After ‘Miracle' Recovery, One-Time Padre Tim Flannery Returns With New Album, Belly Up Show

By Editor, Times of San Diego

September 23, 2022

Songwriter and former San Diego Padre Tim Flannery will perform at the Belly Up in Solana Beach Sunday in his first local show since the release of his new album.

The recording, “Waiting on a Miracle,” is something that sadly, Flannery, 64, understands completely. He had a brush with death in 2020 due to a staph infection, sepsis, double-pneumonia and bladder failure. He was so ill that staff at times put him in restraints due to delirium.

Doctors at Scripps Memorial Hospital Encinitas had told his family – who couldn’t see him due to the pandemic – to prepare for the worst.

He needed a long recovery, but Flannery and his band, the Lunatic Fringe, returned to the music. Their Sunday show, at 8 p.m., celebrates the release of the record along with raising funds for The Love Harder Project, an anti-violence charity founded by Flannery.

The Leucadia resident has recorded more than a dozen albums during a career that for a long time ran parallel with his 11 years as a player and 15 seasons as a coach in Major League Baseball.

A third baseman for the Padres from 1979 to 1989, he also coached for the team from 1996 to 2002, and for the San Francisco Giants from 2007 to 2014 – the 2010, 2012 and 2014 Giants won the World Series.

Flannery’s band includes guitarist, vocalist and producer Jeff Berkley, guitarist Doug Pettibone, bassist Shawn Rohlf, keyboardist Josh Weinstein and drummer Chris Grant. Flannery sings and plays acoustic guitar, while Rohlf adds mandolin, and banjo too. They last released “The Light” in 2019.

“Waiting on a Miracle” has attracted praise from local singer-songwriter Steve Poltz.

“Wow, wow, wow, what a record!” Poltz said. “The man has been spit out and tore up and mangled and wrangled and he’s still kickin!”

Doors at the Belly Up open at 7 p.m. Sunday. Tickets cost $25 in advance and $28 the day of the show.

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