FORT MYERS, Fla. – About a half-hour before the Guyton, Ga.-based Elite Stars opened play the 13u PG BCS Finals, one of the Stars’ assistant coaches turned to his young team that was sitting inside the first-base dugout on Field 3 at the Player Development 5-Plex and began naming names.
“Have you guys ever heard of Dustin Pedroia?” the coach asked the players, with most of them nodding in the affirmative. “How about Nomar Garciaparra?” A few more nods. “And David Ortiz? How about ‘Big Papi’?” Many more nods were seen up and down the bench.
The assistant coach then explained to the group of 13-year-olds that all three of those Boston Red Sox greats had honed their hitting skills in the 5-Plex’s batting cages, a building the young Stars had been using only minutes before. Those BoSox stars had also spent seemingly countless March days practicing or scrimmaging on the 5-Plex’s five MLB-quality regulation fields when Boston used the facility as its spring training headquarters from 1993-2011 (games were played at City of Palms Park just down Edison Ave.).
The Red Sox moved their spring training operations to the jetBlue Park Player Development complex about 12 miles away on the other side of this city in 2012, but the brief history lesson seemed to be appreciated by the young Elite Stars’ players at which it was directed. It just seemed like a great way to kick off a 13-and-under Perfect Game tournament.
The 5th annual 13u PG BCS Finals national championship began its run Friday morning with games at the 5-Plex and City of Palms Park; as the week progresses, games will also be played at the CenturyLink Sports Complex, the spring training home of the Minnesota Twins. Thirty-six teams – including the Elite Stars and the Houston (Texas) Athletics-Gold, the Stars’ opponents on opening day – will play for PG national championship rings over the next seven days.
“This is the tournament we all look towards throughout the whole spring,” Houston Athletics-Gold head coach Ryan Cook said Friday morning. “Every tournament we play and every practice is all aimed toward when we get to Fort Myers, so we’re going to be polished and ready.”
The Elite Stars played in seven tournaments leading up to this one, which head coach Cliff White described as their most important tournament of the spring and summer season. The team played in a PG Super25 tournament in Asheville, N.C. and just missed out on playing the 13u PG Super25 National Championship, which is running concurrently with the 13u PG BCS Finals this week in Fort Myers.
The Stars’ roster consists of 11 members, each of whom lives within a 100-mile radius of Savannah, Ga. They have been playing against each other since they were 7- and 8-year-olds on different teams and coaches like White decided to put them on one team that could be competitive on PG national stages.
“At 13-years-old, these boys are starting to become young men and are starting to deal with different things, and they have done great,” White said. “The challenge is just to be smarter than they are. These kids today, they know a lot, they’re very intelligent and they know the game really well. They’re easy to coach and it’s fun; it’s a great age.”
Despite the record-breaking rain and flooding the Houston area received this spring, Cook guessed this team had played about 30 games before it got here this weekend; still, it practiced a lot more than it played. He feels confident his young Texas kids, the majority of whom call Missouri City home, will take care of their business in a proper and upright manner.
“I’m just making sure they’re focused on what we’re trying to do. We remind them what we preach as an organization and we try to stick with that,” Cook said. “With this group it’s all about having fun and doing it right, and baseball is a lot of fun. … It’s really just effort. Nobody will ever be mad if you dive for a ball and miss it, not if you’re playing the game like it’s supposed to be played.”
The schedule here is structured so games usually start no later than 12:30 p.m. throughout the entire seven-day run, with the idea of completing them before predictable mid- to late-afternoon thunderstorms roll in.
The early start times produce another very favorable happenstance for the players and their families. The business of baseball can be taken care of early in the day and the afternoon and evening hours can be left to the pursuit of fun and sun at the area’s many beaches and hotel swimming pools – or maybe something else entirely.
“A lot of our kids like to go fishing and then go to the beach, and if you can turn it into a family vacation, that’s how you sell it,” White said. “These moms and these dads, they sit out here in the stands all week and watch these kids play baseball, so it’s nice for them to go someplace and be able to relax, too. We get to play some good ball and they get to make a kind of mini-vacation out of it, so it’s fun. I think (PG) was very smart about the way they set the games up.”
The Houston A’s Cook agreed, with one caveat: “You can do some of those things but you’ve got to be smart about it. Don’t be the guy that’s at the beach all day after the game, and then come back looking like a lobster (sunburned) and you can’t play. They have the freedom to go out and have fun but they know what we’re here for.”
The coach of a 13u team faces plenty of challenges and another one is at the forefront this summer. Perfect Game requires full compliance with MLB and USA Baseball Pitch Smart guidelines at every one of its tournaments this year, which presents added challenges for the coaches at the younger age levels. The guidelines call for at least one full day of rest for a young pitcher after he throws a certain number of pitches the previous day with minimizing pitch-counts the ultimate goal.
“It’s definitely made it more of a game of chess when we come here, figuring out who can pitch and setting yourself up right,” White said, while also acknowledging he has 11 kids on his roster all of them can pitch if they have to. “But I think it puts all the kids on an even-keel … and I think it makes it more of a challenge and it makes the boys understand that there is not time for breaks, there are no second chances; I think it’s good. …
“I have no problem with the pitch-counts,” he continued. “I’ve always been one of those guys that as long as long as It’s across the board, what’s fair for one is fair for us all.”
The Houston Athletics organization has two teams at the 13u PG BCS Finals: Gold and Green. A team known only as the Houston Athletics reached the final four of last year’s 13u PG BCS and that team, the Houston Athletics-White, will be playing in the 14u PG BCS Finals July 4-10. Each year brings a new experience.
“I want them to look back at the ambiance (of this event), being able to play on fields like this, the competition, playing (teams from) outside your state,” Cook said. “This is a memory and we just want to make it a fun one.”
The Elite Stars made sure Friday morning that the Houston Athletics’ first memory of this experience wasn’t a very sweet one. The Stars stroked 15 hits in their 12-2, five-inning victory over the A’s: 2021 infielder Cooper George was 2-for-3 with a double, five RBI and two runs scored; 2022 infielder Justin Thomas was 3-for-3 with a double, an RBI and two runs; 2020 infielder/right-hander Ethan Williams had three singles and an RBI and also pitched three innings of three-hit ball, allowing one earned run, striking out three and walking two.
It was a great start for the Georgia boys and less than great for the Texas kids, but there is a lot more pool-play on the 13u PG BCS Finals schedule over the next four days. These things have been known to turn on a dime and there really is a lot more to play here on the fields former and current Boston Red Sox American League All-Stars once used to improve their games.
“One of the other things about Perfect Game is you always have someone watching you; everything’s being written down,” the Stars’ White said. “You don’t get a second chance to make a first impression and that’s what we’re trying to instill in these boys. We want them to come out here and help them get ready for the next level and now is when it’s going to start.
“I hope they have a lot of fun while we’re here and I hope they know what the best 13-year-olds that are out there look like,” he concluded. “Just like this team right here that we’re playing, they came in from Houston, Texas. We get to see how baseball is played in Houston, Texas, and I think Savannah, Georgia playing Houston, Texas down here in Florida is awesome.”