Little League All-Stars in the spotlight

District 52 encompasses Little League from San Mateo to Palo Alto and over to Half Moon Bay and Pacifica. Pacifica National will host the 9-10 tournament at Fairway Park; San Mateo American hosts the 10-11 tournament at Trina Park, while Palo Alto will host the 12-year-old tournament at Middlefield Park.

The biggest development in District 52, however, is an expanded 14-year-old tournament, known as the Juniors division. Once comprised of only a couple of teams, the age group has expanded throughout the district. This year, the 14s will have a nine-team tournament, played at the new baseball facility at Mills High School.

“[This division] has been growing by leaps and bounds,” said Jono Gibbs, District 52 administrator. “Six years ago, we had six teams total (in the district). This year, we had 29 teams. It’s really taken off.”

The Juniors division has all but taken over the Intermediate division, which was implemented by Little League several years ago to give players who aged out of the Majors division another place to play.

The Intermediate field dimensions — which features pitchers at 50 feet and basepaths at 70 feet — are slightly bigger than what the 8-12 year olds play on, which is 40-60.

District 52, however, played on even larger fields for their Juniors teams during the regular season, using fields with dimensions of 60-80. And for the District 52 Juniors tournament, the games will be played on a regulation diamond, with a 60-foot, 6-inch mound to plate and 90-foot basepaths.

“From what we were hearing from middle school kids, they wanted to play on full-size fields. They don’t want to play on the smaller fields. The kids who are 13, the intermediate fields are too small for them,” Gibbs said.

Gibbs said many of the Juniors teams feature 13-year-old players and when it came to all-star tournaments, the teams had to make a choice: play at the intermediate-level field or play on regulation fields.

All but two teams voted to play on the biggest diamond. Those two teams, Palo Alto and Pacifica, will play a best-two-three tournament this weekend at Red Morton Park, with the winner advancing to the Section 3 tournament.

Gibbs said there have been a couple of reasons the district has seen an increase in older kids staying in Little League. One was, the district simply put an emphasis on a Juniors division.

“We really started to feel that a lot of kids were quitting after 12 and there just was no reason for that,” Gibbs said. “We just weren’t putting enough energy into that next level, so we just started pushing it.”

There has also been a dearth of opportunities to play youth baseball past 12 years old. As the likes of American Legion and Joe DiMaggio Summer League have dried up, it limited the opportunities. Babe Ruth remains an option, but the only other avenue is the club and travel ball route. District 52 is simply providing another opportunity for community kids to continue to play in their communities.

“It’s a really fun division and the feedback has been really good. Plus, I think there might be a little bit of club fatigue,” Gibbs said. “The message has really been resonating with the families. It’s about having fun and playing with your friends.

“These are middle schoolers who are about to go into high school and their entire sporting life is going to change.”

All the all-star tournaments begin the week of June 24, with champions being crowned the first week of July.

But before those tournaments start, the Minor and Major Superbowl tournaments take place this weekend. The Superbowl teams are comprised of players who did not make the regular all-star squads, but District 52 decided to give the others a taste of a championship tournament.

Those tournaments begin this weekend, as well, with game beginning Saturday. The Minors Superbowl tournament is hosted by Foster City at Sea Cloud Park, with the championship game scheduled for Tuesday, June 20.

The Majors Superbowl tournament will be held at Belmont Sports Complex with the title game slated for Wednesday, June 21.

It is the second year in a row that the two Superbowl championship games have been played on separate days. Previous, both title games were played at the same time. Last year, however, the Minors Superbowl tournament was smaller and ended a day earlier. This year, the two tournament finals were purposely scheduled a day apart.

“I really like having them on separate days,” Gibbs said, citing the ability for more families, many of whom may have players on both teams, to see both games and not having to decide which to attend.