Chance Smith loved the game of baseball and his memory will never be forgotten.

That was the message Mike Daly, the owner and operator of Flash Baseball, wanted to get across to the hundreds of people gathered around Field 5 of the Flash Baseball Complex in Saturday, May 26.

“Everybody loved (Chance), he was really personable,” Daly said. “He was a very outgoing kid, he was a real pleasant guy.

“He played baseball like a maniac, overly enthusiastic and he couldn’t go harder. He was a big kid, 210 lbs., but for a center fielder who would have played high-level college baseball, that’s how well he ran.”

Smith’s life was cut short when he passed away on February 7, 2012.

As a member of the Flash Baseball organization since its inception in 2002 at the age of six, Smith’s memory is sure to live on thanks to the memorial ceremony that retired his No. 7 jersey Saturday.

“We have 14 teams and we are retiring his number seven forever,” Daly said. “Seven will be painted on the wall and seven will never be used again by a Flash team.”

Flash Baseball is a travel ball organization that has all 14 teams competing in the Southwest Ohio League, a league that gives the youth in Southwest Ohio the best opportunity to play amateur baseball at the highest level in order to prepare players successful high school baseball careers as well as prepare its participants for college.

The Flash teams play at the Flash Baseball Complex, a state-of-the-art facility that boasts 10 professionally maintained grass infields, five lighted fields, air-conditioned arcade, outdoor batting cages, playgrounds and an indoor training facility and restaurant.

The complex holds 15 Continental Amateur Baseball Association sanctioned tournaments a year.

Smith was there from the beginning, before the complex was the masterpiece that it is today. Just a kid with a knack for the game and a smile that brightened everyone’s day.

“His very first swing when he was a little kid, he came into the garage before we had everything built out there and I thought, ‘whoa, this kid likes to hit a baseball,’” Daly said. “He never would swing just half way. Two strikes didn’t matter, he was swinging like he was coming out of his shoes.”

Smith moved up the organization as he got older. The team that Smith was on in the SWOL was classified as National Team Gold, which is the highest level of youth baseball in Cincinnati, the only Flash team to reach that level.

Tragedy surrounded Smith’s death and Daly wanted to use the memorial service as a time to remind the kids as well as the adults in attendance that misfortunes like what Chance went through could be avoided if people are kind to one another and pay attention to what is going on around them.

“I think in a low key way, the theme for the dedication is that we are not going to forget,” Daly said.

Daly tells a story of Smith as an 11-year-old who had just finished a summer playing on two teams, participating on the 11-year-old team as well as the 12-year-old team. The teams played 110 games between them and Smith played in every one.

When the season was over, Daly remembers Smith sitting with his head down and saying, “I can’t believe we’re done with baseball.”

“He just loved the game,” Daly said.

With the big yellow seven painted on the center field wall of each of the fields at the Flash Complex, Daly and the Flash family made sure that Chance’s memory will never be forgotten and his love for baseball will live on even after the season is over.