The Cincinnati Adult Baseball League’s roots date back to the winter of 1987 when a group of local guys caught wind of a national organization called the Men’s Senior Baseball League. That national organization which was created the year before, was attempting to create a network of leagues across America.  Fortunately for us here in Cincinnati, there were enough guys interested to form 2 teams and create the Cincinnati MSBL in the Spring of 1988.

Over the years the organization has been affiliated with the MSBL, Roy Hobbs and now with its current identity as the Cincinnati Adult Baseball League. No individual has been more synonymous with this league over the past 3 decades than Deerfield’s Mel Kattelman. One of the originals to take the field in 1988, Mel spent over a decade running the league in its formative years. Under Mel’s direction the league went from 2 teams playing on a field built on top of a landfill to two dozen teams playing on some of the best facilities in town. On the field, Mel has been a standout player, accumulating nearly 500 hits since 1999 and probably somewhere in the neighborhood of 1000 overall (we don’t have any documented stats prior to 1999) Mel was a big game pitcher on 4 championship teams in the 1990’s. A former teammate described him as the best first baseman he’s ever played with and the last guy an opposing pitcher wanted to see when the game was on the line.

     His career started with the Cincinnati MSBL team and has been spent mostly with Deerfield Construction, except for a brief stint with the Rockies from 2005-2008.

It is our distinct honor to induct Mel as the inaugural member of the CABL Hall of Fame!