.' Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band still rock, quake and shake after 50 years The inspiration for 'Glory Days,' released in 1984 as part of Springsteen's 'Born in the U.S.A.' album, was largely a mystery until Freehold historian Kevin Coyne identified DePugh in a 2011 New York Times article. 'Whenever we're together, it's the same dynamic: I'm the star and he's the guy at the end of the bench," DePugh told the Palm Beach Post, part of the USA TODAY Network, in 2011. 'That's who he has always been to me, my right fielder.' DePugh was a stand-out pitcher who tried out for the Los Angeles Dodgers and played basketball at King's College in Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, earning an English degree. Bruce Springsteen talks 'Road Diary' and being a band boss: 'You're not alone' Family circumstances caused DePugh to raise younger brothers, instead of them going to foster homes, Kane said. DePugh worked as a self-employed contractor and would play summer basketball, where he met Springsteen in 1973. 'Finally, I go to leave. But once I saw Bruce we went back in and closed the place,' DePugh told the Palm Beach Post of a bar they both frequented. 'He had a little entourage with him. They all sat in a booth, but it was just me and him at the bar. All of a sudden, it's 1:30 (a.m.) and they started blinking the lights." A decade later, the night was the setting for 'Glory Days,' one of Springsteen's biggest hit songs, going to No. 5 on the Billboard Hot 100. "I had a friend was a big baseball player\Back in high school," the lyrics go. "He could throw that speedball by you\Make you look like a fool, boy. Saw him the other night at this roadside bar\I was walking in, he was walking out\We went back inside, sat down, had a few drinks\ But all he kept talking about was glory days." "When I first heard the song, I thought the song said 'and all we kept talking about was glory days,'" DePugh told the Palm Beach Post. "And years later, I finally saw the lyrics and saw 'all he kept talking about was glory days.' And I thought, 'Huh, (he) took a little shot at me!" "I was tickled pink I would even get into the song. I certainly wasn't going to complain about what he decided to write about," he continued. "It's about living in the past and letting go, especially for jocks, to get out of that and live in the present. That certainly wasn't the first time I was accused of that." Springsteen and DePugh were later part-time neighbors in Palm Beach County. DePugh, like Springsteen, never strayed far from his Freehold roots, visiting the borough at least twice a year when he went from Florida to his summer place in Vermont, and again on the trip south. "All he wanted to do was raise his brothers, play baseball, play basketball and just hang in Freehold Borough," Kane said. "This one hurt. Joe and I were very close."
Yahoo
01-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
Joe DePugh, subject of Springsteen's 'Glory Days,' dies
Apr. 1—WILKES-BARRE — Mega star Bruce Springsteen's high school friend, Joe DePugh, died this week and "The Boss" issued a statement on social media. "Just a moment to mark the passing of Freehold native and ballplayer Joe DePugh. He was a good friend when I needed one. He could throw that speedball by you, make you look like a fool — Glory Days my friend," Springsteen said. Yes, that Joe DePugh — a King's College graduate and the topic of one of Springsteen's most iconic songs, "Glory Days." "I had a friend was a big baseball player, back in high school. He could throw that speedball by you, make you look like a fool, boy. Saw him the other night at this roadside bar, I was walking in, he was walking out. We went back inside sat down had a few drinks, but all he kept talking about was, Glory days, well they'll pass you by, Glory days, in the wink of a young girl's eye, Glory days, glory days." DePugh was Springsteen's Freehold Regional High School classmate. In July 2011, the Times Leader talked to Joe DePugh when he was living in Stowe, Vermont. The conversation was about those "glory days" that happened long before DePugh donned a King's College basketball uniform. DePugh played sparingly for the Monarchs back in the late 1960s and early 1970s. But it was his prowess on the baseball diamond — Little League to Freehold Regional High School in New Jersey — that inspired his teammate, Springsteen, to write a song about DePugh later in life. DePugh graduated from King's College in 1972 before going on to be a painting contractor, splitting his time between Florida and Vermont. DePugh and Springsteen graduated high school together in 1967. It was back in the summer of 1973, after DePugh played a game in the Jersey Shore Basketball League, that he said he went to the opposing team's sponsor's bar — the Headliner in Neptune on the Jersey shore. "I was leaving the Headliner at about 9:30 p.m. and when I get outside, here comes Bruce," DePugh recalled in the 2011 Times Leader story. "We were 24 years old and he was just hitting it big in the music industry. We went back in and started talking about grade school, the nuns we had, Little League and high school. The 'glory days,' just like the song says." DePugh said there was a dynamic between the two — DePugh was the star of the team and Springsteen was the kid that sat at the end of the bench and never got in the game. "That dynamic has never changed," DePugh said. "We've only been together a couple of times since high school, but when we do see each other, I'm still the big baseball star and he's still the same quiet, humble kid at the end of the bench. We used to call him'Saddie' because he hardly ever played." When "Glory Days" came out in 1985, it was the fifth single released from Springsteen's album "Born in the U.S.A." "I knew immediately it was about me," DePugh said from Vermont. "It described exactly what happened that night. It's never been a mystery — everybody who knew me knew the song is about me." A mutual childhood friend, Don Norkus, arranged for DePugh and Springsteen to meet again at an Italian restaurant in Red Bank, N.J., in May of 2005. " "We got there in the afternoon and stayed until the place closed." Wilkes-Barre connections A week before the Times Leader story, The New York Times published a story about DePugh being Springsteen's "Glory Days" inspiration. A copy editor at the New York Times, Connor Ennis, who grew up in Dallas, PA, called DePugh. Ennis graduated from Dallas High School, the son of the late John and Mary Jo (Joanne) Munley Ennis who both worked at King's College for years. John Ennis was chairman of the English Department and Mrs. Ennis was a resident Counselor of Women when female students first enrolled at King's in 1969-70. Connor Ennis served briefly as a correspondent for The Times Leader. "I was totally surprised about DePugh's King's connection," Connor Ennis said in 2011. "I didn't know much about the story, despite being a huge Springsteen fan myself. When I got to that part of the story, I immediately called my parents and asked if they knew DePugh." They did — DePugh was an English major at King's, but Mrs. Ennis knew DePugh better. "Indeed, I remember Joe and he was a very pleasant person," Mrs. Ennis told the Times Leader in 2011. "He often visited the sixth floor of East Hall, which is where the first young women resident students lived. But Joe was always cooperative about respecting visiting hours." Concert is huge experience In 2011, childhood friend Norkus said he and DePugh were among 30 people from Freehold, N.J., who went to see a Springsteen concert at Giants Stadium in the Meadowlands in 2004. "Bruce left us tickets and backstage passes," said DePugh. "Before he sang 'Glory Days,' Bruce yelled into the microphone, 'Joe D., are you out there?' Norkus' daughter came up to me and said,'the song is about you?' All of my high school friends knew that, but the other 60,000 people at the concert didn't know who Joe D. was." In 2011, Norkus said he hadn't seen DePugh in years. "It always bugged me who that speedball pitcher was," Norkus said. "Joe told me the whole story. It blew me away." Norkus ran into Springsteen two weeks later and he had confirmation straight from the Boss' mouth. "Bruce told me the pitcher was Joe," Norkus said. Reach Bill O'Boyle at 570-991-6118 or on Twitter @TLBillOBoyle.
New York Times
01-04-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Times
Joe DePugh, who inspired Bruce Springsteen's ‘Glory Days,' dies at 75
Thanks to Bruce Springsteen, Joe DePugh's glory days never really passed him by. DePugh, who helped inspire 'Glory Days' — Springsteen's rollicking, yet bittersweet ode to youthful memories on his mega-selling 1984 album 'Born in the U.S.A.' — died of cancer in Florida this week at 75. 'Just a moment to mark the passing of Freehold native and ballplayer Joe DePugh,' Springsteen wrote in a statement posted to Instagram on Sunday. ''He could throw that speedball by you, make you look like a fool' …. Glory Days my friend.' Advertisement DePugh and Springsteen grew up in Freehold, N.J., and played youth baseball together. The two ran into each other in 1973 outside a bar called the Headliner in Neptune City, N.J. Springsteen was walking in and DePugh was, you guessed it, walking out. 'There I am going to the car in the parking lot and here comes Bruce. And I hadn't seen him since we graduated,' DePugh said in a video recorded for an exhibit in Freehold about the history of the song. 'It was great to see him again, and so we got talking, and we're out in the parking lot for a half hour and he said 'Let's go in,' so we went back in and had a drink and then another drink, and all of a sudden the guy's flashing the lights, it was 1 in the morning almost.' More than a decade later, 'Glory Days' hit the airwaves. 'I knew right away,' DePugh said in the video about the first time he heard the song. 'It's an incredible compliment.' For years, the true identity of the pitcher turned barroom companion remained unknown to the public. Former Freehold Little Leaguers had theories about who the arm behind the speedball belonged to — there was the former player who ran into Springsteen in a diner and the local pitcher who made it to the minors, among others. 'There were several candidates for it, people who thought they were the 'Glory Days' pitcher,' said Kevin Coyne, a writer and Freehold historian. 'Joe DePugh was sort of a dark horse.' In 2011, Coyne helped organize a 60th reunion for Freehold Little League, one of the older Little Leagues in the country. Springsteen did not attend, but other classmates did, one of whom identified the pitcher as DePugh. The confirmation had come from Springsteen himself. 'I said, 'Well, Bruce, is it true or is it not true?'' said Don Norkus, a friend of DePugh's who had previously run into Springsteen. 'And he said, 'Yeah, it's true.'' Advertisement Later that year, Coyne wrote an article about DePugh for The New York Times, making his connection with 'Glory Days' publicly known. It was a distinction DePugh wore lightly. 'He was a charming, charming, gracious, modest, lovely human being,' said Coyne, who got to know DePugh in the years since he wrote the article. 'He was not some blowhard, you know, ex-athlete who talked all about his past days. He was just a lovely, modest guy.' And he could really play ball. The Freehold Transcript, a local paper, wrote about a standout Babe Ruth League outing from DePugh on May 14, 1964, when he struck out 11 in a losing effort. The newspaper listed Springsteen on that same roster, but at the time, it was DePugh who enjoyed rock star status. 'Baseball was the world, and if you were good at it, you were a god,' Coyne said about DePugh's and Springsteen's era. Longtime friend Rich Kane recalled his first memory of DePugh at a local home run derby. 'We were older than Joe, but this little son of a gun beat us all and never let us hear the end of it,' Kane said. 'He was the smallest, youngest guy in the area, and he won it over all of these adults. That was my introduction to Joe DePugh. He was just a good guy.' And while some consider the message of 'Glory Days' to be melancholy, DePugh was not one of them. 'There's nothing about that song that bothered him,' Coyne said. 'There was nothing about it, because he was not that person. He was not a person who was living in those days. He had had those days, he had thrived in them and he had loved them, and then he had a nice life.' At the end of high school, DePugh tried out for the Los Angeles Dodgers before going on to play basketball and earning a degree at King's College in Wilkes-Barre, Pa. DePugh lost both his parents at a young age and became the legal guardian for two of his brothers. After college, he worked as a substitute teacher before becoming a contractor. He later moved from New Jersey, splitting his time between Vermont and Florida. He continued to make regular stops in Freehold to see old friends, including, on occasion, Springsteen. 'He said to me, 'Always remember I love you,'' DePugh said in the video about one such reunion. 'He kissed me on both cheeks, and then he was out the door.' (Photo courtesy of Don Norkus)
