Lums young again, itching to get started

COEUR d'ALENE - With five players returning to the Coeur d'Alene Lumbermen "AA" American Legion baseball program in 2010, they won't have to wait long to find out if they match up with the best in the nation.

"Last year, we were kind of a young program," said fifth-year Coeur d'Alene Lumbermen coach Lloyd Duman. "We've got young players again, but I'm excited about these kind of players."

Coeur d'Alene opens the season Saturday at the Dale Dahlgren Memorial Day tournament, facing the Glacier Twins at 2 p.m. PDT at Osprey Field in Missoula.

"It's a nice way to open the season," Duman said. "This is the fifth straight year we've opened there and we get to see a good selection of teams from Montana."

Back for Cd'A this season will be Matt Cade, Alex Krapas, Jason Pattis, Grant Curtis and Kaleb DeHaas.

The Lumbermen will use Curtis, Nathan Collier and Pete Hoffman as primary pitchers early in the season, with Jordan Anderson also expected to pitch when he joins the team after finishing school at Clackamas Community College in Oregon City, Ore.

"Those three will be doing a lot of the pitching early on," Duman said. "Jordan will get thrown in that mix when he gets here. We've got a large group of guys that will probably see some innings on the mound."

Behind the plate will be a mix of DeHaas, Joe Roletto, Alex Gunnerson or Matt Klepfer.

Along the infield, the Lumbermen will feature a rotation of Cade, Curtis and Collier at first base, Julian Burgess at second base, Mitch Bevacqua at shortstop and either DeHaas, Joe Roletto or Collier at third base.

Austin Kiefer will either play second base or shortstop.

Burgess just finished his first season at Whitworth University and Krapas returns after attending the University of Idaho.

"Burgess is a graduate of Lake City and Jordan (Anderson) has playing at Clackamas in their program," Duman said. "Jordan was hurt during the fall, but the coaches at Clackamas have been working with him and are looking to have him pitch in some capacity next year."

In the outfield, Coeur d'Alene will have Taylor Combo or Ransom Storm in left field, Pattis or Chad Nyquist in center and Krapas in right field.

Coeur d'Alene also travel to Omaha and Lewiston for tournaments, as well as host the annual Spokane/Coeur d'Alene Wood Bat tournament during the Fourth of July weekend.

"We like to play a lot of the teams from the northwest," Duman said. "We'll see some teams from the Seattle area and others at the (Omaha) event. We'll come back after the Spokane/Cd'A tournament and get into our league schedule. We get a chance to play teams from all over. It might look like we're playing teams from the northwest/midwest, but we'll have a team from California come to play us. This was kind of our goal - we wanted to see what it's like to play teams from all around the nation."

But it's the Omaha trip that Duman is looking forward to. It'll be the third time in four years the Lums play at that tourney.

"It's really exciting to be playing the final week of the College World Series," Duman said. "To be in Rosenblatt Stadium during that time - it's electric."

The tournament will take place during the closing week of the CWS and Coeur d'Alene will play in one of six pools in the Omaha area.

"It's going to be like 24-7 baseball, but the other nice part is that there is a lot of scouts at several of the games," he said. "It's really the best of both worlds."

In Coeur d'Alene's most recent trip to Omaha, in 2008, the Lumbermen won their pool before a rainstorm left them tied for second place.

Regionals, as well as the American Legion World Series, will be played in Spokane this August.

"It's kind of exciting," Duman said. "We work pretty closely with the Spokane league on the Fourth of July tournament, so to be involved with what is going on is exciting. It's really a nice thing for the entire region to get to see teams from all over the nation."

Coeur d'Alene hosts Prairie on June 8 in its home opener at McEuen Field.