Aliviado needed all the parents to contribute to the team throughout the summer. All the parents had to make sure the kids got to practices on time, six days a week. If they were not carting equipment or manning workout stations on the field, they had to make the potluck dinners that followed games and practices. Parents also needed to monitor their kids’ schoolwork, so that they would not feel extra pressure on the playing field. All a little backwards, that last thought, but essential to make a winning team.
“I’m just a simple guy and all I wanted was to work hard,” Aliviado says. “We had to agree that if we were going to do it, we had to do it the right way. If we go to the mainland, if we make it to San Bernardino, we go for baseball—no swimming, no distractions—because I don’t want to go back and say we should have done this and we should have done that. No regrets.”
The parents had to accept every single decision without complaint. The first time a parent complained about playing time, the more difficult it would be to deal with the other parents. Every kid and every parent had to accept his role, even if it meant playing the leaguemandated minimum of one at-bat and one inning in the field. If someone was sitting on the bench, it was his job to win more playing time by playing well.
Later that night, with both the parents and players sitting on the hill, Aliviado reached into a cardboard box and pulled out T-shirts for everyone. The T-shirt read “One Team, One Dream” on the front and “Work Hard, Play Hard” on the back.
Aliviado gave each of the parents one shirt and each of the players three shirts.
“If you accept this shirt, you have to be devoted,” he told them. Then he spoke to each player separately, in front of the group. He turned to Vonn Fe’ao. “Vonn, if you accept this T-shirt, you accept this goal that we’re going to do. If you take these T-shirts, you have to be completely on board, you have to do everything my way.” One by one, the players surrendered themselves to whatever Aliviado said to do for the sake of winning the Little League World Series. It was like they were all wading into a river to be baptized and born again.
Aliviado told the players to wear a team T-shirt for every practice. “I give you three shirts. On the fourth day, if you never wash it, you wear it dirty.”
“He was the captain of the militia,” says Ed Javier, one of the parents. “Everyone agreed and said they would help as much as we can. That’s where I give Layton kudos—telling parents that they have to accept whatever he decides about who plays.”
The West Oahu all-stars faced little real competition on their road to Williamsport.
They went 3–0 in the district tournament, winning by a combined score of 30–1. Then they went 3–0 in the state tournament. Here’s where they faced their first real competition. Pearl City is a longtime Little League power in Hawaii. In fact, the Pearl City Little League went to the championship game of the 1988 Little League World Series. But the West Oahu kids beat Pearl City 4–0 in the opening game and 5–2 in the championship game.
Cell phones were constantly buzzing during the World Series.
Then it was on to the Northwest region tournament in hellishly hot San Bernardino, California. Only one of the six games there was close. The Hawaiians beat Murrayhill, Oregon, 17–1; Ada, Idaho, 16–5; Heights, Montana, 26–7; and Diamond, Alaska, 10–0. Idaho gave the Hawaiians a one-run game, 6–5, in the semifinals, but then Hawaii crushed Idaho in the final, 12–1.
Hawaii outscored its rivals in the regional tournament, 87–19.
The best sign for Layton Aliviado’s team going into the Little League World Series was that every player on the team did something big at some point in the long run of tournaments. One day it was Vonn Fe’ao or Alaka’i Aglipay hitting a towering home run. Another time it was Harrison Kam making a diving catch he had practiced endlessly on his living room carpet. Another day it was the cousins turning a double play or getting a critical base hit. Or Quentin Guevara pitching a shutout. It was the ultimate cliché— everyone contributed—but it was true.
When it came time to play in Williamsport, the Hawaiians were determined to scare the other side before the games even started.
Opening Day of the Little League World Series attracted a big crowd because Hawaii’s opponent was a team from suburban Philadelphia. Fans came from all over the state to cheer for the Council Rock Little League. On the hills, placards spelled out the team’s hometown, Hollywood style: N E W T O W N. The air buzzed.
The Hawaiians lined up along the third base line for a game of synchronized catch. First, they were forty feet apart. They threw the ball hard, as if they were pitching or throwing out a runner. They moved to about sixty feet apart and snapped the ball harder. Then they threw from about ninety feet, and they snapped the ball harder than ever, their bodies turning over with every throw. Finally, they moved further back—100, 110, 120 feet—for long tossing. The arcs of the balls crossed each other.
Layton Aliviado then shouted and the players started moving together again, in stages, for the original game of snap catch.
The players then broke into two groups. Aliviado hit hard grounders to the infielders, who then threw hard to the catcher. On the outfield grass, Clint Tirpak sent players out for football-style pass patterns. The players darted this way and that, moving out and then cutting over for the catch. Then Tirpak hit them balls that take short, hard skips in the outfield.
Hawaii’s pregame drills sent a message. In San Bernardino, one opposing coach told his players to turn their backs to the field when the Hawaiians practiced. He didn’t want them to see just how good the kids from Ewa Beach were.
Pennsylvania’s boys did standard fungoes and grounders before the game. Their infield tosses were lobs. They knew they were outmatched right away. They wore grim faces.
“There was a real lot of butterflies,” Pennsylvania’s manager Bill Hartley told me later. “Us guys coming off that big win over Toms River [the New Jersey team that Pennsylvania beat in the championship game of the Mid-Atlantic regional tournament], it was hard to keep that emotion level up. Then we saw their ace and the kid with the long hair who threw rockets up there. It affected us.”
Little Harrison Kam made a crucial diving catch for Hawaii—and saw his catch replayed on ESPN SportsCenter’s “Web Gems” feature that week.
With Aglipay on the mound, Hawaii defeated Pennsylvania in the first inning.
Keith Terry, the starting pitcher for Pennsylvania, has a near-perfect delivery. Just one problem: as he moved into his motion, his foot shuffled along the rubber. The rubber shuffle unsteadied his body, which undermined his pitches’ movement and location.
To beat Hawaii, Terry needed to bring the ball inside once in a while. Hawaii is a team of hackers, with enough power to hit the ball out of the park. Most teams pitch Hawaii outside. But the Hawaiians then just move up and hang over the plate and reach those outside pitches. You can’t be scared against Hawaii. You have to burn inside and then get them to chase pitches outside.
Alaka’i Aglipay stepped up with a man on base. Terry got ahead 1–2. But Aglipay hung tough, fouling off three straight pitches. Terry came in again. This time, Aglipay got around on the pitch and sent a parabola down the left field line. The ball wrapped around the left-field pole for a home run.
Terry came in again on Michael Memea, who dumped the first pitch into shallow right-center field. Terry decided to come in again to the next hitter, Vonn Fe’ao. But the pitch was flat and Fe’ao took an extreme uppercut, smacking an arc over the center field fence.
Give Terry credit for the guts to go inside.
Bill Hartley regrets using Keith Terry against Hawaii. “I had more confidence in Darren Lauer,” he says. But Lauer’s father Robert convinced him to use Terry because he thought Terry could pitch harder and longer than his son. “Keith is not a real emotional kid,” Hartley said. “He goes out there like a robot.”
Thanks, coach.
Alaka’i Aglipay started on the mound for Hawaii. Manager Layton Aliviado sta
rted Aglipay in as many games as possible.
“The first inning is the most important,” Aliviado says. “We want Alaka’i for that. And then we can use him again against Iowa. And then we’ll pitch him the whole game against Florida—that’s the good team. That’s when we need him the whole game.”
Aglipay had no trouble with Pennsylvania. The first hitter, Ryan Hartley, dribbled back to the mound. The next hitter, Dave Pine, struck out on a check-swing. Then the team’s power hitter, Blaise Lezynski, hit a grounder to second base. A one-two-three inning.
Exeunt Aglipay, enter Quentin Guevara.
Pennsylvania played a desperate game all night. Hawaii scored three more times in the third. With two baserunners, Pennsylvania’s Daniel Denton leapt and caught Aglipay’s drive—but coming down, dropped the ball. A good throw to second base would have gotten Aglipay, but the throw was off-line. Then, with two men on base, Michael Memea hit a screaming line drive over the right-center field fence.
In the fifth inning, Pennsylvania fans tried to gin up enthusiasm. “Let’s go, Newtown! Let’s go!” they shouted. But they sounded desperate. Not fun.
Against Vonn Fe’ao—Hawaii’s hardest and wildest pitcher—Darren Lauer dropped a perfect bunt down the first base line. The next batter, Ryan Hartley, also decided to bunt when he saw the infield play back.
After taking a ball, Hartley got ready.
A fastball burned inside but Hartley kept his body inside. He stuck out his bat, his fingers wrapped near the thick part of the bat. The sound of the ball hitting his hand cracked throughout the stadium. In pain, he ran around in circles, turning his face upward and downward in grimaces. When his father came over, he was crying—and with his father miked for national TV, his cries were for all the world to see and hear.
The Pennsylvania side sucked its collective breath.
The younger Hartley moved slowly to first base as a hit batsman.
Mike Ludwikowski, the trainer, trotted to the field to look at his hand. Ludwikowski held his hand, turned it over, asked when it hurt, felt for broken bones. He felt swelling, but not a break. Bill Hartley wanted his son to run the bases, and Ryan Hartley wanted to stay in the game too.
Hawaii manager Layton Aliviado waited for the moment’s anguish to subside. Then he walked to the home plate umpire, Bob Claton. Aliviado pointed to his hands, making a bunting movement with an imaginary bat. The umpire nodded. He motioned to Hartley at first base and made a strike sign. Hartley’s dad came out again. Claton explained. Hartley argued. The umpire shook his head.
Hawaii’s Kini Enos, Hawaii’s shortstop and a team leader, swings at a pitch.
Claton ruled that Ryan Hartley should not get a free base but a strike call instead. When he was bunting, Hartley offered at the pitch. That’s a strike, whether the ball hit the batter’s hands or not. Hartley had to come back to the plate, with the count 1–1.
Panic and anger rose from the Pennsylvania parents. “That sucks, ump!”
“Go home, ump!”
“Get another umpire!”
Hey, blame Layton Aliviado.
Hartley could run the bases, but he couldn’t swing the bat. Michael Tentilucci came in to finish his turn at the plate and walked. The crowd came alive again. Blaise Lezynski laced a ball over Zachary Rosete’s head in right field, but Rosete reached over his shoulder and caught it—and then he threw a strike to second base for a double play.
That was the last rally for Pennsylvania.
After the game, Bill Hartley pleaded with the trainer to find a way to get Ryan back on the field. Ryan nodded quietly as the doctor showed him the broken bone on the X-rays. But his dad didn’t want to give up.
“His dad would say, ‘Jeez, isn’t there anything we can do to get him going again?’” trainer Mike Ludwikowski remembers. “When the X-rays came back, I put them on the board. I showed them where the fracture was, and he asked if there’s any chance. I said, ‘No, a fracture is a fracture.’ Then he was fine with it, but as time went on, people started talking and getting in the coach’s head, trying to intervene and ask for other possibilities.”
Of all the teams in Williamsport, Hawaii makes it hardest to pick out the stud player, the one player who’s going to overwhelm other teams with power. Vonn Fe’ao is imposing. Michael Memea, the catcher, is a big, strong kid, but he moves slowly and he swings and misses a lot. Pitcher/infielder Quentin Guevara looks like he’s going to fill out, but he’s a bean now. Sheyne Baniaga is small but has a powerful lower body. Kini Enos is wiry, quick. Others are tiny.
If anyone’s the team stud, it’s Alaka’i Aglipay. In the last year he put on twenty pounds and became more physically imposing. He plays football and has started to work out with weights. His father Jesse has made him into a project. They’re talking about playing pro baseball and training hard to make it happen.
Aglipay was one of just a few pitchers in Williamsport who could locate the ball within a baseball’s width of his target. Coach says throw an outside and low fastball a baseball’s width off the plate, and Aglipay throws it right there. Coach says throw the ball in on the hands, and the ball’s there. Coach says waste an 0–2 pitch, and the ball’s not going to slip across the middle of the plate.
Alaka’i Aglipay’s light brown face is soft, his almond eyes alert and relaxed. Even more impressive, his body flows effortlessly on the field. His legs and arms move like liquid, whether he’s pitching the ball or swinging the bat. In his practice swings at the plate, he scrapes his bat just above the plate as if practicing a golf swing.
Until two years ago, Jesse Aglipay drove a truck for Coca-Cola. Then he started having trouble with his heart and took time off. The doctors decided he had congestive heart failure and that he couldn’t come back on the job full time. Too much stress. So he’s out on disability, permanently.
“So now I have all the time in the world for these guys,” he says. The guys, besides Alaka’i, are twin sons Kana’i and Po’okele, who have just started to play baseball.
More time with the kids does not mean picking them up after school and watching practices. For Jesse Aglipay, it means taking Alaka’i out of school altogether and bringing him down to the field for practice every day.
For two years, Alaka’i Aglipay has been homeschooled. He sees a private tutor named Linda Sofa twice a week, for periods usually ranging from one to three hours. He spends the rest of the time working on his computer and with his books. Before he got the tutor, Aglipay struggled in school. He couldn’t keep his attention on what was happening in the classroom.
“When I started seeing Alaka’i, he was so undisciplined,” Sofa told me. “He had the worst study skills I ever saw. He didn’t have any idea what a due date was. He forgot his books. He forgot his assignments. I just wouldn’t let him leave until he got it right. I tried to use baseball to show him how to do things: ‘Listen, what if you went to the practice field and didn’t have your glove?’”
Aglipay still struggles with his work, but he shows more interest in studies than ever before. He says he’s fascinated by Greek mythology. His writing is getting better. Math and science remain a challenge, but even they are getting better.
The most important thing is that Aglipay has a goal. He wants to attend the Punahou School on a sports scholarship. Punahou is the ultimate sports school on Oahu. It’s golf phenom Michelle Wie’s school. USA Today has ranked Punahou the number four sports school in the United States, on the strengths of its many after-school sports and unmatched state championships won by those teams.
Aglipay played an important role in every one of Hawaii’s wins in the World Series. He pitched in four games, more than any other player in the event. He started the first three games of the series, going one inning in the first two and then shutting out Florida in the third game. And then he beat California in the U.S. championship game. And he was one of the leading hitters in the series, finishing first in home runs (three), second in runs scored (eight), and fifth in slugging percentag
e (1.133).
Vonn Fe’ao launches his body toward second base to break up a double play.
He wasn’t perfect. In his win against California, he walked five batters and left the game in the fifth inning. He was tired from the long season and lost about five miles an hour on his fastball. Still, he surrendered only one run and got the win.
After the game, he broke down crying. His mother took him to the parking lot to console him. The next day he was embarrassed at his outburst. It became a family joke. “I’m glad you weren’t crying on the mound,” Jesse teased him.
Everything Alaka’i does, the family is involved.
Before the state championship game, his arm was hurting. His aunt massaged him to get him ready for the game. “He had these muscle spasms that could have gotten really bad,” says Dawn Aglipay. “She told me, ‘I don’t see this in kids. It’s unusual. You better be careful.’ She took care of it. She used a Hawaiian massage called Lomi Lomi and he hasn’t had any problems since then.”
As much as things fell apart for Pennsylvania in the World Series opener, they came together for Hawaii. Aliviado was chipper after the game. He bounced off his chair in the front of the media room, directing questions to his players sitting behind the table.
“We never did scout the other teams,” he says. “People said they were good but don’t worry. But we always worry.” Aliviado is pleased that he can replace his ace pitcher early. “We knew we would have a righthander then a left-hander and then see what happens.”
Aliviado was gentle toward the injured Ryan Hartley, but doesn’t want to get caught up in the collective hurt and anger on the Pennsylvania side. “I just told him [Bill Hartley] it was sad that that happens but what can I say? I feel bad too, but that’s baseball.”
Aliviado took issue with a statement that his Hawaii boys are bigger than Pennsylvania’s players.
Little League, Big Dreams Page 10