Fred Parham
Inducted: 00/00/0000

Fred Parham began playing softball in the early stages of what is today called Emerald City Softball Association back in 1978. This is over 30 years of being associated with ECSA and he is still actively part of ECSA.

Over these 30 years he has been a player, coach, ECSA Team representative, mentor and friend to many players of the ECSA. He's been a huge financial supporter of the league via participation in the league fundraising events or donating when we host the World Series. Back in the early 1990's the league used to have drag competition - each team submitted a participant - the event was held to raise funds for the league and for teams going to World Series. Back at this time Fred was quite renowned for his Tina Turner impersonation and would bring the house down with his Tina Turner numbers. Just recently in 2008 Fred and his partner Greg became Diamond Club members to show their support for ECSA hosting the 2008 World Series.

Where Fred shines the most in his softball career with ECSA is when he is coaching. Any team he's coached he truly looks at every player as his kids - a sort of extended family. He loves to teach, mentor and make his teammates better players and better people. He is their coach and he is their friend. In a conversation just recently Fred shared some of his softball philosophy that he was sharing with the current team he is coaching. It is related to sportsmanship - telling his players you have to respect you competition win or lose - at the end of the game when you go out and slap hands with the other team and say "good game" you truly need to mean it. This philosophy has been prevalent throughout Fred's softball career - he is a very focused and intense person during a game but when the game is over you are his friend and he truly respects any team or players he plays against.

Fred has coached several teams over the years that have earned World Series berths. A memorable such team is the team he took to the 1992 LA World Series. This team ended up making it to the championship game and took 2nd place in the C Division of that World Series. He has taken teams to the Minneapolis and San Diego World Series and was a mentor to the Monarchs; the team that took 2nd place in B Division at the Portland World Series. The Monarchs were also the B Division Champions the following year at the Washington DC World Series.

In recent years whenever this league was in need of coach for a team Fred was always the first one to approach about coaching. He did it with the Angels a few years ago - the league had players that wanted to play - but no coach - they asked Fred and he stepped up and took on coaching and playing on that team. He moved the team up to the B Division after one year and coached them a couple more years. He took the 2008 season off but then in 2009 was approached by the Atomic team - who had just won the D Division in the 2008 World Series and several of the players were moving up to play in the C Division and wanted someone to coach them - someone to make them better players and to prepare them to play in the C Division. Fred was the excellent choice for that and again agreed to coach another team. They will be a better team for it.

Fred is one of (3) active members of ECSA that is still playing/coaching in the league since its inception - the other (2) are Bruce Caszatt and Time - both Bruce and Time are already ECSA Hall of Fame members. It's time to add Fred to that list. Fred possesses everything that you would expect of an ECSA Hall of Fame member: Longevity in the League, respect and loyalty to the League, leadership, humanitarian, success as a player and coach (several championships), and sportsmanship. The ECSA is definitely a better League because Fred has been part of it for the past 30 years.