Some thoughts from the Legion state tourney

Some thoughts on the state Legion baseball tournament currently underway at Palmer Field.

The baseball on Saturday was very good. Stamford’s 5-2 win over Greenwich and Cheshire’s 1-0 win over Trumbull were both well-played, exciting games. Although this is written before Sunday’s games and things may have changed, Cheshire’s pitching is impressive. In three tourney games, two with Meriden and the game with Trumbull, Cheshire’s pitchers threw three shutouts.

Mike Hickey was terrific Saturday, firing a two-hitter, striking out four and walking two in a command performance. There is a game scheduled for tonight at 6:30 at Palmer, but the weather might have something to do with that.

In Bristol, West Hartford continued its roll beating Avon 7-2, and South Windsor upset Water-

ford 4-0.

The winners in Bristol and Middletown come to Palmer Field Friday to open the best-of-three championship series at 6:30 p.m. The title will be decided Saturday with a game at 1 p.m. and, if needed, a second immediately following.

Both teams will advance to the Northeast Regional at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Mass.

The 17 and under title game will be Sunday at Palmer at 1 p.m. and the 15 and under championship game will be at 4 p.m.

However

The paid attendance for Saturday was 232. That’s not very good. In Bristol — with area teams — it was worse at 212. I get that in Middletown there was no team of local interest, but I also believe that the long, drawn-out state playoffs are hurting interest rather than enhancing it.

That eight teams could put only 444 fans in the two parks should be a wake-up call for the Legion. A shorter tournament with teams at one site makes so much more sense.

Yet the Legion seems oblivious. Hold it at one site, with dates certain, with all teams in action, and interest will increase. As it is, most media ignore the tournament until the final days. And know what? No one should be surprised.

Also, the pitch-count rules have to be revisited. Connecticut’s rules are more stringent than national rules for reasons that escape me. All during Saturday’s games, Legion officials were yelling from the field to the press box that pitcher X had 22 pitches left, then 15 .... Just silly.

But there’s more

The state tournament is supposed to be part of the national tournament played by national rules. Besides less stringent pitching rules, national requires nine inning games. You remember that quaint notion? Called real baseball?

So Connecticut and nationals came up with this truly zany solution: Let’s not call all the games prior to the best-of-three championship series a state tournament. That’s why you see these terms like Regional and Super Regional, whatever those terms mean. Go to the national Legion Baseball website. The Connecticut State tourney is listed for only July 28-30.

I figure a rose is still a rose, but not in Legion circles. By not calling all the postseason games prior to July 28 state tournament games — which anyone knows is exactly what they are — Connecticut gets away with seven-inning games and a maximum pitching limit of 105 pitches when the national rules allow 120.

Here’s the hilarious kicker. Come Friday, because that’s the “official” state tournament, national rules kick in and the games will be nine innings and the national pitching rule will prevail.

Oh, and this is brought to you by a national Legion organization that says — in a flat-out lie — that the World Series in Shelby, N.C., draws over 100,000 people. Can’t make it up, folks. Paul LaFleur from Bristol, a member of the state committee, has long advocated doing away with Connecticut rules and playing by national rules. I mean, it is a national program.

His entreaties fall on deaf ears.

Middletown thoughts

I wasn’t surprised that Middletown didn’t get past Greenwich. The deck is stacked in favor of zone champions and it should be.

The umpiring controversy involving Middletown is disturbing. I wasn’t there; I don’t know what happened. We all know Middletown coach Tim D’Aquila was ejected for the first time in his coaching career in Middletown’s 8-1 loss on Tuesday.

But after that, who knows? There is D’Aquila’s version and there are the umpires’ versions. The umps’ versions are, if true, damning. My guess is the truth is somewhere between the two versions. I will say this: an umpire should do everything he can not to eject a coach in a playoff game.

I am further disturbed, however, by allegations that an umpire on Wednesday used unacceptable language towards Middletown players at the end of the game. I have three players who have confirmed to me in separate conversations that such a thing did happen.

I have no reason to disbelieve the kids who are 16, 17 and 18 years old. But I wasn’t there. I do know the state Legion is investigating.

There is no excuse for an authority figure — none — for using profane/obscene language towards kids. Let’s hope that somehow it didn’t happen.

RCP thoughts

The team just couldn’t score. I thought RCP was one of the better teams I saw, but against West Hartford it was helpless on offense. My goodness, in three games it left 28 runners on base and in nine bases-loaded situations RCP scored two runs.

The pitching was fine and the defense was OK — not great, but OK. But at the end of the day, a team has to have more of what than the other guys? Oh yeah, runs.

Coaching thoughts

It is my experience that the bigger the game, the more coaches in almost every sport tend to become Republicans: conservative, conservative, conservative.

So they play little ball which means they bunt. Bunt a lot. Every study shows it doesn’t work, but they do it.

Time after time the bunt fails. Ask RCP and West Hartford. Both bunted like it was the only thing to do. It failed time after time. Every study shows that runners from first with no outs score more often than runners from second with one out. Makes no difference.

And the situations where teams bunt sometimes are inexplicable. Saturday, trailing 1-0, Trumbull — the visiting team, mind you — had its No. 8 hitter bunt into the No, 9 guy in the fifth inning. I mean, he’s hitting ninth for a reason, right?

The hitter popped up and the No. 1 hitter flied out. Bunt failed.

In one of the RCP vs. West Hartford games, RCP did a sacrifice with one out, Lord have mercy. The next hitter popped to second. Bunt failed.

Also in that series, West Hartford tried a suicide squeeze bunt, the batter popped it foul, but the runner charging down from third ran into the third baseman who was going after the popup. Interference. Runner was out. Bunt failed.

In the first game of the series, RCP had a kid bunt with two strikes. He fouled it off. Strike three. Bunt failed. Undaunted, in the next inning RCP bunted the No. 7 hitter so Nos. 8 and 9 could hit (!). Nobody scored. Bunt failed.

Twice in games I saw a pitcher walk the first two batters. On the next pitch, instead of giving the pitcher a chance to walk the ballpark, the hitter was ordered to bunt. I guess the coach thought it was a good idea to give the struggling pitcher an out. All gifts gratefully accepted.

This stuff happens all the time.

One coach said to me, “Hey, it’s wood bats, gotta manufacture runs.” Really? How about swinging the bats? Last time I checked, that’s a pretty good way to manufacture runs.

I also think coaches create a mindset among their kids that we can’t score unless we bunt. Evidence shows that to be wrong. Hey, sometimes it’s easy to bunt against bad teams in regular season games, but in big games against good teams, different story.

There are a lot of coaches who bunt a lot and who have reputations for being avid believers in the bunt. They win a lot of regular season games. Don’t win many big games, though. Just don’t.

Hey, in the Major Leagues, the master of little ball was Gene Mauch. He won a lot of games. Never won a title. Not one.

I hate the bunt, but the love affair with it that many coaches have will continue. Rarely is that love affair consummated.

The tip of the iceberg

Sue Bird, the former U Conn mega-star, announced she is gay. Stephanie Dolson, former U Conn star, announced she is gay. Former U Conn star Diana Taurasi married her girlfriend.

Kansas State sophomore linebacker Scott Franz, who started all 13 games last year, announced he is gay and said he never felt “so loved and accepted” as he has been by his teammates.

University of Arizona freshman football player My-King Johnson announced he is gay. Former NFL player Ryan O’Callaghan announced he is gay. Chip Sarafin, Arizona State football player who graduated in 2014 was openly gay.

Ladies and gentlemen, these out gay athletes are only the tip of the iceberg. At your high school — see Mercy’s prom date controversy last spring — at your college, in your family and among your friends, whether you know it or not, there are LGBT folks.

I have an acquaintance who has over 1,000 Facebook friends. He knows of no one who is gay — except, well, one obvious exception — among the 1,000 friends. He is deluding himself and he needs to pay attention.

There was a line used years ago that if all the LGBT people were to suddenly turn purple — now that’s a fabulous gay color! — the rest of the world would be stunned. It amazes me there are still people who would be stunned.

I mean, open your eyes.

The folly of year-round sports

High school baseball coaches — I have copies of emails — pressure their kids not only to play fall baseball for a specific school-centered team, but also summer baseball for their chosen teams so that in their 20-game high school season they will be, uhhh, better.

That’s crazy stuff. And just a thought, maybe if kids weren’t forced to play year-round baseball there would be fewer arm injuries. I know this year-round nonsense happens in every other sport. Spring football — which is nuts — summer basketball, off-season soccer, volleyball, swimming and on and on.

What happened to letting kids be kids? What happened to letting a kid baseball player, if he wanted to play Legion ball, of letting him do that? I know that in one case this summer, the kids spurned the high school coach and played Legion baseball. Not only was their decision sensible, they benefited from a vastly superior experience.

In the email I have, an area high school coach “strongly encourages” his kids to play for his own specially selected fall team. To a kid, “strongly encourages” is an order. Disgraceful. Adults should stop trafficking in high school kids. Let the kid do what he wants. The best athletes are not kids who specialize in one sport, but are kids who play a variety of sports. And one more thing. If the kid wants to go to the beach in the summer, let her go.

Let kids be kids, damnit, and stop worrying about your greater glory as a coach. Because at the end of the day, that’s precisely what this is.

Here and there

I remember Santo Fragilio, the city’s musical genius who passed away at age 92 last week ... I marched in his MHS band at football games, played in concerts, marched in parades for Santo ... I played the clarinet, albeit not very well ... but it was fun ... Santo Fragilio was a good man who lived a wonderful life bringing so much joy to so many ... may he rest in peace.

Masahiro Tanaka, had he been good, would have the Yankees in first place ... but he’s been hideous and if you want to find one guy who is responsible for the Yankees not being in first, it’s Tanaka ... Aaron Judge remains unbelievable, by the way ... but honestly? ... the Yankees are not very good ... mediocre at best ... they’re lucky the Red Sox aren’t much better.

Middletown Post 75 stayed at a hotel in Greenwich last Tuesday night rather than driving back and forth on I-95 ... smart move.

WCNX radio is scheduled to broadcast 15 high school football games this fall .... its opener is Norwich Free Academy at Xavier on Sept. 8 ... the week afterwards, it will carry Middletown High’s home opener with Bristol Eastern ... the Internet station run by Judy and John Clark will carry Xavier (four games), Middletown (five games), Cromwell/Portland (one game) and South Windsor (five games).

Wesleyan will play nine games this season — four at home — for the first time since forever ... the NESCAC had long stuck with eight games until this year, finally relenting from pressure from the ADs.

Legion rules say that once playoff competition begins, a player must devote himself solely to Legion baseball, a perfectly reasonable requirement ... apparently that didn’t mean anything to a kid pitcher from Avon and another from West Hartford ... both pitched in showcases which is expressly forbidden ... it cost Avon a forfeit as they played the kid ... West Hartford had the good sense not to play their kid ... both were suspended for the rest of the year ... uhhh, where were the parents?

Oh, I forgot ... the world is all about me.

Jim Bransfield Monday Musings