04/24/2006 4:29 PM ET Pitching in to fight ALS Baseball marathon raises funds for Lou Gehrig's disease By Mike Petraglia / Special to MLB.com

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Walter Bentson is smiling, his cheeks a rosy red and his eyes watering slightly from the wind blowing into the third-base dugout. One of the top amateur umpires in Massachusetts and president of the Boston Park Baseball League, Bentson is taking a break, sitting in front of a portable propane heater. He has spent most of the last 15 hours behind the plate calling balls and strikes.

Bentson has primary lateral sclerosis (PLS), a neurological disease and an ailment that's in the same family as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis or ALS -- Lou Gehrig's disease.

Seeing Bentson changes one's perspective -- even after playing 33 consecutive innings.

Red Sox ace Curt Schilling has vowed to do whatever he can to help those who fight ALS, including lending his name to the third annual "100 innings to benefit Curt's Pitch for ALS." The event began Saturday at 9 a.m. at Fitton Field, the home of park of Holy Cross baseball. All proceeds from the baseball marathon go to benefit the Massachusetts chapter of the ALS Association, with a goal this year of $120,000.

Since its inception in 2004, the Boston Men's Baseball League, through its marathon baseball game, has raised over $300,000 for Curt's Pitch for ALS and the ALS Association MA Chapter. Without the BMBL, there would be no players and without Brett Rudy there would be no game.

And while more than 60 players pitched in to help, everyone wanted to play at least respectfully well, including Bentson's two brothers, Kevin and Michael, who made the trip to Worcester from Brewster, N.Y. Neither brother complained when the strike zone was not expanded for them at the plate and both were called out on strikes.

The debilitating muscle disease has slowed him somewhat physically, it certainly hasn't impacted Walter's sense of humor.

He joked after completing the 2005 event that all he needed to get through 100 innings again was a chair to sit in. So in the top of the 38th, umpires from around Massachusetts, who also donated their time to the event, presented him with a brand new black-stained wooden chair, with an inscription to remind Bentson of the day.

"A thing of beauty," Bentson said while smiling and sitting in his new piece of furniture.

Since 1991, Bentson has umpired throughout New England. Whether it's Boston's local amateur leagues or the prestigious Cape Cod Baseball League, Bentson has always shown passion for the game of baseball while maintaining great respect from everyone who happens to come in contact with him on and off the diamond.

Mike Petraglia is a contributor to MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

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