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On Little Leaguers and Jimmy Funders
BY CHRISTOPHER YOUNG
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Can a Little League game become one of ESPN’s Instant Classics? Why not? Thursday night’s astonishing Little League World Series semifinal — won by Saugus, Massachusetts, over Richmond, Texas, 14-13 in extra innings — was the type of game that would go down in the annals of baseball history at any level. In fact, the game that saw Saugus vault to the American championship game was the kind of game that would probably typify a 2003 Boston Red Sox game-seven World Series contest — it’s up to you decide who would be on the losing end, though. What a roller-coaster road it was for the 11- and 12-year-olds from Saugus, a town of 25,000 north of Boston heretofore known primarily for the Hillside Steak House and the Golden Banana nightclub along mall-lined Route 1. Seemingly scoring at will in the first three innings, the Bay Staters scored two in the first, two in the second, and six in the third to take a 10-2 lead, and though the offense was silenced for the next three innings, Saugus still took a 10-4 advantage into the final inning, the sixth. Then, unbelievably, the Richmond team began to come back, and with two men (boys) out and trailing by four, the Texans collected three singles, a walk, and an error — mind you, all with two outs, shades of October ’86 — to tie the game. As the inning unfolded, 12-year-old Richmondians with tears in their eyes could be seen with hands clasped in prayer in the dugout, looking to the heavens for a miracle. And ultimately it came, at least temporarily: Saugus found itself three runs down heading into the bottom of the seventh after giving up three more runs in the top of the next inning. Richmond had scored nine runs in the course of two innings, and now it was the Saugites who were in the dugout, with tears streaming down their faces in quiet desperation. Did they believe in miracles? You betcha, but it still didn’t look good for the boys in red. But the Richmond pitcher, Cody Robinson, was obviously overthrowing in anticipation of his team’s advancing to the title game, and ended up walking three of the first four Saugus batters in the bottom of the inning. After a pitching change, Dario Pizzano singled home one run to make it 13-11, but Joseph Kasbuski, who earlier had ripped a three-run home run, popped to second with the bases still loaded. At that point, Richmond manager Jim Michalek, who was miked for ESPN’s TV coverage, instructed his catcher, Marcus Martinez, to set up far outside the strike zone, and told pitcher Randall Grichuk to intentionally throw wide to Saugus’s Matt Muldoon. Apparently Michalek believed that walking in the twelfth run was not as bad as letting Muldoon beat him, and he was confident that Robinson could dispose of the on-deck batter, shortstop Dave Ferreira, to slam the door. But in spite of Martinez setting up a full nine inches wide of the plate, both of Grichuk’s first two pitches curved inward and caught the outside part of the plate for called strikes. With the count 0-2 and two outs, it seemed like the end was near for Saugus, but Grichuk again got greedy and threw it on the outside corner, and this time Muldoon reached out and punched a single to right, scoring the twelfth run. When the right fielder’s throw to home sailed high over Martinez’s head, the tying run scored. As Al Michaels would say, "Un-be-liev-able." But it wasn’t quite over. Ferreira then grounded a dribbler down the third-base line, and believing it was going to roll foul, stood in the batter’s box for a full second before hustling for first. By the time Grichuk got to the ball and whipped it to first, Ferreira had reached the bag (I think) and Dario Pizzano had snuck home for the winning run to lift Saugus to the heart-stopping 14-13 triumph. I don’t know about you, but in most of the Little League games I've seen on the local sandlots kids struggle to make contact with the ball, fielders hope against hope that the ball won’t be hit to them, and the rightfielder picks his nose along with dandelions in the outfield. The level of play in this year’s tournament has been incredible, and Saugus’s pitching and defensive prowess — before Thursday’s struggles in both areas — were thus far the story of the tournament. I mean, our softball team can barely turn a double play, and here are 12-year-olds converting double plays like Nomah to Millah in Updike’s lyric little bandbox. Yet it had to be emotionally draining and exhausting for both teams on Thursday, as the winners had to survive an eight-run lead, blew that eight-run lead, surrendered four runs with two outs in the final inning when victory was all but clinched, fell behind by three runs, and rallied for four runs against all odds with just three outs remaining in their season. And then there are the Texans. Ouch. Why wouldn’t there be tears all around? However this implausible story turns out for the Saugus Little Leaguers over the weekend in their US and (possibly) International championship games, they can take great pride in their efforts to get to the finals — hell, to get to Williamsport at all, since most of the other teams like Texas and Florida get to play ball year-round — and to bring excitement to a region looking for some heroes on a nightly basis. So, what will a $200 lunch get you? Well, in the case of the middle event of WEEI’s Jimmy Fund Radiothon, it’ll give you quite a bit, and your faithful correspondent was pleased to take part in Friday’s noontime event. The three-tiered event held at Fenway Park, which included a "Breakfast with the Owners" of the four major Boston-based pro teams, "Lunch with the Boys" — which in this case implied some Red Sox players — and "Cocktails with the Legends," a pre-game party that reportedly would allow guests to hobnob with some of Boston’s sports icons, benefited the Jimmy Fund, which is the fundraising arm of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston. Upon entrance to the event, attendees immediately saw banks of telethon volunteers taking calls for pledges for the event, which by mid afternoon had raised nearly $300,000 for the fight against cancer in children. Even the hated George Steinbrenner, through a call-in to WEEI-AM’s "Dale & Neumy Show," pledged a whopping $10,000 to the cause on behalf of the pinstripers in memory of late Sox broadcaster Ken Coleman, who passed away Thursday. There was a certain sad irony in the timing of Coleman’s passing, by the way, as he had always been at the forefront of any fundraising efforts involving the Jimmy Fund, and would have been a central character at this event had he not succumbed to bacterial meningitis on the day before the Radiothon. Anyway, those who shelled out the two bills immediately got a tour of the old ball yard. Sure, you could get the same guided tour for five bucks on most weekdays, but on a glorious sunny afternoon on a day just made for baseball, it still was nice to be able to walk on the warning track surrounding the field, visit the newly constructed Monster Seats above the 37-foot left-field wall, and cool off in the .406 Club, the 14-year-old luxury seating area that sits high above the field behind home plate. A couple of pieces of tour-provided trivia: • There is reportedly a 50-year waiting list to become one of the scoreboard operators who reside inside the left-field wall and control the manual scoreboard. The same pair of guys has done it for every home game except one over the past 13 years. (The only game they missed was when one of them got married, and had his scoreboard partner as his best man.) They don’t dare take another game off, since they reportedly feel nervous about losing their jobs to the number-one guy on the waiting list. • The only cup holders to be found in the Fenway Park infield and grandstand seats are for the front-row seats which ring the infield. Owner John Henry’s box seat, located next to the home dugout, has a locked-up TV monitor which allows him to watch NESN’s coverage of the contest from his seat. • Seats in the .406 Club — renamed a year ago in honor of Ted Williams from its previous moniker, the 600 club (named for the 606 theater-style seats inside) — must be purchased in blocks of four for a three-year commitment. At $36,000 a year for the four seats, you get free popcorn for each game and two parking passes, all the while promising to meet a reasonably strict dress code (collared shirts and pants, and the only hat one can wear is a Sox cap). After the tour was completed, attendees were treated to, well, lunch. For that price, maybe you’d expect steak and lobster, but this was a fundraiser for charity, so no one was surprised to see the choices limited to baked chicken, hot dogs, hamburgers, sausages, and salads. One of the highlights of the meal, though, was the opportunity to run into various baseball personalities roaming around, including Sox GM Theo Epstein, the Sox radio team, Joe Castiglione and Jerry Trupiano, former Sox player Mike Andrews, baseball writers Sean McAdam and Dan Shaughnessy, and later, radio guys Bob Neumeier, Dale Arnold, and Glenn Ordway, who were broadcasting from a studio adjacent to the dining area. After lunch, Sox players Tim Wakefield, Scott Sauerbeck, and Johnny Damon took part in a freewheeling panel discussion with the assembled audience. All the players were full of jocularity and good humor, and they provided a lot of interesting and candid answers to audience members’ questions. Given the recent contretemps regarding the Red Sox players’ feelings of negativity from the fans and media lately, it was refreshing to see the trio so relaxed and willing to interact meaningfully with fans and the media. As one man said on his way out, "The best thing was that [the players] could joke with you and act like human beings." On Monday: highlights from the cocktail party with the legends, and the weekend series with Seattle. Sporting Eye runs Mondays and Fridays at BostonPhoenix.com, and Christopher Young can be reached at cyoung[a]phx.com
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