The arthritis in his arms won't allow Peter Bragan Sr. to raise a shotgun anymore or swing a 5-iron ("it makes me sick"), so all he has are memories of bird-hunting and those two holes-in-one recorded in the 1970s at North Birmingham Golf Club.
Bragan's 86-year-old body has become frail over time. He depends on a pacemaker to keep his heart in rhythm and a motorized wheelchair to get around.
Age has robbed the Jacksonville Suns owner of many pleasures, but there's one desire that will never fade away, no matter how many health challenges Bragan faces - chasing Southern League championships.
If anything makes this octogenarian feel young again, it's watching his 2009 Suns - after beating the Tennessee Smokies 2-1 on Wednesday night to take a 2-0 lead in the SL championship series - put themselves on the brink of winning it all.
"This is what makes me happy, so why give it up?" Bragan said. And then he added, playfully: "Now you offer me about $22 million [to buy the team], then I might have to talk about it."
No chance. Bragan, wearing his 2005 Suns championship ring, can't put a price tag on winning. It's what drives him in the ninth inning of his life.
Baseball has been in Bragan's blood since he and his six ballplaying brothers were little kids in Alabama. The former Birmingham Barons bat boy (1938-39) spent much of his work life as a car dealer, but these last 25 years owning the Suns have been his true joy ride.
Take Game 1 Tuesday night, a 6-5, 10-inning victory over Tennessee that ended with the Suns dog-piling Chris De La Cruz after his walkoff single brought home Ryan Klosterman. The Suns were one out from defeat until Brad Davis' solo home run set up the final heroics.
"That was a dreamer. My heart was real patty, patty, patty," Bragan said.
Back in March, there was a different kind of tension. The Double-A Suns had switched affiliates from the Los Angeles Dodgers to the Florida Marlins. Bragan and his son, president/general manager Peter Bragan Jr., weren't sure how much of a contending ballclub they'd have on the field.
"Me and Daddy had a lot of trepidation before the season," Peter Jr. said. "The way this year has turned out, it's been like a fairy tale."
The Suns drew 354,553 spectators, only a 3 percent drop in attendance from 2008, despite a tough economy. During the season's second half, the Suns are a blistering 52-23, including a 5-0 record in the postseason. They've been as dominant as any of their championship teams in 1996, 2001 and 2005.
"It's the best clubhouse I've ever been in," Suns manager Brandon Hyde said. "These guys really enjoy playing with each other. So we're riding it."
As is Bragan, the left-handed first baseman who often had to be removed from the ballfield by his high school principal and told to get back to class. At 9:21 p.m. Wednesday, right after the Smokies' Starlin Castro struck out to end the game, an exuberant Bragan continued his tradition of ringing the victory bell. He usually gives it about a dozen rings, but he struck the bell 28 times.
With the Suns on the verge of a championship, an old man is feeling like a kid again.