12B THE PALM BEACH POST • SUNDAY, AUGUST 24, 2003 LITTLE LEAGUE WORLD SERIES Coach: ‘I don’t know how to get him out’ > GEORGE from 1B Travis who showed the way by poking an immediate hole in the starting pitcher for Saugus. A few minutes later he was loping home on a hit by DeJesus, turning the scoreboard on early for East Boynton, just as he ignites the lineup every night. “I went out to talk to my pitcher on one of Travis’ at-bats,” said Saugus manager Rob Rochinski, “And I looked at my pitcher and I looked at my catcher and said, ‘I don’t know how to get him out.’ ” Saugus never did. In the two games East Boynton split with the New England champions at Williamsport, Travis went 6for-6 with two home runs and three RBI. Overall, he’s hitting .667 at the World Series. And all he wants now is a shot at Japan. While Emerson, Saturday night’s winning pitcher, loves to watch cartoons, Travis is locked in on ESPN SportsCenter. He’s done enough homework to know that just three of the last 10 World Series titles have gone to an American team. And sufficiently stoked to cherish the first crack at Japan ace Yuutaro Tanaka tonight. “I just want to play Japan, ” said Travis, who has pitched and caught at Williamsport in addition to playing his usual second base. “They’ve always been a good team. I think it will be fun to play them.” And a kick for us to watch this crackerjack of a Palm Beach County product do his thing again for Brent Musberger and his ABC prime time audience. This may be Devon’s debut on national television and his first starting role before an announced crowd of 36,500, but it doesn’t take much of an imagination to see that it won’t be his last. “If you throw a football to Devon, he’s like Jerry Rice,” said East Boynton manager Kenny Emerson, understandably smitten. “If you put skates on him, he’s like Wayne Gretzky. He’s just one of those special kids, but boy, can he hit a baseball.” It’s not just the camera that loves him. The word is that some major-league scouts already are commenting on Travis’ soft hands in the field. Of course, of course, it’s time to stop making such a monster out of one middle schooler. Broad is well ahead of his baseball class, too, and East Boynton’s batters generally pound quality pitching as a whole, as Saturday night’s 10-hit total against Saugus clearly states. There’s just something about Travis, though, that tells East Boynton’s opponents with one first-inning swing, that they had best consider ducking. “That kid might go places, yeah, “ said Rochinski, the Saugus manag- World championship game ‘If you throw a football to Devon, he’s like Jerry Rice. If you put skates on him, he’s like Wayne Gretzky. He’s just one of those special kids.’ KENNY EMERSON East Boynton manager PATHS TO GLORY: Devon Travis hit one of East Boynton Beach’s four home runs in Saturday’s victory over Saugus, Mass. ALLEN EYESTONE Staff Photographer er. Round and round the bases and all the way home, that’s the usual pattern. It’s the victory parade Devon Travis has been leading for weeks of tournament play. One more night of it and he’ll direct East Boynton to the first World Series title for a Florida team after seven runner-up finishes. “It feels great to be the best team out of I don’t know how many in the U.S.,” Travis said. “It feels good to be No. 1.” Get used to it, kid. You’re as golden as the moment, an ESPN highlight and a cartoon all in one. A [email protected] In control East Boynton Beach (21-2) vs. Japan (17-0) The Japanese have blasted their way to the championship game, going 5-0 and outscoring their opponents 49-8. Japan has been the best hitting team in the tournament, batting .364 with 14 home runs. . . . Five starters are hitting better than .357, led by first baseman Shigeki Umeda, who is batting .615 with a team-leading four home runs. . . . Starting pitcher Yuutaro “Tank” Tanaka is 1-0 with a 0.75 ERA in eight innings. He has a fastball around 70 mph and a good curve. He also is one of the team’s best hitters with a .562 average, two home runs and a team-leading 11 RBI. Tanaka hit a mammoth home run in the international championship game that almost carried to the top of the first hill at Lamade Stadium. Probable starting lineups East Boynton No. Name Pos. __________________________ 2 Devon Travis C .667, 2 HR, 9 runs, 3 RBI __________________________ 14 Jordan Irene SS .333, 1 HR, 4 runs, 4 RBI __________________________ 15 Michael Broad P 2-0, 0.00 ERA, 11 IP, 19 K .267, 3 HR, 5 runs, 4 RBI __________________________ 22 Richie DeJesus 3B .600, 2 HR, 4 runs, 8 RBI __________________________ 5 R.J. Neal RF .385, 1 HR, 3 runs, 3 RBI __________________________ 16 Cody Emerson 1B .077, 1 run __________________________ 13 Benny Townend CF .182, double, 2 runs, 2 RBI __________________________ 7 Matt Overton LF .091, 1 run __________________________ 1 Ricky Sabatino 2B 0-for-3, 2 runs __________________________ Japan No. Name Pos. __________________________ 14 Hokuto Nakahara RF .375, double, 7 runs __________________________ 16 Takeru Ohmae 2B .333, 2 doubles, 5 runs __________________________ 24 Yuutaro Tanaka P 1-0, 0.75 ERA, 8 IP, 12 K .562, 2 HR, 8 runs, 11 RBI __________________________ 21 Shigeki Umeda 1B .615, 4 HR, 7 runs, 8 RBI __________________________ 9 Jun Onozawa C .357, 2 doubles, 5 runs, 0 RBI __________________________ 20 Hirofumi Yamazaki 3B .357, 2 HR, 5 runs, 8 RBI __________________________ 18 Ippei Endoh CF .200, HR, 2 runs, 2 RBI __________________________ 19 Toshiki Maebashi LF .125, HR __________________________ 8 Kazumasa Sakamoto SS .182, double, 4 runs __________________________ Road to the championship East Boynton Beach’s summer-long odyssey began June 15, when coaches selected an all-star squad from six league teams. More than two months later, it concludes with tonight’s Little League World Series championship game against Japan. ALLEN EYESTONE/Staff Photographer SOUTH WILLIAMSPORT, Pa. — Cody Emerson struck out nine, walked two and allowed four hits in a complete-game victory, his second of the World Series. Emerson had similar success – eight strikeouts and two walks – in his first start, a 7-2 victory against Tallmadge, Ohio. District 7 tournament June 28-July 7: East Boynton goes 4-0 in pool play, then beats rival West Boynton 1-0 and 8-0 in the best-of-three championship series. Section 2 tournament Four homers, Emerson’s pitching pace Boynton > EAST BOYNTON from 1B you see them hit in practice and you know they can,” manager Kenny Emerson said. “They are well-versed, well-trained. Tony (Travis) and Joe (Irene) do a lot of great and long hitting practice. “They’re coached what to do. Sometimes they don’t do it. Sometimes they do. Tonight they had the eye.” Travis and third baseman Richie DeJesus led the way for East Boynton, each going 3-for-3 with a home run. DeJesus had four RBI. DeJesus carried the team early, knocking in the first three runs as East Boynton raced to a 5-1 lead after three innings. “I hit the ball good,” DeJesus said in his usual short sound-bite, “because (the pitches) were right down the middle.” Starting pitcher Cody Emerson overcame some early trouble to do what he has since tournament play began in late June: win. Emerson, who hasn’t lost, pitched a four-hitter, giving up one earned run and striking out nine. “He’s sneakier than he looks, with the hat on crooked,” Saugus manager SHANNON O’BRIEN/Staff Photographer Gail and Ed Mullen, parents of East Boynton’s Patrick Mullen, cheer their team to victory in the U.S. championship game. Rob Rochenski said. “He just looks like just a regular 12-year-old kid, but he’s a pretty good pitcher.” After East Boynton took the lead in the first inning on DeJesus’ tworun single, Saugus cut the lead in half in the third inning But East Boynton put the game almost out of reach with three runs in the bottom half of the inning. Travis led off with a single. With one out, Michael Broad walked and stole sec- ond. But Travis was picked off third base on a controversial call, which seemed to ignite East Boynton. DeJesus singled in Broad, and R.J. Neal followed with a two-run home run to center field to make it 5-1. Travis added a two-run homer in the fourth, and Broad and DeJesus went back-to-back in the fifth to put the East Boynton fans in full party mode — and the team in its fantasy game. “I thought it was just a dream to get here, but it’s an even bigger dream to be the No. 1 team in the whole U.S.,” Neal said. Now Broad, who has given up four hits and no earned runs in his two wins at the World Series, will try to make East Boynton the first Florida team to win the Little League World Series championship. “It feels incredible because there are like thousands of Little League teams in the U.S. and to be the best one is incredible,” Broad said. “I just can’t wait to see when I go up there and I see a Japanese kid I’m pitching against. I’m going to start cracking up because it will be so unbelievable. This is all pretty unbelievable.” A [email protected] July 18-20: East Boynton defeats Port Salerno 8-0 and Palm Beach East 13-0 to win its third sectional title in a row. State tournament July 25-31: East Boynton suffers its first defeat, a 5-2 extra-inning decision against North Naples, but bounces back to win the next three games. In the title game, East Boynton wins a rematch with North Naples 9-1 to become Palm Beach County’s second state champion. (Delray National won in 1993.) Southeast Regional Aug. 2-9: East Boynton wins all three games in pool play, then beats North Carolina 5-0 in the semifinals. In the championship game, Michael Broad pitches a no-hitter and hits a grand slam to highlight a 4-0 victory against Georgia, making East Boynton the first South Florida team to qualify for the Little League World Series. Little League World Series Aug. 15-24: East Boynton beats Richland, Wash. 8-1 and Tallmadge, Ohio 7-2 to qualify for the U.S. semifinals. After a 4-3 loss to Saugus, Mass., to conclude pool play, East Boynton defeats Chandler, Ariz. 4-1, then wins a rematch against Saugus 9-2 to capture the U.S. championship.
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