The City of Maricopa held a private ceremony Saturday to unveil a statue dedicated to a Little Leaguer who died in 2013 after contracting a staph infection while playing his favorite sport.

Current and former city officials joined the family of Tommy Fitzgerald to unveil and dedicate the bronze statue. At 12, Fitzgerald contracted a staph infection through a knee wound he received while playing baseball. He died in August 2013.

The memorial sits just north of Pacana Park’s softball fields. The statue stands a little over five feet tall, and the player wears Fitzgerald’s jersey and No. 33. Next to the statue is a plaque that reads, “In memory of Tommy Fitzgerald, God’s all-star.” It is also adorned with photos of Fitzgerald.

Vice Mayor Vincent Manfredi attended the unveiling and said during a council meeting the event “brought closure … to a time where people were talking about this memorial and statue for 12 years and trying to figure it out.”

He said Councilmember Amber Liermann was instrumental in bringing that sense of closure. 

“I lived here when Tommy played baseball and when he passed away, it was really tragic for our community. I remember the efforts made by Tommy’s friends and family, the petition his friends did and the fundraising happening,” Liermann recalled. “I remembered all these details very clearly, so when [city council] had a meeting about Iconic Park, I just thought, ‘What happened to Tommy’s statue?'”

It turns out, a statue had been sitting in his mother’s closet for years. 

“I got a hold of his mom and … she shared with me that she had a very earnest prayer, asking, ‘Please, God, do something so I can get Tommy’s statue where it needs to be,'” she said. “The timing was really special, so I told her I would do everything I could to make sure his statue was put up at Pacana Park.”

That meant not only getting approval from city staff, but also coordinating with Fitzgerald’s friends and family to attend the ceremony. Liermann said everyone “got on board very quickly.”

Plans to memorialize Fitzgerald were brought up by his teammates and former Maricopa City Council member Julia Gusse shortly after his untimely death.

Gusse, who was a councilmember at the time of Fitzgerald’s death, said there was a suggestion from the Maricopa Youth Council to name one of the fields after him, but the council at the time did not go that direction.

“They approved a statue as long as we could fundraise and create this piece of art,” she recalled.

However, that effort lost steam as his teammates grew up and the roughly $80,000 cost of a statue seemed out of reach.

“The family was just happy this got done,” Gusse said, adding that the family ultimately funded the project on their own. “Money didn’t mean anything to his mother for that statue.”

Seeing the statue dedicated at Pacana Park was an emotional moment, she said.

“It was a fabulous feeling to see it go up,” Gusse said. “It’s the fact that we made a promise, fulfilled it and the community for generations to come will continue to experience this. His death left an impact here and, hopefully, this leads to greater sepsis awareness.”

Editor’s note: Vincent Manfredi owns InMaricopa.