Rain shortened the DeKalb Invitational at Northern Illinois University with the Sparks 18u Red team being declared the champions of the Varsity Division and the Illinois Sparks Black team declared 2nd place finishers with the Illinois Central Outlaws..
The Crystal Lake Cardinals 16u team wond the JV division with Bartlett Silver Hawks finishing 2nd with a perfect 3-0 record but allowing 15runs in the tourney compared to 11 the Cardinals allowed.

Tony Matteras Springfield Statesmen 17u team went undefeated with a 6-0 record in the Jefferson College-Mineral Area College tourney put on in Missouri by Diamond Sports.

The NIU tourney was a disaster due to 2 days of downpours which caused the tourney to be cut short.After working all day Sat to get the fields in shape for Sunday a 2 hour early a.m thunderstorm wiped out the Sunday slate all together. Wish there would have been an astro turf field complex nearby but that concept hasn't arrived yet!!!

Sure has been a lot of money spent by people going to tournaments that never got played this summer.

IL weather stinks...all year round.

Woodly, all one can reasonbly expect is the promoter's best effort. Mother Nature can get after it sometimes and so, everyone knows that if they've played ball at all. I'm sure that the system of awarding places was not the promoter's first choice but they do have a system in place to do so. Good for them.

Isn't woodly one of said promoters?

Just asking out of curiosity, because that was the conclusion I had drawn...

quote:

Originally posted by J.Weaver #5:
Isn't woodly one of said promoters?

Just asking out of curiosity, because that was the conclusion I had drawn...

I don't know but do know "Promoters" isn't the best word give the context that some attribute to the word. In the context I mean, those that work hard to get a given event off the ground and to make it successful. Woodly, I hope you didn't take offense at my choice of words.

Woodly's gang busted tail to get the fields in Dekalb ready. Too bad the Sunday morning boomers came. Every weekend has brought rain and another unfinished tournament. Supposed to be nice this weekend though...

You could call Woody a promoter because he promotes kids right and left. He does a lot of work behind the scenes for alot of kids. It is refreshing to have tournaments ran by someone who actually knows baseball.

As far as the weather those guys work as hard as anyone and really just not alot you can do if it rains.

call me a promoter or whatever you want to call me--trust me when i say i have been called alot of things in the last 8 weeks..Appreciate the kind words and i do understand there will be criticism when someone does not make an effort to get the fields playable... but as other team coaches have said throughout----it has rained all spring, all summer and i am sick of rain...An enjoyable job it is when rain doesn't spoil it for kids and YES...ALOT OF MONEY HAS BEEN SPENT by teams with rain spoiling alot of tourneys--- last week at Dekalb was the first tourney in 3 years that Diamond Sports had to declare a champion in a rain shortened tourney--- We have always gotten the kids the games-- but last week was impossible and i am in Bloomington right now with 45 teams--and forecast is rain Thurs, Fri, Sat, Sun, Monday..and even Tuesday..... last summer event of year..Fall preview next week with small tourney, week off, then fall preview at Rockford--then 9 weeks of Fall ball...
guys we try and we are BASEBALL PEOPLE...and the compliments outweigh the criticism...keeping us going...tough job but we stay at it...and each week pray there is no rain just like the kids and coaches