Root for the Home Team

By Robby Wellington – Staff Writer

I have never rooted for the American teams in the Little League World Series. Ever. You see, I grew up playing Bronco baseball, the unheralded yet vastly superior brother of Little League. In Bronco ball, 11 and 12-year-olds are actually allowed to lead off and steal bases, there are dropped third strikes, and every single popup doesn’t go for a homerun (a problem which the LLWS mercilessly fixed this year).

In 1993, the Bronco World Series moved to Monterey, California, only a few miles from my home. All the usual ingredients were there, a 6’6 manchild from San Diego, some kid from Illinois blowing in the low 70s, Chinese Taipei and Puerto Rico teams with more mustaches than a bad porn flick and overzealous coaches and parents, one of whom repeatedly kept yelling perhaps the greatest heckle of all-time: “You’re taking away these kids’ DREAMS ump! Taking away their DREAMS!” The event was entirely engrossing to an 11-year-old boy and certainly seemed to match the Little League World Series in everything. Everything but exposure that is. Aside from the occasional local news team, there were no television cameras and crowds that appeared to hover in the mid-hundreds.

I tried to do a bit of Internet research and found nothing but this amateurish site; you know you’re in trouble when Wikipedia doesn’t even have an entry. And it’s not as if the Bronco World Series is new, it has been around since 1961, boasting winners from nine different states (primarily California and Florida) and six different countries. There was a perfect game thrown by some kid from the Philippines in the Championship Game in 1990, a 3-home run game by a Puerto Rican in 2000, a 1-0 game that lasted 19 innings and 18 stolen bases by a Korean team in 1996. Growing up watching these teams compete, I was always frustrated and irritated to watch the extensive coverage of the Little League World Series on ESPN; jealous of all the attention the kids were receiving, most notably the American kids, with whom I naturally identified more easily. So all these years, I have carried this grudge against the Little League World Series, and the American teams in particular, rarely watching the games and making snide comments about the quality of play when I did.

This year, however, I have finally found an American team I can embrace, a team I will be pulling for all the way through the final game. There is something about the boys from Beaverton, Oregon that gets me fired up. Maybe it’s the fact that they don’t all cry when they lose, like every other team, or the fact that they are primarily long-haired hippies from the West Coast, or the fact that they actually run the bases aggressively, taking advantage of throwing errors so common in Little League. Or maybe it’s just the fact that young stud Sam Albert absolutely dominated the basepaths last night and had a sixth inning webgem that caused Illinois’ pouting pitcher to instantaneously throw a temper tantrum right at first base. Albert is officially my favorite little leaguer shorter than 6’8. Anyway, Beaverton, I hope you guys make the finals, as America will have my much-needed support for the first time in 14 years.

Addendum:
I know that the fantasy baseball coverage on this site has been a bit weak over the past couple of weeks and I apologize. I originally planned to write a fantasy baseball article but, to be honest, I have already locked up a first round bye in my baseball league, and plan on coasting these next two weeks. But once playoff time comes around (September 11th), I’ll be the world’s most vigilant fantasy baseball player and plan on sharing whatever insights I may have from then on out.


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3 responses to “Root for the Home Team”

  1. John Avatar
    John

    Go Beaverton!

  2. Walt Avatar
    Walt

    ya how crazy is that 6 foot 8 kid?! He looks like a beast next to the guys standing on first base.

  3. Alena Avatar

    Hello allI will continue to visit enjoyed the reading thanks

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