They’ve got the best feeling
Four-time defending champion Galway Hitmen relish the opportunity to play for another title at home
Say one thing for the players on the Galway Hitmen senior men’s softball squad, they’re not merely happy just being here, in this case at home for the 2016 nationals opening today at the Caribou Memorial Complex in St. John’s.
“This is probably the best club team in the world right now,” says coach Mark Dwyer. “That isn’t boasting or grandstanding. That’s how talented this team is.
“You will never, ever see one of these players mention the word losing,” Dwyer continued. “And we make no apologies for that. We go to the ball park every day with the mindset that we’re going to win.”
The Hitmen enter the tournament as the four-time defending Canadian champions — three times under the 3Cheers-Bud Light banner, and last year with their current sponsor and nickname.
That’s a first for Newfoundland sports on the national stage, and there could be a variety of reasons for that, not the least of which is the calibre of play at the senior men’s level these days, and the number of elite-level players in senior men’s across the country.
But there is also no denying that the crop of Newfoundland softballers playing at that elite level is the best this province has ever seen.
Five starters on the Hitmen — pitcher Sean Cleary, Ryan Boland, Jason Hill, Brad Ezekiel and Stephen Mullaley — were members of the national senior men’s team that won gold medals at the world championship and Pan American Games last summer.
Earlier this month, Cleary and Ryan Boland helped the Toronto Gators win the International Softball Congress world title in Moline, Illinois. Shane Boland, Craig Edmunds and Jeremy O’Reilly, who will also suit up for the Hitmen, were also on the Gators’ roster.
“This is probably the best club team in the world right now. That isn’t boasting or grandstanding. That’s how talented this team is.”
Galway Hitmen coach Mark Dwyer
The Gators beat three-time defending ISC champion Hill United Chiefs in the final. The Chiefs featured Hill, Brad Ezekiel and Mullaley.
“The hardest part of my job,” laughed Dwyer, “is figuring out who’s starting and who isn’t.”
Mention fastpitch softball and the conversation usually begins and ends with pitching, and on that note, the Hitmen can trot out the game’s best in Cleary, a Harbour Main native.
At the ISC tournament, Cleary was a perfect 5-0 with a 0.97 ERA and 71 strikeouts in 36 innings of work. He started and won the gold-medal game at the Pan Am Games in Toronto.
Cleary anchors a staff that also includes veteran Robbie Greene, Hill and Blair Ezekiel.
“And remember,” said Dwyer, alluding to the 2015 senior men’s nationals in Ste-Claire, Que., “we didn’t have Cleary or Greene early on in the tournament last year because of work and family commitments.
“Our pitching is very, very solid.”
It’s not the first time Newfoundland has played host to the senior men’s nationals — St. John’s was the site of the 2007, 1995, 1989 and 1979 events — but it’s the first time this province stages the event as home of the defending champions.
Dwyer admits there is expectation that comes with the distinction.
“Especially given the fact we want to do something special, and we want to do it in front of the home fans,” he said.
“But to be truthful, while there is a certain amount of pressure, it’s nothing compared to the pressure these guys put on themselves to perform every night.
“They want to be the best, and they’ve been proving that the past number of years.”
In a bit of a bizarre twist, Softball Canada touts this tournament as the Canadian senior men’s championship, and while there are 10 entries, only four provinces are represented. Four of the 10 teams are from Saskatchewan, three are from Newfoundland — the Kelly’s Pub Molson Bulldogs and WMC/The Bigs Bombers join the Hitmen — and two clubs are from Ontario. There’s a single team representing Nova Scotia.
All games will be played at the Caribou Complex in the Pleasantville section of St. John’s, a facility which houses two diamonds. In conjunction with the senior men’s, a four-team masters tournament will be played mostly at Lions Park. That event features two teams from Newfoundland, an Ontario club and a squad from Nova Scotia.
Ten games in the senior men’s are scheduled for today, with play beginning at 9:30 a.m., weather permitting. The opener features the Bulldogs taking on the Bulyea Rustlers of Saskatchewan.
Playoffs get under way Saturday, with the senior men’s bronze-medal game slated for 1:30 p.m. Sunday. The final goes at 4 p.m.