Baseball Victoria, Author at Baseball Victoria

Baseball Victoria is pleased to announce the following updates regarding the 2015/2016 Junior Competition.

Charters

Over the last couple of months, Baseball Victoria has been consulting with all charters and clubs in rolling out and finalizing the charters for the upcoming seasons.

During this consultation period, it has become clear that there were a number of challenges that existed, which we have attempted to alleviate by realigning the charters.

Some of the challenges are a by-product of a junior structure that has not been adjusted for over 30 years. The new junior structure will help address some of these challenges, however, other areas still need to be reviewed such as the junior criteria, how we recruit participants, ensuring a quality entry-level program and changing the way we deliver the sport. Increasing our resources within each charter by having a Charter Development Coach and Officer will assist in improving our sport.

The main changes that have occurred during the consultation period:

The charters for the Little League Major, Junior League and Senior League will be as follows:

Southern Mariners

Eastern

Berwick

Bonbeach

Cheltenham

Chelsea

Moorabbin

Sandringham

Springvale

Blackburn

Ormond

Malvern

Melbourne

Upwey

Waverley

Northern Diamondbacks

Geelong Baycats

Doncaster

Essendon

Fitzroy

Newport

Preston

Sunshine

Werribee

Williamstown

Made up of local

Geelong Clubs

The Western Mets charter will conduct a Little League Minor competition on Friday nights and Berwick and Pakenham Pumas will also form a Little League Minor Charter.

Baseball Victoria is still working with some clubs which may result in further clubs joining the above charters.

Charter Academy Program

In 2015/2016, Baseball Victoria is pleased to launch the charter academy program. The academy program is a high level competition. It will be a competition-based academy program that picks the best players from both the Little League and Junior League age groups, in order to provide high quality competition games for those players as well as an academy training program. The sessions will be held on Saturday mornings alternating each week between training and playing games against the other charter academy teams.

Originally the cost to participate in this program was $420. However, Baseball Victoria (BV) is pleased to announce that it has been able to source funding from Sports and Recreation Victoria (SRV), with Victorians More Active funding that will significantly subsidise this program for 2015/2016. This has enabled us to reduce the cost to participate in the charter academy program to $250. Note: BV and each of the Charters will endeavor to look at future funding opportunities to keep the cost of all Charter programs from 2015 – 16 onwards to a minimum.

Charter Development Coaches and Officers:

Baseball Victoria is pleased to announce the following appointments for the roles in each charter:

Charter

Charter Development Coach

Charter Development Officer

Southern Mariners

John Carlile

Chris Kennedy

Eastern

Chris Harman

TBA

Northern Diamondbacks

Paul Brown

Bronwyn Gell

Geelong Baycats

TBA

Joshua Beaumont

Western Mets

N/A

Bronwyn Gell

The charter development coach (CDC) will oversee the charter academy in each charter as well as working to improving the coaching standard within the charter.

The charter development officer (CDO) will be responsible for going to schools on behalf of the clubs in their charter to increase participation in the sport.

Charter Committee:

Each charter will form a committee to be made up of members from clubs within the charter. This committee is formed for the sole purpose of organising and overseeing the charter competitions, charter representative teams and the promotion and development of the sport within the charter. These charter committees are still to be formed. Once finalised clubs will be advised of the members of the committees.

Baseball Victoria would like to take this opportunity to thank all clubs for their patience and the valuable feedback and assistance provided during the consultation period. The changes we are implementing are significant changes that would not be possible without your assistance and support.

Williamsport, PA, home of Little League. A clean town, with lovely old buildings and big trees that line the streets. Population around 30,000 and only a 3.5 hour drive from the bright lights of New York City.

It is Little League World Series week and there is a buzz in the air. Hotel lobbies have large welcome signs, shop fronts have Little League welcome signs, basically the whole town is a giant moving welcome to Little League sign.

A walk through downtown quickly gets you to W 4th Street, completely blocked off in preparation for the opening night’s Grand Slam Parade. There are camping chairs lining the street to secure position at 3:00pm, cherry pickers and scaffolding set up for the live broadcast.

Image: W 4th Street preparations

Image: Broadcast 'booth' on the footpath

6:00pm and the whole town plus the tens of thousands of family, friends and World Series visitors are out. It is difficult to move through the streets and the only way to get a good view if you didn’t secure your position early is to get creative.

The parade MC warms up the crowd with the YMCA and another jumping, shuffling group dance that obviously hasn't yet made it to Australia, before the first float makes its way down the road to huge applause.

Image: Locals securing any vantage point they can

Acrobats, inflatable minions, giant shopping trolleys built on top of what looks like a drag racing car, are weaved into the parade line up with the teams, all connected to a local business or community service showing their support for Little League.

Image: Free products thanks to the sponsors

The Cronulla Charter from Australia are in the fifth parade division, between the South Williamsport Mountie Marching band and the Muncy Bank and Trust Company. On the back of a semi-trailer float prepared by local volunteers, the young Aussie’s have the biggest smiles you’ve ever seen as they wave and cheer their way down the road.

Image: Does it get any better for a thirteen year old? Cronulla soaking up the atmosphere form their float

The whole crowd has a soft-spot for Australia, but you can hear the teams’ family, wearing Australia jerseys, holding green and gold inflatable kangaroos and Australian flags, louder than anyone else.

DAY 1 OF PLAY RESCHEDULED
Unfortunately due to wet weather and thunder storms, all play on Day 1 of the LLWS had to be cancelled by the International Tournament Committee. All first-round play has been rescheduled to Friday 21 August (local time). Australia Region's first game against Latin America is now scheduled for 1:00pm Friday 21 August local time, 3:00am Saturday 22 August AEST. Check your local guide to see if ESPN 508 are able to reschedule live coverage, or follow live scoring HERE.

Baseball Australia (BA) is the national sporting organisation recognised as the official governing body for the sport of baseball in Australia by the Australian Sports Commission, the Australian Olympic Committee, Major League Baseball and other professional baseball leagues around the world.

BA is governed by a Board of 7 independent Directors and is administered by a CEO and team of employees who are responsible for the day to day delivery of our core operational areas including Participation, High Performance, Business Development, Finance and National events.

BA has 7 State and Territory members, over 400 clubs and 50,000+ grassroots members. BA is a 25% equity shareholder of the Australian Baseball League (via a Joint venture partnership with Major League Baseball (MLB)) and enjoys a strong relationship with MLB and the International Baseball Federation.

Baseball is in an exciting period of growth in Australia and BA is seeking the services of 2 suitably qualified national directors to fill 2 casual voluntary vacancies.

Successful candidates must possess the following general skillsets:

· Demonstrated Board or senior executive experience;

· Highly developed skills in creating, executing and reviewing strategy;

· A comprehensive understanding of corporate governance principles;

· Demonstrated ability to communicate and influence;

· An understanding of baseball and/or the Australian sporting landscape would be advantageous.

Each director on the BA Board also has a ‘portfolio’ which relates to key elements of the BA strategic plan. As such, in addition to the general skillsets, we are seeking candidates for the Board with specific experience/expertise in the following areas:

Role 1 – Government and stakeholder relations

· Government relations at all levels of Government with particular focus on the Federal arena;

· Stakeholder management and engagement;

Role 2 – Participation

· General sports participation principles (with a strong focus on participation drivers);

· Participation Funding / Grant opportunities;

· The role technology plays in delivering game development outcomes.

To apply for these roles, candidates should send a brief letter and attach a professional curriculum vitae (no more than 5 pages) outlining skills and experience that may prove their suitability for the Baseball Australia Board.

Please email applications, addressed to Baseball Australia CEO Brett Pickett, to abfadmin@baseball.org.au, ensuring the words “Board Director Application” are placed in the subject line of the email.

Applications Close: 7 September 2015.

Baseball is in an exciting period of growth in Australia and BA is seeking the services of 2 suitably qualified national directors to fill 2 casual voluntary vacancies.

Successful candidates must possess the following general skillsets:

· Demonstrated Board or senior executive experience;

· Highly developed skills in creating, executing and reviewing strategy;

· A comprehensive understanding of corporate governance principles;

· Demonstrated ability to communicate and influence;

Role 1 – Government and stakeholder relations

· Government relations at all levels of Government with particular focus on the Federal arena;

· Stakeholder management and engagement;

Role 2 – Participation

· General sports participation principles (with a strong focus on participation drivers);

· Participation Funding / Grant opportunities;

Applications Close: 7 September 2015.

SURFERS PARADISE, Aus. -- In preparation for the U18 Baseball World Cup, Australia and Canada faced off in an eight-game series on the Gold Coast sanctioned by the World Baseball Softball Confederation. See below for game-by-game recaps and links to results.

Game 1: Australia 7, Canada 2

Dean Frew went 3-for-4 with two RBIs and Jye Deeble struck out six batters in three innings of relief work as Australia won the opening match of the series 7-2. The game was tied through the middle of the fourth innings before the Aussies broke the deadlock by scoring five runs in the bottom of the frame. Mitch Holding led off the innings with a single, and moved to second on James McCallum's single. Both runners advanced a base on a wild pitch before Frew drove them in on a clutch two-run double to centre field to get the scoring started. Max Barrett started the game for Australia and earned the win, allowing just two runs in four innings pitched and striking out five batters.

Game 2: Australia 13, Canada 1

Josh Rawlinson and James McCallum tallied three hits apiece as Team Australia soundly defeated Canada in the second game of the series. McCallum led the team with five RBIs, followed closely by Rawlinson with four and Tristan King with three. After taking an early 3-0 lead after the first innings, visiting team Australia scored three more in the fourth, two in the sixth, four in the seventh and one final run in the top of the ninth innings. On the mound for Australia, Alex Wells dominated, striking out nine batters and allowing just three hits in his five innings of work.

Game 3: Australia 6, Canada 5

In the bottom of the ninth innings, leadoff batter Tristan King slammed a walkoff solo shot over the left field fence to propel Australia to a 6-5 win and a 3-0 series lead. Canada struck first with a run in the top of the second innings, but Australia evened the score in the bottom of the frame on an RBI single off the bat of Ryan Kift. The Canadians took a 3-1 lead on a pair of runs scored in the top of the third innings and padded the lead with another run in the next frame. Australia took a one-run lead by putting a four-spot on the board in the bottom of the sixth, led by a three-run home run by Dean Frew and a go-ahead RBI single from George Callil. However, Canada tied the game again on a leadoff home run in the seventh, setting the stage for King's ninth-innings heroics.

Game 4: Australia 4, Canada 3

After jumping ahead to a 2-0 lead after the first innings, visiting team Australia won its fourth game in a row, hanging on for a close 4-3 win over Canada. James McCallum once again led the offence, going 2-for-4 with an RBI, while starting pitcher Joshua Hendrickson earned the win after tossing four innings and allowing just one run and one hit. Mitchell Neunborn picked up the save, striking out two batters in his inning of work.

Game 5: Australia 8, Canada 3

Australia took a 5-0 lead in the series with an 8-3 win in Game 5. Second baseman Dean Frew went 2-for-4 with four RBIs to lead the offence, and hit a three-run triple in the eighth innings to extend the Aussie lead. The Aussie side got on the board first in the bottom of the first innings on Frew's RBI single that drove home Alex Wells. Canada took a one-run lead in the top of the third, but Australia tied the game in the bottom half of that same frame. The Canadian side scored again in the top of the next frame, but once again Australia answered, scoring two runs to take the lead for good.

Game 6: Australia 4, Canada 0

Nate Vankan led off the game with a solo home run and Alex Wells struck out 10 batters in five innings pitched as Australia took a 6-0 series lead over Canada. Wells allowed one hit in his start, earning his second win of the series. At the plate, Vankan went 2-for-3 and Mitch Holding drove in two runs.

Game 7: Australia 3, Canada 2

George Callil hit a two-out RBI single in the bottom of the seventh inning to give Australia a 3-2 walk-off win over Canada. With the win, Australia took a 7-0 series lead and swept both games of a Sunday doubleheader at Surfers Paradise. The Canadians took an early 2-0 lead in the top of the third on an RBI single and an RBI triple, but Australia got the runs back in the bottom of the fourth, sending two runners home on a wild pitch and a lineout. In the bottom of the final frame, Ryan Kift singled to right and stole second to put himself in scoring position for Callil, who drove home the winning run.

Game 8: Canada 1, Australia 0

Canada avoided a series sweep with a close one-run win in the series finale. The home Canadian side scored the lone run of the ballgame in the bottom of the second frame, when Tristan Pompey led off the inning with a double and came around to score on a throwing error. Joshua Hendrickson started the game for Australia and tossed four innings of two-hit baseball, allowing just the one unearned run and striking out one batter while walking three. Tristan King led the Aussie offence with a pair of hits. Canadian hurler Michael Brettell dominated on the mound, striking out eight Australian batters in his six innings of work and earning the win.

Use the links below to further recap all the action.

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