Crown Point, Lowell looking good in first round of District II Little League All-Star Playoffs (age 10 and under)

    Little League 10s --  1st round --pool play Friday, July 7, 2006 at the Whiting Little League
WP - Jake Jatis  (1-0) 2K, 1 walk (1 inn.)
  LP - Marcos Arredondo (0-1) 2K, 1 walk (2 inn.)

Irving (0-1)
Andre Jordan (CF) Double

CROWN POINT (2-0)
Ben Baumeister (CF) 2 doubles, walk, RBI
Donnie Ernst (SS) Double, single, 3 RBIs
Eric Haniford (0F) Single, 2 RBIs
Glenn Hecht (2B) Single, RBI
Jake Jatis (P) Triple, HBP, RBI

WHITING, IN (7-7-2006)  What became clear Friday night at the Whiting Little League was, barring a remarkable upset, Lowell and Crown Point will be the two teams that advance to the six-team District II 10-year-old baseball finals.  There's that large a gap between the two south Lake County squads and everybody else.

Friday, Lowell rolled over Hobart Township 17-1 in four innings and Crown Point routed Irving 13-1 in four innings. When you factor in Hobart Township's 8-2 win over Whiting in Thursday night's opening round and Crown Point's 2-1 win over Lowell, there isn't much doubt about how this tournament will end up.

"Anything can happen," said Lowell manager Russ Hamm.  "Just because you beat somebody 17-1 doesn't mean that somebody who lost can't turn around and beat you the next day.  That's what I was trying to tell them."

Crown Point manager Don Ernst said much the same thing. 

"We can't just assume we're going to win here.  Anything can happen.  Our boys don't need a day off.  We've got a lot of energy.  We need to play."

Lowell scored 10 runs in the first inning, sending 16 batters to the plate and benefiting from five walks and two errors.  Lead off man Seth Patrick had two singles and a walk and three RBIs.  Lowell was able to use one pitcher per inning, keeping all of them eligible for the team's next game.  If you pitch more than one inning in a Little League all-star game you are immediately ineligible to pitch in the next game.  So, when a team gets a large lead in the first inning, smart managers pitch one hurler per inning for the remainder of the game to keep their entire staff available for the next contest.

Lowell's Grant Weinmann allowed just one hit in five innings in the 2-1 opening loss to Crown Point.

"We've only allowed one hit in two games," said Hamm.  "Our pitching's been very good so far."

CP (2-0) used three pitchers in the 2-1 win over Lowell and four more in the romp over Hobart Township.  Done Ernst, who got the pitching victory against Lowell, was 2-for-3 against Irving, a Hammond Little League.  Lead off man Ben Baumeister hit the first pitch twice for extra base hits in each of the first two innings.

Truthfully, both games were painful to watch and you could not tell if Crown Point and Lowell were so dominant or if Irving and Hobart Township simply were so limited.  That doubt won't be erased until the two top teams get to the district finals.

Crown Point wanted to win all four games at Whiting so they will be a number one seed going into the district finals at Highland.  The four top seeds in the eight team quarterfinals get to face a 1st round pool runner up in the quarterfinals.  At the district finals, a team must win three consecutive games in three days to advance to the best-of-three playoffs against the District I champion.

LITTLE NOTES:  Crown Point Little League president Dave Hanaway said that talk that the Crown Point Little League being ineligible to host the state finals due to inadequate lighting isn't really true.

"We hosted in 1990," Hanaway reminded.  "The Little League has 14 districts and they like to rotate the finals through all the districts.  Highland is in good shape to host the finals next year.  District I had not hosted the finals since 1964.  Everybody wanted to make sure they got it."

The CP Little League is in top shape. 

"We were up to 570 (players) this season.  We went from seven to eight teams.  We're still growing."

Another of the Little League's most baffling rules was enforced several times at Whiting Friday as on-deck batters were told to put the bat down and go back in the dugout.  This rule, in theory, is for the batter's safety, but the Little League still allows 10-year-old boys to be first base coaches, where they can easily be hit by a line drive.

All levels of baseball and softball allow a batter in the on deck circle (some levels insist upon it) except the Little League.  For a baseball player to not be allowed to swing the bat in the on deck circle is crazy, but certainly no more bizarre that the rule which says that a Little Leaguer cannot go to the restroom during a game without permission from the press box.

There is a skating park that was built two years ago next to the Whiting Little League and Lowell's players went to look at it after their victory over Hobart Township. Crown Point manager Don Ernst said his boys won't even look at it.

"I told them that I would stay away from swimming and skateboarding and tumbling if they would.  We're all in this together trying to represent the town.  They can stay away from that stuff for four weeks."

No one at Whiting was certain where the 10-and-under state finals were located, including people from Lowell and Crown Point who figured to be advancing to the district finals.  As impossible as that seems, it is not unusual in the Little League where the organizations operate almost totally within themselves and they consider the season to have ended when the district playoffs end.

The Whiting Little League field was in very good condition.  In past years the field has been somewhat dry and brown, but last week's games were played on a lush green surface. 

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Revised: July 09, 2006.