Calling Little League's Intermediate 50/70 World Series (for 13-year-olds) is one of the annual highlights of my broadcast schedule. It's so much fun and I look forward to it (and prepare for it) for months in advance.
But I can admit the lights shine brightest on ESPN's coverage of the 12-year-old Little League World Series, with regional games featured on linear television. Williamsport is the event so many of us grew up watching (I can still vividly remember some of the broadcast opening from when I was 9), and, of course, it's the one I aspired (in vain, as I knew it would be) to play in.
So when I had the chance to call two games in 12-year-old regionals, filling in for a fellow announcer experiencing technical difficulties connecting with our Whitestown, Indiana site (pictured), it was a no-brainer! I was already in Little League mode, paying attention to the regionals anyway, and still had pages left in my custom scorebook built to support Continuous Batting Order, in which every player (up to 14) is in the batting order the entire game.
So on August 6, I called the Great Lakes Region elimination game between Jasper, Indiana and Bowling Green East, Kentucky:
The following day, I called the Midwest Region winners' bracket final between Webb City, Missouri and Sioux Falls, South Dakota:
They were both tight, well-played games that seemed to fly by (less than 1 hour, 45 minutes for each) compared to the games in Livermore, which are an inning longer and inevitably slow down due to the addition of leads, pickoffs, and true stolen bases.
As I do at the 13-year-old level, I took pride in calling the teams by their league names, not just by the states involved. There's state pride involved, absolutely, and some teams even choose to order new uniforms that feature their state name. But most wear their original uniforms bearing their league name, and when you've beaten teams from all over your state to win the prize of representing that state, the town and the league deserve some specific love. Some towns have more than one league, too, as my hometown did when I played. After all, California didn't win back-to-back Little League world championships in 1992 and 1993; Long Beach, California did!
The games were close and interesting and fun to call, and both were such an adrenaline rush, too: I was trying my best to get up to speed on these teams in short order, working with a new partner in Chris Burke and new production crews, and scrambling to get everything done. For the second game, I even had enough time to set up and appear on camera for our open!
It was incredible fun, an important contribution to our team's coverage, and a taste of something I can hope to work on again in the future!
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