This post is part of a media project called SoCal Sports History 101: The Prime Numbers from 00 to 99 that Uniformly, Uniquely and Unapologetically Reveal The Narrative of Our Region’s Athletic Heritage. Pick a number, and consider the list of athletes attached to it. Who wore it best? Or, what’s the most compelling story linked to it? Any person, place or thing is in play with Southern California connections. Star power, transformational achievement, longevity, notoriety and quirkiness all factor in. Whatever leads to a lively discussion and interpretation.
The most obvious choices for No. 21:
Eddie Meador: Los Angeles Rams
Michael Cooper: Los Angeles Lakers
LenDale White: USC football
Wally Joyner: California/Anaheim Angels
Maurice Jones-Drew: UCLA football
Jim Hardy: USC football and Los Angeles Rams
The not-so-obvious choices for No. 21:
Alyssa Thompson: Angel City FC
Zack Greinke: Los Angeles Dodgers
Walker Buehler: Los Angeles Dodgers
Milton Bradley: Los Angeles Dodger
The most interesting stories for No. 21:
Sean Burroughs: Long Beach Little League baseball (1992 and 1993), Long Beach Wilson High baseball (1995 to 1998)
Jeff Burroughs: Long Beach Little League baseball (1963); Long Beach Wilson High baseball (1965 to 1969)
Southern California map pinpoints:
Long Beach
Reference books on the subject:
“The Little Team That Could: The Incredible, Often Wacky Story of the Two-Time Little League World Champions,” by Jeff Burroughs with Tom Hennessey, 1994
“Jeff Burroughs’ Little League Instructional Guide,” by Jeff Burroughs, 1990
“Seasons in Hell: With Billy Martin, Whitey Herzog and ‘The Worst Baseball Team in History’ – The 1973–1975 Texas Rangers,” by Mike Shropshire, 1996
Debbie Burroughs said exactly what you’d expect as someone’s protective mother and faithful wife.
“Let’s focus more about the ups than the downs,” she said, as I explained to her in August of 2013 that I was compiling a look back at the 20 years since her son, Sean, and her husband, Jeff, were part of Long Beach Little League’s back-to-back World Series celebrations in Williamsport, Pennsylvania.
We could minimize some of the details about Sean’s comeback from an assortment of personal issues. At that time, he was back in the Los Angeles Dodgers’ minor league system, in Double-A, up against it at age 33. Maybe there was pathway back into a sport that had become his identity.
Stearns Park, home of Long Beach Little League tucked away amidst Lakewood Boulevard, the 405 and the Los Coyotes Diagonal, south of the Long Beach Airport runway, had been the baseball haven for Jeff and Sean Burroughs as they learned the game. Like a diamond handed down through generational caretaking.
They both grew up to learn the sport with their parents and friends and teammates, then gravitate over on the other side of Los Alamitos Traffic Circle and launch down Pacific Coast Highway to find Long Beach Woodrow Wilson High, across the street from the well-used Blair Field. It sent them both into a Major League Baseball career arc.
Jeff’s calling card became the 1974 American League’s Most Valuable Player Award, twice named to the MLB All-Star team of each league. The last of his 16 seasons was with Toronto, coming up a game short of going to the World Series.
Sean’s seven years of MLB play showed a lot of early promise, but an injury, trades and releases marked the journey. An addiction to pain killers were not helpful.
Jeff and Sean, as the father-son combo and favorite sons of Long Beach, could reflect two decades later on what they went through.
It may have brought joy, but there was a tragic end when, late in a May day afternoon in 2024, word spread that Sean had died at age 43.
In a circle-of-life moment, he was at Stearns Park to drop off Knox Burroughs, his 6-year-old son and Jeff and Debbie’s grandson, for his Little League game. Sean was an assistant coach for his son’s team. But when he wasn’t there for the first pitch, some were concerned and started looking for him. They found him down in the parking lot and called 911.
Debbie would send a text to the local newspapers to confirm that Sean died of cardiac arrest from a fentanyl overdose.
Continue reading “No. 21: Sean Burroughs (and Jeff Burroughs)”
