USSSA AA World Series
Pov’s/Walser Chevy/Reebock wins the last leg of the AA Grand Slam. That makes it four different teams to capture a World Championship this season in AA.
Reeces/Rooster/Easton-ISA, New Construction-ASA, BEP/KCS/JDS/TPS-NSA and of course Pov’s the USSSA. This win was a great win for the Pov’s team, who lost a big one this season, that being their manager and a special person Pat Stanchfield, who passed away a few weeks before this great win. I’m sure Pat was looking down on his boys this weekend. The Pov’s boys are a great bunch of guys and a terrific team who have played very good all season long. This win keeps alive the winning streak for the Minnesota teams who every year seem to win at least one. Last year the Long Haul AA team captured 3 of the 4, before that it was Spectrum.
Pov’s was led by MVP Scott Brown who was 14-16 with 5 homeruns. Finishing in 2nd. place was a very good team out of Texas, Quick Roofing/Advanced/Nike This team has played in a lot of tournaments this season and have proven that they are very competitive. Getting the 3rd. spot in this one was Maroadi’s/Transfer/Frank-n-stein/Nike, who have had an up and down season, but who are a very talented and just didn’t get it together in this year’s Worlds. Fourth place went to Deery Bros/Gold’s/Easton a good A team. There was a lot of talk that this wasn’t a good field of teams, but I disagree. First of all we only had about four legit AA teams playing this season. Most of the teams that declared they were AA, in fact were very good A teams. This was the first year that there were no Long Haul AA team, a Hague AA team or a Spectrum AA team to contend with. Taking a look at what happened this year, Budweiser & Pov’s were the best two teams after the 3 Super teams, then a couple of other teams like Reece’s, K&G were the next best teams at the upper level. I don’t think it’s hard to figure out what needs to be done in 2002 with the 3 Super teams whoever they end up being and maybe a fourth team. I think the rest of the teams should be sanctioned Class A and get rid of the AA program. There are about 30 good A teams and on any given weekend one of the 15-20 could win. If your A team isn’t good enough to compete then I suggest you go down to a lower level. There are a lot of good ball players playing on these A teams who surely could be playing at the next level up, but unfortunately there aren’t enough sponsors to make up more teams so that these players could get a chance to play every week against the best players in the World. I’m here to tell you there were some great A teams who on the bigger fields and longer bases competed against those best teams this season and played very well.
Teams like K&G, L&L Painting, Reece’s, Creative Stucco, Marodi’s/ Quick, Team Mizuno, Mountain Top, LDJ Varsity, Mississippi Worth, Red’s, New Construction, Aubrey’s, Florida Heat, WW Gay & Suncoast. They were much more competitive in these conditions. Take these teams along with Pov’s, Bud, Aftershock and the 3 Super teams it sure would make a hell of a tournament every weekend in the right city, state with the TV involved, and with the right balls to make this game more competitive and a much better situation for all.
This year the AA programs in the World Tournaments were made up of a lot of good A teams, and if they didn’t enter we would of had about 4 or 5 teams in each AA World. All I can say is thank God for those A teams who came to play to help make it a better Series. In my opinion the 2002 season should be made up of about 3 or 4 Super teams and the rest should be Class A, no AA. Again this is my opinion.
ALL Tournament Team
Pov’s/Walser Chevy/Reebock:
Chaun DeMars
Todd Volkers
Dan Yochum
Wes Cambell
Bryson Baker
Richie Alioti
MVP: Scott Brown