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The Estevan KPC Mosquito AA Sluggers were winners at the Annual Legasse Tournament in Regina, May 15-17, 2009.

The Sluggers won 3 of their 4 round robin games before going to theChampionship game against the Regina White Sox. The Sluggers beat the White Sox 4-3 in an extra inning to capture the title!!

Mel Murray was an intergral part of Estevan Minor Baseball for 23 years, serving in different areas to ensure all kids had an opportunity to participate. He has been the heart and soul of this organization. At our last meeting, Mel was presented with an autographed Jason Bay (Boston Red Sox) jersey to thank him for his dedication to our club.

This picture was taken at the March 16th meeting (Mel on left, new president Kent Phillips on the right)

When you see Mel, say hello, and thank him for his many contributions to Estevan Minor Baseball!

They are the champions, sort of.

The Estevan KPC Blazers have the rare disinction of laying claim to the Prairie Midget AAA Baseball League championship without playing in the championship series.

The catch is that they will be sharing the title this year with the Moose Jaw Cardinals.

Estevan swept its best of 3 second round playoff series with the Yorkton Cardinals this past weekend, only to find out that the league final against Moose Jaw was not going to happen.

"I just got word that we can't agree on dates to play Moose Jaw," Blazers coach Mel Murray said Monday evening. "The dates that we can play they can't make it and the dates they can play we can't make it. So I just got a ruling from the president of the PMBL (Ron Knaus) that there will be co-champions this year"

The scheduled final was shaping up to be a strategic duel. Moose Jaw carved its path with defence, beating the Regina Athletics 3-2 and 4-2 in their second-round series. No slouches on defence themselves, the Blazers took the opposite approach. Estevan took a 12-1 decision Friday in Yorkton and followed with a 11-10 win Saturday afternoon at Lynn Prime Park.

"Westerns is the goal but it would have been nice to finish off the league and go in as league champs because we felt we had a really good shot at (it) but that isn't going to happen now," said Murray, who says the Blazers are just starting to hit their peak as a team. "It's just going to give us two less games to get ready for Westerns is what it does."

Midget AAA and Bantam AAA Westerns are scheduled for Aug.21-24 at Lynn Prime Park. Murray expects to know all participating teams by Thursday or Friday.

news

A good Haul for Westerns

(Courtesy of the Estevan Mercury, Aug.6, 2008)

Kent Phillips didn't have to look very hard to find the silver lining in a one-win showing by his Estevan Prairie Mines and Royalty Haulers at the bantam AAA provincial baseball tournament in Saskatoon last weekend.

"We finished 1-3 but we played some of our best baseball of the year," the Haulers coach said Friday. "We played very well compared to where we were at the start of the year. We were in every game that we played."

Most encouraging to Phillips was the team's 7-6 extra-inning loss to the top-ranked Saskatoon Blue Jays in the Haulers' tourney opener.

Estevan went on to beat the Saskatoon Braves 14-12, followed by an 8-7 loss to the Regina Pacers and an 8-3 defeat at the hands of the Regina Jays.

"That goes to show that we did play well enough to compete there," said Phillips, suggesting perhaps that the Haulers could be more than just the token host team when they host the Western Canadian championship starting Aug.21.

"At the start of the season our defence was our weak point and we spent a lot of time working on our defence and that came around," he continued. "We went from committing a half-dozen to a dozen errors a game and cut that to one or two a game. Then we spent the last few weeks of the season working on our hitting and that came around too."

As losers of the provincial championship game the Regina Buffaloes will attend Westerns as Team Saskatchewan.

Aiding Estevan's cause will be a pair of imports. Phillips is bringing Weyburn P/C Garrett Walbaum and Yorkton 2B/SS/P Troy Waggoner along for the ride in hopes of giving his team a last-minute spark.

"We'd be happy just to compete in every game we're in," said Phillips. "If we play defensively sound and hit the ball like we did last weekend we'll be fine."

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Luscar Cactus Park is going to be a busy area of the city this weekend as Estevan Minor Baseball is hosting the Saskatchewan Baseball Mosquito and Pee Wee AA Championships.

The Competition starts Friday and concludes with the championships in both divisions on Sunday.

Two Estevan teams, the TS & M Tornados and the A's will be competing in the Pee Wee division, while the KPC Sluggers will be seeking the Mosquito championship.

The Tornados are in Pool A with Martensville Mustangs, Prince Albert Cubs and Yorkton Cardinals.

The Estevan A's are in Pool B with Weyburn Youngfellows, Swift Current Indians and Lloydminster Twins.

In the Mosquito division, the KPC Sluggers are in Pool A with Weyburn Encana Oilers, Prince Albert Yankees and Swift Current Indians. In Pool B are Pilot Butte Broncos, Lloydminster Twins , Saskatoon Blue Jay Sluggers and Yorkton Cardinals.

A pre-tournament coaches meeting for Pee Wee and Mosquito teams will be held at the park at 10 a.m. on Friday.

The first games at 12 noon in the Pee Wee class will feature Estevan TS & M Tornados meeting Yorkton and Weyburn clashing with Estevan A's.

The schedule continues with games at 2:30 p.m. involving Martensville and Llyodminster and Swift Current and Prince Albert.

The Mosquito division will have games going at the same time. Weyburn plays Estevan KPC Sluggers and Yorkton plays Pilot Butte at 12:30 p.m. and Swift Current clashes with Prince Albert and Saskatoon plays Lloydminster at 2:30p.m.

Friday activities will end with the opening ceremonies at 5 p.m. and a skills competion one hour later.

On Saturday, action resumes in both divisions at 9 a.m. Other game times are 12 noon, 3 and 6 p.m.

Tie-breakers, if necessary, will be played at 9 a.m. on Sunday. The semi-finals start at 12 noon with the gold medal games at 3 p.m. However, if no tie-breakers are needed, the semi-finals will then start at 10 a.m. and the gold medal game in the Pee Wee division will start at 2 p.m. The gold medal game in Mosquito would start at 1:30 p.m.

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Even on a team that has won six of it's first 9 games in the Prairie Midget AAA Baseball League, Riley Spencer had an unusually hot start to the year.While most of Saskatchewan was still dealing with winter's remains, Spencer, along with Estevan KPC Blazers teammates Riley Panteluk and Derek Wallace, began the season a few weeks early by attending a week-long baseball camp in Phoenix, Ariz. at the beginning of April. The America's Baseball Camp trip was organized by Sask Baseball's high performance director Greg Brons to help develop and evaluate candidates for the province's 2008 Canada Cup and 2009 Canada Summer Games teams.

But Spencer says it also proved valuable in terms of getting a leg up on the competition for the 2008 season as a whole.

The highlight for both Rileys: The instruction they received from a number of former professional players, including Ben Boulware who played five seasons in the Chicago White Sox organization, Thomas Waligoria (Chicago Cubs) and Mike Baker (Cincinnati Reds).

"But not better coaching than you have here, right Riley?" Blazers Coach Mel Murray joked after overhearing Spencer recap the week's events.

"It was fun, a good experience" Spencer, who pulls triple duty at pitcher, second base and centre field for the Blazers, continued. "Except when our bus broke down on our way home and we were sitting on the highway in the middle of the desert for about four hours."

Brons invited 40 players to attend the camp, which also saw the Saskatchewan team get a taste of international competition by playing exhibition games against teams from Chicago and Oregon, among others.

While neither player felt they hurt their chances at making the Canada Cup team during the camp, both say their immediate focus is on the season at hand. The Blazers are hosting the Western Canadian Midget AAA Championships in August and eveidently have no plans to be "just" the token host team.

"It should be a good season if we keep our errors down," said Panteluk. "We should be in the top couple teams in the league."

The Estevan Blazers are off to a 1-2-1 start in the Prairie Midget AAA Baseball League season.

After drawing even with a 6-6 finish against the Regina Mets in their home and season opener on April 29, the Blazers hit the road this past weekend for 3 games in two days.

The Blazers won their game Saturday against the Moose Jaw Canucks on Saturday by a count of 16-0 before heading to Raymore for a double header with the Renegades on Sunday. *

Estevan was not as successful in Raymore, dropping Game 1 by a score of 5-1 and Game 2 by a 15-3 margin.

The Blazers currently sit seventh in the 11-team circuit and return home for their next action, a Thursday double header against the Moose Jaw Cardinals. Those games are scheduled for 6:30 and 8:30 PM at Lynn Prime Park.

The Estevan Tornadoes had an equally uneven weekend in Baseball Regina's peewee AAA ranks, falling Saturday to Pilot Butte 7-2 and then returning the favour later that afternoon with a 16-3 thumping of their own.

Austin Orsted picked up the win in the second game, with Connor Mack pitching two innings in relief. Orsted and Mack also led the way at the plate. Orsted went 3-3 with three doubles, while Mack was 2-2 with a double and a walk.

The Tornadoes will play a pair of double headers this weekend. Saturday against the Regina White Sox and Sunday against the Regina Pacers at Luscar Park.

The Estevan Sluggers Mosquito AAA team has the same schedule as its peewee counterparts this weekend, while the bantams will host Yorkton Saturday and the Pacers on Sunday only at Lynn Prime Park.**

*The Blazers played two games against Moose Jaw and won both giving them a record of 2-2-1

For the first time, Estevan's senior and older minor baseball league players will be able to play on a flood-lit field, thanks to a local volunteer effort.

Mel Murray, a king pin for minor baseball efforts in the Energy City, was on hand with a crew of workers on Wednesday morning, completing the installation of eight, 70 foot light standards surrounding Panteluk Construction field in Lynn Prime Park, the newest of two baseball diamonds on the north side of the city.

"There's a total of 44 lights on the eight poles, that meet all professional lighting standards for baseball fields," said Murray just before he grabbed a wrench to muscle down some bolts that would secure another tower of lights.

"We had some good volunteer effort here, equipment and guys from Skylift Services, Baxter Transport, Supreme Construction, PS Electric for the wiring, it's been great," he said.

The estimated value of the lights and construction effort would work out to between $200,000 and $250,000, Murray said.

The lights will now make it possible for more games to start a little later in the summer months and allow them to play past a sixth or seventh inning without having to be called on account of darkness.

Both the Panteluk field and the nearby Peterson Construction field, also located in Lynn Prime Park, will be used for this late summer's Western Canadian Bantam and Midget AAA Baseball Championships.

The park has also been the site of construction of new scorers' booths and a consession area as well as some grandstand seating to provide even more efficiency and comfort for ball players and fans.