They showed up on chilly March nights. With baseball gloves, bats and boyish hopes, they shook off the long winter to demonstrate their skills — throwing, catching and hitting.
No one guessed, at those tryouts in Everett’s American Legion Memorial Park, that the luckiest players would truly become boys of summer.
“It was very historical; it had never happened,” said Julie Hansen, vice president of baseball for North Everett Little League. “There were never any expectations. But these kids never stopped.”
On July 9, at Marysville’s Cedar Field, the North Everett Little League 9- and 10-year-old All Stars played in the Washington District 1 Little League championship game. The team lost, 12-0, to the Mill Creek All Stars.
That final score says nothing about an Everett team that just kept winning, against odds and expectations.
At more than twice the size of the North Everett league, Mill Creek Little League is a powerhouse program that in 2008 sent a team to the Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pa.
Starting June 26, in day-after-day games leading up to their July 9 finish, the Everett kids lost one other time to Mill Creek. But in six other games, they beat All Star teams from South Everett, Lake Stevens, Marysville, Mukilteo, Alderwood and Pacific Little League of Edmonds and Lynnwood.
All are programs much larger than North Everett, which Hansen calls “the forgotten Little League.”
“Our goal was to make memories for these kids,” said Vince Mardesich, manager of the North Everett team. His 9-year-old son, Nick, was among the players. The All Star teams are chosen after regular-season teams cast votes, each team choosing three kids to try out.
Most years, Mardesich said, North Everett All Stars have been “two games and out” of postseason play.
Playing for the 9- and 10-year-old North Everett All Stars were: Gabe Waddle, Daniel Peterson, Nick Mardesich, Michael Figueroa, Ian Willows, George Duffy-Russell, Wyatt Mason, Ryan Burt, Alex Pignataro, Ryan Swatosh, David Palmiere, Elijah Ross-Rutter and Ben Hansen. Mardesich had coaching help from fathers Tony Pignataro and Robert Waddle.
For one player, it was a painful and poignant time. George Duffy-Russell, now 11, shouldered the heavy game schedule while his grandfather was losing a battle with cancer. Philip Duffy, 72, died Tuesday, a day after George visited and showed his grandfather the second-place trophy.
George’s mother, Annie Russell, said her father was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer about three months ago.
At every All Star game, her son would say, “I’m playing this for my grandpa,” Russell said. She would share game details with her dad, a lifelong Everett resident. “My dad just relished the stories. He loved baseball,” she said.
When George brought the trophy, Russell said her father told the boy, “I’m so proud of you, George. You’re my hero.”
Russell likens the team’s feat to “a David and Goliath story, or Cinderella.” Not only is the North Everett Little League small, many of its players are from low-income families that qualify for scholarships to help pay joining fees.
Hansen, whose 10-year-old son Ben played on the team, said their success was so unexpected that several families had to cancel vacations. One family repeatedly changed airline reservations as the team kept winning, she said.
Ron Burt, whose 10-year-old son Ryan was an All Star, said the kids may have been a bit intimidated by teams with fancy uniforms and winning reputations.
“Once they started playing, it’s just baseball,” Burt said. “You hit, you throw, you catch. They realized they could compete with these guys.
“They were just scrappers,” Burt said. “They started to believe anything is possible.”
Julie Muhlstein: 425-339-3460, muhlstein@heraldnet.com.
Talk to us
> Give us your news tips.
> Send us a letter to the editor.
> More Herald contact information.
