The Herts Cubs took a major step towards the 2008 Herts Little League Baseball title in week 5. They overcame the Blue Jays and Yankees convincingly and also took care of the Herts Red Sox in a nail-biting 11-10 win. The Yankees and Red Sox are keeping the pressure on the Cubs standing 2 and 4 games back. The Blue Jays find themselves in trouble 6 games back and in a 3 game losing streak.
The fans at Grovehill Ballpark had the opportunity to see another triple play (fielding team getting three outs to end the inning in the same play). Last week it was Zachary Longboy for the Blue Jays. This week, with runners on first and second base, shortstop, Mikito Ariga, snagged a line drive, which took the runners by surprise as they were expecting the hard hit ball to fly past Mikito for a base hit. That was the first out. Mikito made the rest look easy, stepping on second base for the second out and then swiftly tagging the helpless runner from first to complete an unassisted triple play.
Week-after-week the Herts Little Leaguers are getting better and better and as the Great Britain National Team Manager, Stephan Rapaglia, told the players last week “the better you are, the more you will enjoy baseball”.
Coach Lee Manning has taken the initiative over the next few weeks to hold extra midweek sessions focusing on positional play for those who want to specialize in specific positions. More details will be sent out to players in due course.
Note: Last week’s player of the week is Lewis Paterson after hitting the first ever Herts Baseball Little League home run. It was a two-run homer over left field and apparently Lewis said that one of the GB coaches had given him some advice which he followed – swing through from the hips more – which must have given him more power.
This week’s player of the week is Ozan Martin who has shown tremendous improvement and dedication not only this week but from day one of the league season.