Different, but the same game

It has been a different year in the area for American Legion baseball.

Whether it be some teams playing a limited schedule, or playing with a smaller roster, give them credit.

They hadn’t given up.

STARTING FRIDAY, the three teams in the Class AA North Idaho League — Coeur d’Alene, Prairie and tournament host Lewis-Clark — were scheduled to open a double elimination tournament at Harris Field in Lewiston.

But back to that abbreviated schedule.

Coeur d’Alene (5-4), with 11 players on its roster, canceled Tuesday’s North Idaho League doubleheader at Lewis-Clark and opted out of the Area A (district) tournament. The tourney will now be a best-of-3 game series between Prairie and Lewis-Clark starting on Friday, with a doubleheader scheduled for 4 p.m. An if-necessary game is scheduled for Saturday at 11 a.m.

The Lumbermen had 11 players on the roster this year, one of which — Caleb Beggerly — committed to play football at NAIA Montana Tech in Butte this fall. Jackson Sumner, another Lums player, just wrapped up his freshman year at Big Bend Community College in Moses Lake.

Prairie is 7-23, but holds a win over Lewis-Clark earlier this year.

Lewis-Clark is 13-18.

Only the top team from this year’s Area A tournament advances to the state tournament starting next Friday at Stampede Park in Nampa.

It wasn’t that long ago when districts often required a four-day tournament, with teams from Cranbrook and Trail in British Columbia also competing. Those teams chose to leave the league due to travel and instead compete in leagues in Washington.

A few years ago, Northern Lakes fielded a AA team, and even Sandpoint has played some years as a AA team, making things a little more competitive within the area. Both are playing as Class A teams this year.

At the lower level, area teams have also had some success in recent years, with Coeur d’Alene’s A team advancing to a regional tournament last summer.

And who knows, next year things can change with those younger kids coming up to play at the higher level.

IF YOU claim to be a fan of baseball, you have a few memories of the All-Star Game.

There’s more than a few that jump out in my memory.

Although some of the better ones have nothing to do with the game.

Usually as the best players in the American and National League squared off, I’d be on a family vacation along Swan Lake, 20 miles outside of Bigfork, Mont.

Watching on television was a little more difficult back then, as we’d tune in on a 10-inch portable television that a relative had brought and hooked up to rabbit ears.

In 1989, while watching the telecast from Anaheim, I watched as Bo Jackson and Wade Boggs hit back-to-back home runs to start the game as the American League beat the National League that year.

When the game was played in San Diego in 1992, I sat and watched again as the American League beat the National League again.

Being a kid, sometimes my attention turned to something else throughout the game, but watching the best of the best in each league play against each other — at least then — was special.

Back then, the idea of interleague play was a few years off and the teams in each league just played against each other, making the game a little more special.

Now, it might be just another game to some, but it’s still something worth tuning in for.

No matter where you’re at.

Jason Elliott is a sports writer for the Coeur d’Alene Press. He can be reached by telephone at (208) 664-8176, Ext. 2020 or via email at jelliott@cdapress.com. Follow him on Twitter @JECdAPress.