Boys of summer: McIntire All-Stars play for State title
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McIntire Little League’s 11-12-year old All-Stars battle for the State Championship tomorrow.PHOTO COURTESY MCINTIRE LITTLE LEAGUE
After winning the District 14 Little League Championship in dominating fashion, scoring 109 runs and only giving up 10— led by slugger Stevie Mangrum’s amazing 13 home runs in just 5 games— the McIntire Little League 11-12-year old All-Star team is poised to make history.
For only the second time, McIntire has made it to the finals of the Virginia State Little League Championship, with the title to be decided Wenesday, July 29 at 6pm in Fairfax, Virginia (depending on the weather). Not since a former McIntire Little League player named Chris Long was an All-Star has the team played in the Championship game, and no team from McIntire or District 14 has ever won the Virginia State Championship.
“I think what makes this team special is that they have been together their whole Little League career,” says McIntire League president Bob Schotta. “Ten of them played together on the 9-10 team that finished third in the state last year. They were the best team in that tournament by far, but didn’t win, so they have had a bit of a chip on their shoulder.”
While the team has had some close games in the tourney, Wednesday’s game against reigning champion Chantilly American, a Northern Virginia team, will be their toughest, says Schotta.
Schotta encourages folks to come watch the game if they can, but it will also be podcast at sportsannouncing.com. In addition, Schotta will also be tweeting the action.
This is great for these kids and their “little league careers”, but really a lousy thing for youth baseball in Charlottesville. The guys who run that league salivate for a state title, and if you have a kid in the league, it quickly becomes clear (from their tales about the storied Chris Long days of yore) that some children are valued (the athletically talented), while others get the message that they’re not good enough for sports. And quit. As their coaches had hoped. The better to concentrate their coaching efforts on the worthy stock. Though it’s a city league on city land, the kids playing there are not city kids, and McIntire’s record with the African-American kids living in the neighborhoods all around McIntire Park is abysmal. It’s no surprise that there are none in the photo above. My understanding is that the local league to brag about is at Cove Creek, which is not affiliated with Little League, and so does not buy into the nonsensical high-stakes pressure of the “World Series.” They brag not about Williamsport but about the colleges where former players have gone on to play.
Bob,
We’re getting a divorce. Why can’t you be happy for our children?
Bob,
I trust that you have some legitimate concerns but I’m not sure that this is the appopriate context or forum. These particluar all-stars are striving for excellence in something they dedicate themselves to. There is nothing wrong with adults giving them a place to do that even if other kids - including those who do a bunch of other things - cannot participate. There are a lot of graduates of that league who would challenge your comparison of McIntire versus other league’s diversity. The decline in African American participation in the sport has become a nationwide issue involving factors that should not be placed at the feet of the volunteers at any one particular league.
Trust me, Cove Creek and other local leagues outside of Little League take all-star tournament success seriously. You can also trust me, that McIntire has plenty of college success stories to be proud about. I’d be surprised if they don’t have a disproportinate number. And guess what? Many of them are African-American.
I am so proud of these young men and what they have accomplished. These kids show what hard work can do and it made all of those practices in 30 degree weather worth while. These kids are also fortunate to have such dedicated coaches that spend countless hours coaching any kid that signs up along fixing the fields, batting cages, and equipment for kids to use. Many of these coaches don’t even have children in the league but they still devote 30+ hours a week of their time. One of the most amazing things about McIntire Little League is that it is all volunteer even the umpires. I have been very fortunate to have all five of my children play at McIntire and go on to be successful at Charlottesville High and Buford.
Bob G:
Would it be better if AllStar team was made up of players who sucked?MLL does more than a few things right regarding baseball in general. #1 no child who wants to play is denied the oppty b/c of finances.
2.MLL carries 13 kids on their Allstar team which reduces the # of at bats that the best 11 get. MLL does this because the experience is so great & win or lose the kids get a lot out of it.
3. I have been in the league for 6 years. In almost every instance where a kid has had a bad experience the blame can be placed 100% on his or her parents.(We have girls who are pretty damn good btw). Just because we have coaches who devote countless hours to the team does not mean that a parent can roll his kid out of the car and expect to get back an Allstar in a few months.The kid has to want to practice and the parent has to make it happen.
Our team tries to string together small wins(getting a hit etc) and build on those successes during a season.
McIntire has its faults but they are minimal compared to the great work they do.
I am sorry that you had a bad experience in your LL career but these are great kids with great coaches who care for them very much, whether they make Allstar or not.
All:
The coaches’ and league’s efforts are admirable (ethnic diversity aside), up to the point that they play the Little League All-Star games. I just can’t see a meaningful defense of that–the march to Williamsport. I’m surprised the Hook got caught up.
From today’s Washington Post…
They Grow Up So Fast
By Sally Jenkins
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
One of the more disconcerting things Little Leaguers have learned from major leaguers is how to shower the infield with so much spit it registers like precipitation on a Doppler. What does a 12-year-old boy need to spit for, anyway? To get rid of the Laffy Taffy in the roof of his mouth? The answer is, so he can look like a mini-man on ESPN’s telecast of the Little League World Series.
It’s frightening how easily they pick up the mannerisms of their counterparts in the bigs. After every swing they slide the bat down and grip it manfully by the fat end, and stalk out of the batter’s box. They adjust their batting helmet with one gloved hand, and adjust their lower region with the other. Watching them, you get the same creepy feeling you do watching little girls in beauty pageants, wearing hair spray and wiggling their hips as they belt out Broadway tunes.
The argument for abolishing the Little League World Series is on display this week on ESPN, ESPN2, and ESPN360, every time a 12-year-old does an interview, every time announcer Orestes Destrade calls a 4-foot-8 pitcher “a little John Franco,” every time a skinny pre-adolescent gets a sore arm from throwing too much, and every time a kid imitates Matt Garza by hawking up a glob and spewing it into the dirt.
The stated mission of Little League is “in developing the qualities of citizenship, discipline, teamwork and physical well-being. By espousing the virtues of character, courage and loyalty, the Little League Baseball and Softball program is designed to develop superior citizens rather than superior athletes.” But let’s be plain: If the kids playing in Williamsport exhibit any of the noble qualities listed — and some do, especially character — they do so in the face of pressures that would buckle adults, and despite a cacophony of mixed messages.
Watch ESPN’s broadcasts, and you’ll hear a lot of banal moral maxims about “citizenship,” but search in vain for any evidence that it is more important than athleticism. What you’ll see are boys, some quite small, in a stadium the size of a Class AAA ballpark holding crowds of 45,000 foaming with vicarious ambition. You’ll see pre-adolescents throw upward of 200 pitches on short rest, contrary to all medical advice. You’ll see stern-faced men in managerial uniforms urging them, in voices that crack hoarsely, to “Get out there and get it done!”
Mainly you’ll see a lot of grownups acting out a central hypocrisy, the pretense that winning doesn’t matter, while in the stands and on television they screamingly demonstrate how much it does matter, how much it really, really matters.
Hardly a second goes by on ESPN without a reference to the majors. During a Sunday night broadcast of a game between Chula Vista, Calif., and Peabody, Mass., we learned who every boy’s favorite big leaguer is usually Albert Pujols, and which big leaguer called which team to wish it luck. We learned that John Tudor was from Peabody, and while Adrian Gonzalez grew up in Chula Vista.
We watched as Peabody pitcher Matt Hosman, an angular boy in spectacles, threw a valiant game against Chula Vista, holding them to two runs in five innings with a 70 mph fastball that seemed too powerful for his frail arm, before he left the mound when he passed the limit of 85 pitches allowed in one game. Medical advisers have told Little League a safer limit is 75, a standard it declines to implement. We didn’t hear that from ESPN, but we did hear that Hosman is so popular in Peabody a local diary named an ice cream after him, and put him on the carton.
We watched another Peabody kid, Austin Batchelor, make a spearing catch in the outfield, and heard Destrade and Sean McDonough bray, “Austin Batchelor, you are going to be on SportsCenter tonight!”
We learned from the network chatter that Chula Vista had hit 46 homers in just eight games, and that “The comparisons to major league teams are astounding!” because it took the Braves 17 games to hit the same number.
When Hosman was replaced on the mound by Matt Correale, a lefty with two prominent front teeth, we heard that his nickname is Matt the Rat, and that “He will have memories that will last a lifetime.” But then Chula Vista’s superior size and strength took over in a 12-run inning. At 12-0 in the sixth, Correale was finally relieved, and stooped in the grass with his mitt over his face, as if he had something to be ashamed of. He didn’t — Chula Vista has scored 127 runs in eight games and is favored to win the whole thing. A fine hitter named Andy Rios, who lives in Gonzalez’s old house, slugged two homers in one inning to make it 14-0. “Boom, boom, pow! This one was See-Ya!” the broadcasters shouted.
The founding idea of Little League is a good one: It gives kids of all abilities and sizes a chance to participate equally and to learn the correct fundamentals, which delivers a lot of joy. But the World Series has become a distorting influence, infecting kids and parents alike with major league fantasies that lead to emotional and physical stresses. In a recent New York Times Magazine story orthopedic surgeon James Andrews described an “epidemic” of arm and shoulder injuries to young ballplayers. Andrews has been keeping tabs: in 2001 and 2002 he performed a total of just 13 shoulder operations on teenagers. Over the next six years, he did 241.
The number of elbow ligament replacement operations he has performed on kids has risen from nine in 1995-98 to 224 between 2003 and 2008. The problem is overwork. Children are playing year-round for multiple teams, and throwing way too much. In last year’s Series one young pitcher threw 288 pitches in four games over 10 days of the tournament. Compare that to CC Sabathia, who made just two starts and threw 214 pitches in a similar 10-day period.
Sports, at their best, are supposed to be contained environments where children experience joy and rehearse success and failure through play, supposedly without the pain and pressures that await them in real life. But in the Little League World Series kids experience pain and pressure along with their joy — and pick up vulgar habits — all in the quest to act like “big leaguers.” As we all know, being a big leaguer is not synonymous with behavior worth emulating. The Little League has badly confused teaching kids to be good ballplayers with teaching them to be good people. They are two entirely different things.