Class of ’91 honor Steele graduate Jason Dusho with scoreboard

by JOHN LASKO News-Times reporter Jason Dusho is described by his best friend and former team mate Bryan Draga as a very successful baseball player who was a fun-loving and caring guy, who had a very gentle personality, as well as someone who liked to have a good time with family and friends. “He definitely cared about his family and looked up to both of his brothers and he was also very respectful to his parents,” Draga said. “He was one of three boys in the middle and he also held his two brothers in very high regard.” Dusho was admitted to a Detroit, Mich., hospital in November, 2006, and died unexpectedly due to sepsis or multiple organ failure on Dec. 19, 2006. He was only 34 years old. What makes this story even more heartbreaking is the fact that his mother died nine months before his death. “Everybody was sad and we all struggled with a way of honoring his memory and also showing support to his family who have been through so much,” Draga’s wife, Kelly, who was also friends with Dusho, said. Shortly after Dusho’s funeral, Draga and some of his friends were thinking of a way they could somehow both memorialize and commemorate Dusho’s life. “We tossed around the idea about setting up a scholarship for students who were going to go in to the field of communications, but then we decided to do one nice thing rather then do something annually,” he said. Dusho, a 1991 graduate of Steele High School, played baseball from his freshman to his senior year. He was a pitcher and also played third base for the Comets during his senior year. He was a two-year letterman within the sport and also earned the title as the Comets’ Most Valuable Player. During his senior year, Dusho also participated in the all Southwestern Conference all-star team as a star pitcher. He then went on to graduate from the University of Cincinnati in 1996 with a bachelor of arts degree in broadcasting. Right after graduation, he worked for WIZS radio in Cincinnati as an on-air talent. That same year, he accepted a position as both the production and creative services director for the Clear Channel radio station group in Norfolk, Va. In 2001, Dusho moved once again and became the new disc jockey as well as the creative services director for 97.9 WJLB radio, which is an urban contemporary station in Detroit. His on-air name was Jason Alexander. He also started his own business called Da Sho Creations, making commercials, doing voice-over work, as well as imaging services for large market radio stations throughout the country. “We felt it would be nice to dedicate some equipment to the high school sports program or I thought maybe we would give something in regard to communications equipment, whether it be new audio/visual equipment when they do their daily announcements over the television system,” Draga said. Two steak fries, other benefits and some large cash donations from the such organizations as the Amherst Eagles and the Amherst Athletic Association later, Draga, along with his sports minded buddies, purchased a $14,000 scoreboard. It was dedicated to Dusho’s memory, before the Comets sectional championship game against Elyria last Thursday. “I think this is a great testament to who Jason was as a person that so many people from different walks of his life would want to come together and work to dedicate something in his honor. It really shows the type of person he was and he was the common thread between all of us,” Draga said. “When you reflect on it, I think this is a really nice celebration of who he was and I think from all of his friends and classmates who now live in Michigan,Texas to Ohio — folks who haven’t spoken to each other in years. They really came together to celebrate his life and in true retrospect, it is a true testament for the person he was and it was an honor to be a part of it.” Jason’s father Dennis, along with his older brother Brian, came from Boise, Idaho and his younger brother Jeremy, who now lives in Rocky River, made the trip to Amherst to honor the family’s middle child. “Jason showed great humility. If he did something right guys would come up and tell me, your son would not show any accolades. He does a great job and when we tell him how great he is, he always bows his head a little bit so he is also very humble,” Jason’s father said. “He’s also a very giving individual and he was a great, very lovable, big teddy bear type of individual who loved kids.” Dusho’s family and fellow classmates gathered around the pitcher’s mound where the dedication ceremony took place. Varsity baseball coach Al McConihe presented Dennis Dusho with a plaque which had Jason’s accomplishment as an all-SWC pitcher along with his number 34 and his graduating class on it. The scoreboard and the plaque are meant to be a lasting memento and tribute for his family to remember the occasion. Before the game started, the scoreboard was officially turned on for the first time. “It’s phenomenal and words cannot describe how I feel right now, It is just great,” Dusho said. “I used to tell Jason all the time that you’re so lucky to have so many friends — he probably had 30 or 40 friends he kept in contact with all of the time.” Draga doesn’t want people to view this as a regular scoreboard which tells the score, the inning and how many balls and strikes are against the batter. Instead he wants them to view this new piece of equipment as a way of remembering a guy who loved the sport of baseball, the same way he cared about his family, his friends, and his community.