Eric Huppertz joined the Chicago Metropolitan Sports Association ( CMSA ) in the fall of 1998 to play flag football. He also has played CMSA softball and tennis—and softball is his favorite.
"I've played on several great teams and met a lot of good friends in the softball league," Huppertz said. "Roscoe's used to be the place where everyone went after [Open Division] Sunday softball games. It was the de facto host bar, week after week, and it was always a blast. When I played for Big Chicks, the running joke was that we were the football team for Rydell High—from Grease, of course. Every year we had a Homecoming game, and we'd even elect a Homecoming Queen after the game. It was so much fun."
This season, his partner of nine years, Roberto Rodriguez-Torres, also is Huppertz's teammate.
"Being teammates comes naturally for us," Huppertz said. "A few years ago we played football together. On that team, it was impossible not to have a great time. This season we played softball together on the Bad News Beards—a fun, quirky, and improbably successful team. Playing sports together is something we both enjoy and look forward to."
Huppertz said there really is no key to their longevity off the field. "We just like being together," he said. "We both have a strong sense of 'even when you piss me off, there's still no place I'd rather be.' People have asked me how I managed to find such a good match, as if they expect to hear advice like 'eat less and exercise more.'
"But we met because we were both in the right place at the right time. It was luck, plain and simple."
Actually, it was at Northalsted Market Days in 2005.
"We never really had a first date. We were just suddenly together, and never looked back," Huppertz said. "It sounds corny, but we knew it was love when we shared a bratwurst with sauerkraut and mustard."
The two had actually met a few months earlier—at the 2005 Chicago Pride Parade.
"Pride will always be special to us, because that's the day our lives changed forever," Huppertz said.
THE STATS
Age: 47
Neighborhood: North Center
Relationship status: Partners with Roberto Rodriguez-Torres, 36, an urban planner
Job title: Customer Relationship Manager, UBS Global Asset Management - End User Services
Hobbies: Writing, bicycling and photography
Favorite TV show: Modern Family
Favorite movie: Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
Four people ( living or dead ) you'd like to have dinner with: Mark Twain, James Burke, Robin Williams and Ludwig Wittgenstein
Little-known fact: "I can flex my pupils, or, more accurately, my irises the way some people can wiggle their ears."
