The Little League World Series is being played in Williamsport, PA and there was a time I thought I may be getting to see it in person.
The year was 2009 and Bridge City had a group of 12 year olds that were pretty good. In fact one of them, Chase Shugart, is pitching in the big leagues for Pittsburgh.
Lead by their coach Ronnie Shugart, Chase’s uncle, along with Mark Watts and Mike Taylor, the team cruised undefeated through District and Sectionals outscoring their opponents something like 100-5.
The next stop was State in Tyler and I was approached by Ronnie about broadcasting the tournament. It took a lot of logistics to make it happen, including finding places to broadcast from because there were no press boxes.
In the first game, BC was beat 13-1 by Lamar National. Ronnie said, “We have been together since these kids were seven and for the first time I really didn’t know what to tell them after the game. It had been so long since we lost. But when we got into the outfield to meet, Blake Pruett said, ‘Coach, this is double elimination right?’ and I said yes and he said ‘OK, we got this,’ and the kids agreed and we walked away.”
16 years have gone by and Ronnie still has a great memory of that summer.
BC would win their next game 6-1 and face First Colony in the semis. FC jumped out to a 5-0 lead in the first but BC would rally to tie it in the 6th and then win it in extra innings thanks to Chase Rutledge who hit a 2 run shot. Ronnie would remind me that FC would score one in the bottom of the seventh and have the tying run on when the next batter hit a drive to right field. The right fielder overthrew his cutoff man but the runner also fell coming around third. The overthrow went straight to the catcher who made the tag and BC wins 7-6.
The BC magic was not over but they would have to beat Lamar twice in the finals. In the first game, BC was down 3-0 going into the 6th (last inning). Rutledge would drive in a run to make it 3-1. Ronnie remembers Kolten Bergeron hitting a ball to short. “All the shortstop had to do was throw to second and the game was over. But instead he went to first. Bergeron was too fast and beat the throw to load the bases.”
Now some of that BC magic also came from Ronnie. He told Coach Watts to pinch hit Bryce Carey for Matthew Kress and Watts didn’t want to do it. Carey was in a major slump but Ronnie had been watching the pitcher who was throwing his fast ball up in the zone.
At that same time, my partner in the broadcast, Rick Dearing, knew what Ronnie was thinking and said, “Carey is the best fast ball hitter on the team. If this guy leaves one up he’ll take it out of here.” And a moment that still raises the hair on my arms, Carey sends an 0-2, 2 out pitch over the wall for a 5-3 lead. Ronnie had one more trick in the bottom of the sixth. His pitcher, Coby Roddy was out of pitches. He brought in Pruett, who had been catching and hadn’t thrown a pitch in the playoffs, to seal the deal. “His ball runs in,” coach would say. “I thought he was the right guy at the time.” He was. Cards win. But they had to win again.
With Jonah Watts on the hill BC jumped out to a 3-0 lead in the first. “Jonah was dealing,” coach said. He would strike out nine before Lamar scratched two in the fifth.
The game was started in the morning and I was proud that KOGT was able to bring the games back to Orange County because the boys had become “must hear” radio and they were gaining fans every broadcast. And I got to see that during this game. Bobby Fillyaw sent me a photo of all of the vehicles on the front row at the Country Club. It was after the 12 noon start for the weekly Rotary meeting but everyone was still in their car or truck listening to the game.
Back to the game, Rutledge would come in and strike out the final four for a 3-2 win and the first trip for any Orange County LL to the Southwest Regional in Waco for a chance to go to the LL World Series.
Of course we were going to make the trip also even though we knew if they made it to the Championship game, we would not be able to broadcast because ESPN had the rights. More on that later.
Gotta tell one on Coach Shugart. After winning the Championship and going through all of his postgame duties he prepared to leave. Most everyone else had already jumped on Hwy. 69 for that four hour ride back to BC. Shugart has a blowout on his truck. He gets the truck to WalMart in Tyler for a tire and gets a call from the people at the Southwest Regional who want all of his info on his team. He carried all of the birth certificates, parent info, proof of residence, etc in a binder so he brought it into the waiting room with him while he was waiting. He gets the tire, drives home. He gets home, but his binder was still in Tyler. His state of euphoria quickly turned to panic. But the story ends well. The binder was still there and WalMart actually mailed it Next Day Air to him. I think I would’ve been driving back to Tyler.
The trip to Waco didn’t come without a story. Buff and tough Oliver Rutledge decided he was going to take the scenic route as he rode a bike, as in bicycle, to Waco. It took him three days to get there. Slept in the woods. I think he got some TV pub out of it too. Ronnie remembers the trip also because Frank Carpenter, who was with BCPD at the time, gave them a police escort out of town which had to be pretty cool for a bunch of 12 year old’s.
The tournament was pool play and BC (Texas East in the tourney), handled Arkansas and New Mexico pretty easy. Then they followed with wins over Colorado and then Mississippi 6-5 where Chase Shugart hit a walk-off HR to send them to the final against San Antonio.
Now as I said ESPN had the rights to the Championship but many wanted to hear our call of the game and of course we thought we deserved to do it. Enter Donnie Shockley. I don’t think he’d mind me saying that he can be very persistent when he decides he wants to do something and that something was getting us to broadcast the Championship. He made some calls, called in some favors and somehow got to talk to the VP of Programming at ESPN in Connecticut.
Although he was telling the truth that we had just been hit Hurricane Ike 10 months earlier and many still didn’t have cable, much less homes, I’m sure he sugarcoated it a little bit. Enough that they agreed to let us broadcast. I spoke to her and she informed me they would “change the contract” to include KOGT. I asked, begged, for her to send me a copy (so I could frame it) but I guess she was through doing me favors.
In the photo below from a shot taken off the TV, you can see me in the big circle because they had no room for us in that big ass press box. Again, done with favors. But you can also see many of the BC fans wearing black earphones. That was so they could listen to us broadcast from inside the stadium. They were called Smart Bugs from my friend Charlie in Jefferson, Tx.
The game started well for BC as they took a 4-1 lead in the first thanks to a 3 run homer from Rutledge. Shugart started the game and struck out nine before he maxed out. San Antonio battled back with one in the third, three in the fifth and one in the sixth to win the game 6-4. It was the end to a remarkable run.
“We still get together with some of the boys and we talk about it,” Coach Shugart said. “Johnny Dishon’s team will be 12 next year and they’ve won State the last two years. Hopefully they’ll get that chance to experience what we did and maybe go all the way.”
There were a few players that didn’t get mentioned but I certainly don’t want to leave out because they all played a part. Ryne Shugart (Ronnie’s son named after Ryne Sandberg), Tryce Howard, Dillon Taylor, Blaine Slaughter, and Corbin Vogeli. Thanks for the ride in ’09 fellas.
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