Davie boy part of a third World Cup title with USA Baseball
Davie’s Spencer Garrett Butt had never gone out of the country — until a recent trip to Chinese Taipei put him at the center of his baseball universe.
The trip was memorable for so many reasons, but most importantly he and his teammates took their field of dreams and propelled the USA Baseball 12-Under National Team to the title in the 2017 World Baseball Softball Confederation (WBSC) World Cup play at that age level.
Butt, 12, was one of just two Floridians — the other being Hialeah’s Brandon Olivera — on the squad that won a third straight world championship with a 7-2 victory over host Chinese Taipei in front of a sellout crowd at the 11,000-seat Tainan Stadium.
In fact, USA Baseball team members have secured gold medals all three times they have participated in the Cup competition. The other two years they won were in 2013 and 2015. The event is held every two years, and the games are streamed live on YouTube.
Butt, who has been involved in diamond doings since age 7, played a key role in the title encounter as he went 2 for 2 with a walk and a run. He finished the tournament batting .600 with nine hits in 15 at-bats. His plate effort included a home run, two doubles, three RBI, five walks and six stolen bases.
“It was the best few days of my life,” said Butt, a seventh-grader at Imagine Charter School in Weston. “It was the biggest game I had played in my whole life. Hearing the national anthem — Spencer Garrett Butt, Imagine Charter
on foreign soil was just the best part of the whole trip.”
Experiencing a different culture and environment was something very special for a young ballplayer.
“When we got to Chinese Taipei, it was unreal,” Butt said. “It was kind of like a dream, and after those last few days it really kicked in School seventh-grader
how much this means and how good you did to get there. The experience was so surreal…it was like a culture shock really.”
Butt and Olivera, who knew each other through playing travel baseball in South Florida, each made it through local and national tryouts to earn a spot on the
U.S. team. Butt said his gold medal hangs in his room and he looks at it every day when he wakes up. Olivera, who plays for the South Florida Gamblers (Palm Beach Gardens) was the winning pitcher in the championship game.
The first tryout was at Westminster Academy, where 50 local players attempted to make the initial cut which would earn them a trip to California for a threeday national open event where the roster was further reduced. A total of more than 100 players from around the country were then paired down to the final roster of 18.
Butt, a member of the Plantation Stars Prime 13-Under team, pitched and played second base for the United States team. He said he is going to put his USA uniform in a shadow box to preserve it. He plans on trying out again in two years for the 15-under age group team.
The whole experience has been a game-changer for him.
“Baseball has been my passion since I was little,” Butt said. “I want to go to the major leagues and I have had that dream my whole life.”
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