Elisa Carney, the East Hampton Little League organization’s secretary, said before the East End Physical Therapy-Fifth and Dune game began Saturday morning that more than 400 youngsters between the ages of 5 and 12 are playing baseball this spring at the newly built turf fields off Stephen Hand’s Path.
Signs there remind you that “these are kids, this is a game, coaches are volunteers, officials are human, and no college scholarships will be handed out today.” On a fence near the two turf fields are placards attesting to the seven District 36 championships East Hampton Little League baseball and softball teams have won since 1991. Four have been won in the past six years, presumably evidence of the sport’s growing popularity here.
The 9-and-10-year-old team which won the 2018 district baseball championship is to be honored at the local “world series” championship games at Stephen Hand’s on June 8. The team’s roster included Victoreddy Diaz, Livs Kuplins, Trevor Meehan, and Finn O’Rourke, all of whom were on East Hampton High’s varsity team this season, and Kai Alversa, who pitches for Bridgehampton-Ross.
Diaz and Kuplins were on the 9-10 baseball 2017 district championship team as well, as were four other Bonac teammates, Carter Dickinson, Tyler Hansen, Hudson Meyer, and Justin Prince.
The playoffs are to begin on June 3. All the teams will make them, and rather than a best-of-three series it will be one-and-done, said Carney, who added that on June 2 the organization will treat its players to a Mets-Diamondbacks game at Citi Field, with some of the money that adults pay for tickets being kicked back.
Kathryn Mirras, who played softball for the University of Virginia after graduating from East Hampton High School, has been overseeing coed T-ball for 5 and 6-year-olds on Saturday morning from 9 to 10:30; first and second-grade boys and girls are playing in the coaches-pitch Olympic division, and there are 21 teams in the boys and girls Minor (9-10) and Major (11-12) divisions.
Race Lane, at 7-2, led the 11-12 baseball division as of earlier this week, followed by Smile Navy Beach at 5-2, East End Physical Therapy at 5-4, Fifth and Dune at 2-6, and the Amagansett Fire Department at 2-7.
Baseball’s Minor division was led by M&R Deli at 9-0, followed by C.E. King at 9-1, Springs Fire Department at 3-6, the East Hampton Town P.B.A. at 3-7, Travis Field Memorial at 3-7, and Highpoint at 2-8.
In softball, Wirth & Company topped the Major division at 5-1 trailed by Highpoint at 4-1, the East Hampton Village P.B.A. at 5-3, the East Hampton Fire Department at 4-3, the Friends Of Erin at 0-4, and John Hummel at 0-6. Mickey’s Carting, at 6-2, led the Minor division, with the Amagansett Fire Department at 5-2, the East Hampton Lions at 3-5, and Pipemasters at 1-6.
Carney said the baseball and softball coaches are considering whom they’ll recommend to play on East Hampton’s traveling all-star squads several weeks from now.
In the aforementioned Major division game, East End Physical Therapy, which had been shut out 1-0 by Race Lane’s pitchers, Jackson Cook and Kix Bock, the evening before, overcame 2-0 and 3-2 deficits in the last two innings to defeat Fifth & Dune 4-3 thanks to Alex Bobek’s two-run walk-off drive to center field that scored Dickson Bennett with the tying run and Wyatt Musser with the game-winner. Owen Diamond, who went all the way on the mound for East End Physical Therapy, was the winning pitcher.
