Most frames of reference to the late John Ellis almost reflexively ping-pong between his time with the Yankees and his vocation to fight cancer, the disease that, in the immortal words of Jim Valvano, never did capture Ellis' mind, heart or soul.

But Ellis was more, well more than even the noble designations of ballplayer and cancer crusader suggest. He was among our corner of the world's first larger-than-lifers, one of the first who made The Big Time, strengthened by New London roots that begin and end here:

John Ellis was the toughest dude in town.

"I can give you plenty of stuff for a puff piece," childhood friend John Ryzewic, who would later play basketball at Dartmouth for Dave Gavitt, was saying. "But that really wasn't John."

The John his friends knew growing up behind the armory in the College Heights section of New London hit baseballs over the bleachers at Morgan Park, punched out an opposing catcher who tagged him at the plate too aggressively once and even tackled a teammate a few yards short of the finish line, after challenging the guy to a foot race.

Put it this way: The pantheon of toughness back from in the day featured Clint Eastwood, Clorox, Algebra II and John Ellis, not necessarily in that order.

"He didn't want to fail at anything," childhood friend and now longtime basketball official Henry Gunther said. "He was unique."

"I played football with him at New London," said Pete Gianakos, who would blossom into the man who fed the whole town, running Mr. G's. "John was a great fullback and corner. I was a safety. I never had to make any tackles. If they came around the corner, John would knock all the blockers down and make the tackle himself. And I hated tackling him in practice."

This was in the mid-to-late 60s, when high school sports felt almost mythical around here. New London competed in the old Capital District Conference, long bus rides to slay all the Hartford schools and surrounding towns. The dramatis personae are still mentioned with reverence to this day, beginning a decade earlier with Patsy Cannamela and Art Quimby, morphing into Dave Connors, Billy McCarthy, Bill Foye, Bob Simoni and Billy Butchka.

But then there was the man who made the Yankees, right from College Heights, even though he was undrafted.

"He got a great deal with the Yankees because he cold-cocked the catcher in a high school baseball game," Ryzewic said.

Gunther tells the story:

"We were playing Fitch and there was a play at the plate," Gunther said. "The catcher was Paul Williams and he tagged John hard. John got up and threw a haymaker. They threw him out of the CDC for it."

And because of that, Ellis didn't get drafted, instead playing American Legion ball as a free agent. Gunther said that because no other team held Ellis' rights, the Yankees were free to offer whatever they wanted.

"John tore it up in Legion ball," Gunther said. "One day we were playing an exhibition game in Massachusetts. It was a big, open field. He hit a ball so far to right center that by the time the outfielder got to the ball, John was already sitting in the dugout."

And this was a time when Ellis, who made it to the majors as a catcher, wasn't even the catcher on his own Legion team. That was Jim Powers, who went on to win state championships coaching baseball at St. Bernard.

"John played right field," Gunther said. "By far our best hitter. One of the stories I remember the most was the day he says to (first baseman) John King, 'I can beat you in a race.' They start running. King was a yard in front of him, so John dove and tackled him. It took the whole team to break them up. That tells you how bad he just didn't want to lose."

Later in life, Ellis and his wife, Jane, founded the Connecticut Sports Foundation, later renamed the Connecticut Cancer Foundation. Few others in the history of the world fought cancer with more verve, running a foundation has given more than $7 million to Connecticut families dealing with the financial hardships that often follow a cancer diagnosis — and more than $2.5 million to support cancer research at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in Manhattan, N.Y., where Ellis had been treated.

And it all began behind the armory.

Turns out the toughest guy in town used his strength not just to make the majors, but to never cower from the disease that claimed his physical being. John Ellis tackled cancer the same way he got John King. And people are alive and get to read this because of it.

RIP to the man whose spirit still reflects the resolve of his hometown.

This is the opinion of Day sports columnist Mike DiMauro