WOOSTER — There the three stood. Side-by-side behind home plate before the first pitch was thrown.
During a brief moment of silence before Wooster’s first varsity baseball game since the death of sophomore second baseman Maddox Graser on Friday, April 24, during a Monday evening at home (a 7-2 Wooster win over Lexington), the loud noise reverberated across Legacy Field and the surrounding areas on the high school campus.
The sounds of “Vroom Vroom Vroom” were heard loud and clear from the very thing that connected them: dirt bikes.
Sophomores themselves and high school classmates with Graser at Wooster High School, Brant Barnard, Mason Strock and Aidan Dordea together in that moment gave an ode to their fallen friend and bike-riding mate.
Graser’s enthusiasm for riding dirt bikes has been well told over the past two weeks. From all accounts, he lived for riding on those dirt tracks. The vigor that came with it. The danger of the tricks and jumps one could attempt. The liveliness of it all. The pure adrenaline of being absorbed into all that action.
That was big part of who Maddox Graser was. And his dirt bike buddies were right there along with him.
“We were best friends the first day we met. Just instantly when we began talking in class,” Barnard said.
However, when Barnard and Graser started connecting, he wasn’t into dirt bikes at the time.
“I actually didn’t ride dirt bikes. He kind of got me into dirt bikes,” Barnard explained. “We both liked sports and playing video games. Then we started fishing and riding bikes together. He got a dirt bike. He had a pit bike. A little tiny bike. Then I got one also, then we started going to the track together and riding dirt bikes. Racing around and trying jumps.”
“We kind of grew up together. Kindergarten was the first time we started hanging out,” Strock said. “We’ve always been around each other all our lives. We kind of acted like the same people. This group is all similar. Lots of dirt bikes, fishing, wrestling. Stuff outdoors.”
Dordea vividly remembers the first time he and Graser met, and that’s when he got a small glimpse of what kind of dirt bike Graser was working with.
“Yeah, it was in eighth grade. Last period of the day,” Dordea said. “I think I had a Yamaha hoodie on. That’s the bike he rides. He came to me after class and asked, ‘Do you ride?’ I said, ‘Yeah, I ride.’ We exchanged what we rode and we kept talking from there and a couple of weeks. I feel like our friendship grew over the years. Me and Mason started engaging and we just developed that friendship bond. I’ve rode with him a few times.”
Barnard even recalls the first time he got on the track with Graser at a private motocross facility.
“It was at this place called Apple Cabin in Lodi (Apple Cabin MX Track). He told me to go,” Barnard said. “I went and we went on the smaller track together. We got faster as we rode more. Then we got big bikes and went on the big track.”
Were there any super competitive races amongst everyone?
“I’ve definitely battled with him a couple of times but no actual races with him,” Barnard said.
“Maddox was a lot faster than me. I never battled with him. There was one time I tried this one jump,” Dordea added, continuing his story. “I rolled over the turn and I came down on my bike. He rode over and was like, ‘Oh, is that you?’ He looked down on me and was like, ‘Of course.'”
But for all the adventures dirt bike riding provided “Maddo” — one of Graser’s nicknames — getting on the track wasn’t the only passion he had dialogues with his friends about.
“Never really dirt bikes. It was always baseball,” said Strock of Graser, who was an All-Ohio Cardinal Conference Honorable Mention pick as a freshman. “He was one crazy baseball player. He always talked about college and MLB. He had the potential. He was a hardworking kid.”
“He was good at everything,” Dordea said. “He did derby cars. He was good at everything he did, honestly. Very talented kid all-around.”
So, what will you remember the most about being in his presence?
“Just being with him,” Strock said. “He always looked out for everybody. Especially this group. That was a big aspect of it. Seeing where he could have gone. Whether that was MLB or getting into supercross or motocross stuff. If you needed him, he was there for you. Maddox was a real caring hardworking kid.”
“The thing I’m gonna miss most is probably the way he acted,” Dordea said. “He had a very interesting, funny, but sometimes serious personality. But he would laugh about it afterwards.”
“I’ll miss a lot of stuff about him like fishing or just going to the pool or him just coming over my house,” Barnard said. “Just hanging out.”
If there’s one thing you can count on from the three, from here on out whenever they hit the motocross track, they’ll be thinking of Maddox.
“I might never be faster than him,” Strock said. “He was always quick. Definitely going to have him in mind.”
“I’ll always think about him when I’m on the track,” Barnard said. “It will definitely suck to not have him there.”
“Whenever I go out, I’m always going to ride for him,” Dordea said. “I’ll keep that in my heart just because he can’t anymore.”
Sounds like Graser’s crew will be taking it one dirt bike ride at a time.
jamessimpson@gannett.com
Twitter/X: @JamesSimpsonII
This article originally appeared on The Daily Record: Wooster’s Maddox Graser and buddies shared a fondness for dirt bikes
Reporting by James Simpson II, Wooster Daily Record / The Daily Record
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