MONTREAL -- John Elias, a longtime basketball referee who coached McGill University to its first Canadian Intercollegiate Baseball Association championship in 1994, passed away on Dec. 9 in Montreal. He was 82.

A former minor league pitcher who was a 2017 inductee to the RDS Quebec Baseball Hall of Fame, Elias served as the inaugural head coach and field manager for the McGill Redbirds baseball team. He guided the program to the CIBA pennant in 1994 with a 10-2 first-place record and a 2-0 mark in post-season play.

SEE JOHN ELIAS INTERVIEW IN 1994 TSN STORY

Born on June 14, 1938 in Montreal, he was educated at Van Horne elementary school and West Hill high school, then Pasedena City College in California. The six-foot, 185-pound southpaw, earned a baseball scholarship to Michigan State and pitched for the Spartans before graduating with a science degree. He then transferred to Springfield College in Massachusetts, where in 1962, he earned a master's degree in physical education, kinesiology and physiology.

Elias had a reputation as someone who could throw strikes and landed a job pitching batting practice for the Montreal Royals, the city's minor league team which folded in 1960.  From 1962 to 1965, he embarked on a four-year pro playing career in the minor leagues as part of the Kansas City Athletics and Baltimore Orioles organizations. He pitched for their farm teams in Bluefield of the Appalachian League, Daytona Beach of the Florida State League, Lewiston of the Northwest League and Burlington, N.C. in the Carolina League.

In 1964, he played for Granby of the Quebec Provincial League and three years later, he pitched for Canada at the Pan American Games in Winnipeg. From 1968 to 1970, Elias helped lead Trois-Rivières to a pair of Quebec league championships. In his later years, he played in the Dorval Senior Baseball League.

During his teaching career, Elias served as a scout for the St. Louis Cardinals and when the Montreal Expos were founded in 1969, he was hired to pitch batting practice. He taught physical education and coached basketball at various Montreal area high schools, including Baron Byng, Rosemount, Howard S. Billings, Bishop Whelan and St. Pius X.

Elias also had a distinguished 50-year career as a basketball referee in the high school, collegiate (CEGEP) and university ranks and was assigned to work at several national championships.

He was inducted to the Montreal Jewish Sports Hall of Fame in 2003 after serving the community as an assistant coach for Canada at various international events. Part of the staff of the gold medal-winning baseball squad at the 1997 Maccabiah Games in Israel, Elias also collected a pair of silver medals as a coach at the 2000 Maccabi Pan Am Games in Mexico City and the 2005 Maccabiah Games.

Elias operated the Grand Slam Baseball School, which produced a number of pro prospects and ran for 27 years in the Montreal regions of Côte St. Luc (24) and Town of Mt. Royal (3). In 1988, he was named ambassador of the year for Côte St. Luc, in recognition for his development of baseball in the community.

For a dozen years, Elias participated in various forms in the Major League Legends baseball game fundraiser in support of the Joe DiMaggio Children's Hospital in Hollywood, Fla. In 2008 he assembled and managed a team representing Canada to victory in the Vintage Baseball World Series Championship in Westfield, Mass.

After retiring, Elias spent most of his summers at the family cottage in Kingston, Ont. He is survived by his wife Marlene, daughter Caroline and three grandchildren (Ashley, Connor and Owen Smith).

Due to the pandemic, there will be no funeral service. The family intends to gather to honour his memory at their cottage in the springtime. Donations may be made in his memory to: MAB-Mackay Rehabilitation Centre. A memorial tree can be planted in his name and messages of condolences can be left in an online Guestbook of the Montreal Gazette.

SOURCE:
Earl Zukerman
Communications Officer, Athletics and Recreation
Agent de communications, Sport et activité physique
McGill University / Université McGill
(514) 398-7012
earl.zukerman@mcgill.ca