“I’m just getting tired,” said Webb, who will turn 80 in March. “But I still love the sport.”

Webb suited up this week in her custom “Grandma Judy” Cardinals jersey for her final scheduled game coaching the Remnants, a ragtag group of women in the fall recreational league at the Bridgeton Municipal Athletic Complex.

The second-place Remnants — encouraged but not required by Webb to wear red — were squaring off against the league-leading 3 Up 3 Down, who were clad in matching burgundy T-shirts.

The previous faceoff with 3 Up 3 Down ended in a nail-biting 11-9 loss for the Remnants. Tuesday night, with storm clouds gathering overhead, would be their last shot for slow-pitch retribution and a victory for Webb.

Webb has spent almost three-quarters of a century dominating every type of diamond: in pickup neighborhood baseball, competitive fast pitch, senior tournaments and beer-league battlegrounds.

Webb grew up in Gilmore, just a few miles east of Wentzville, where she lives now. She was sandwiched between two brothers, and by the time she was 6, she was a regular in daily sandlot contests.

“My older brother was picked first,” she said. “I was picked second.”

Webb played in a dress and Mary Janes. She had to dust herself off a little earlier than the boys to head home to help her mother get dinner on the table.

It was the early 1950s, two decades before Title IX of the Civil Rights Act would steamroll barriers for girls in sports. Webb had no real baseball team available to her. She and her dad would throw the ball around, next to the field, while her brothers competed in Little League.

By middle school, Webb had joined a community fast-pitch softball team, usually captaining the infield at shortstop. She played until college, where she earned a degree in education.

Then she got married, had three girls and got a job teaching elementary school.

One day at her second job, behind the deli counter at Schnucks, she was asked by a woman she knew if she wanted to be a part of her slow-pitch team.

As soon as Webb dug out her glove and took a few warmup swings, it all came back: not just the agility and the strategy, but the purpose.

“I loved the camaraderie,” she said. “I just enjoyed being around a group of people who loved playing.”

Softball took her to tournaments around the country. It kept her active and connected, introducing her to teammates less than half her age. Each December, she hosted a softball Christmas party.

“She’s always moving,” said Kelli Webb of St. Charles, the oldest of the daughters.

Five years ago, Webb recruited some members from her senior league to form a new squad. Middle daughter Kerri Schulte, who hadn’t played since fifth grade, signed up.

“I like watching her enthusiasm,” said Schulte, a right fielder who lives in Foristell.

The team’s roster includes five other septuagenarians — plus baby boomers, Gen Xers and millennials.

Webb christened them the Remnants because “I couldn’t think of a team name. We’re just a bunch of leftovers.”

Those leftovers boosted her spirits during treatment for ovarian cancer in 2020, when she had to wear a ballcap to protect her head from sunburn after her hair fell out. She’s cancer-free now, but the treatment caused neuropathy in her legs.

“She’s kind of knock-kneed,” said Jenny Holmes of Florissant, Webb’s youngest daughter. “The cancer wreaked a little bit of havoc on her.”

Webb finally was feeling her age. Last summer was her swan song in the field, after she fell on a sprint from third to home. This year — she decided before opening day — would be her last one in the dugout, managing the Remnants, arranging the lineup, coaching base runners.

Next spring, instead of getting the team back together, she’ll have her right knee replaced.

She knows it’s time to let go. She is ready, and she is not ready.

The season has also been emotional for her daughters. They came out Tuesday, with their kids and family friends, bearing balloons and cupcakes, to cheer from the bleachers for Grandma Judy.

Before the first pitch of the 8:30 p.m. doubleheader, Webb was feeling good. The Remnants were fired up.

“She pushes us,” said Emily Quiles of O’Fallon, Missouri. At 30, the outfielder is the youngest Remnant, just a few years older than Webb’s grandchildren.

“All right, home team, get out there,” Webb told her players, just as she has countless times before.

The women dispatched their opponents — no damage done — after four batters. But 3 Up 3 Down held the game scoreless in the bottom of the first and knocked in three runs in the top of the second.

“This team is 6-and-0, and we’ve got to beat them,” Webb told the Remnants before their second at-bat. Lightning punctuated her charge.

The umpire saw it, too. The weather had delivered a curveball; the game was called.

So, in the end, Webb will have more managing to do, after all.

She’ll be starting the makeup game with a three-run deficit to erase. It’s nothing her decades of experience can’t handle.

“Listen, team,” Webb commanded, as the Remnants grabbed their bats and headed to their cars, “I expect everyone here next week!”