Easley Gives Players "World Series Experience" Each Year

Easley will host the Big League Baseball World Series for the 13^th year this summer.

This year's series will be held July 24-31 at the J.B. “Red” Owens Recreation Complex in Easley.

Easley Patch recently sat down with Stephen D. Keener, President and Chief Executive Officer of Little League Baseball and Softball, to talk about what makes the Big League World Series and Easley such a great fit.

The series had been held in Fort Lauderdale, Florida for about 26 years, Keener said.

As the original organizers in Florida began to retire, Little League officials thought it might be time for a new home for the series, Keener said.

“After 26 or 27 years, nobody really wanted to do it, but it was necessary,” he said.

The series moved to Tucson, Arizona, the home at the time of USA Baseball, a strong partner of Little League, for several years.

“It was a great venue, and we had good people helping us, but the weather,” Keener said. “It can't warm down here in July, but out there, it was a bit unbearable with the heat.”

The fit wasn't right in Tuscon, he said.

“The kids participating weren't getting a World Series experience from it,” Keener said. “It just wasn't the experience that we wanted the kids to have from it. We didn't have the community support.”

Officials began looking for a new home for the series.

“(Earlier) Easley had expressed interest in hosting a World Series here,” Keener said.

Easley had sent a group to Williamsport to explore the possibility.

“At the time, there just wasn't an opportunity to move a World Series,” Keener said. “So when the opportunity did develop, we went back to the folks in Easley and said, 'Are you still interested?' and they said, 'Absolutely.'”

After seeing the facilities in Easley, officials said, 'This will work,' Keener said.

“It made for a relatively easy decision,” he said.

There are several factors that made Easley appealing as a new home for the series, Keener said.

“Number One, the facilities are terrific,” he said. “Mayor Bagwell, his predecessor Mayor Christopherson and the City of Easley have done an outstanding job of developing the complex that we're playing on.

“It's pretty evident to me that the city leadership here understands the value of a strong recreation program for it's community ,” Keener continued. “My hat's off to them for having the foresight and the vision to develop facilities that made it appeal for us to bring an event of this nature here.”

Easley is of comparable size to Williamsport, Keener said.

“It's really kind of a small town,” he said. “Close enough to a metropolitan area, but far enough away that it kind of feels like a smaller town. Those types of communities tend to get a little more emotionally involved with an event like this. So you have terrific facilities and very spirited support from the community, which is important, because when the teams arrive here, we want them to feel like this is the biggest deal in town.”

Officials want all the teams to feel special.

“Obviously, someone's going to win the tournament, but we want all the teams to come in and feel like this is an experience we wouldn't get anywhere else,” Keener said. “And Easley demonstrated very quickly that they could provide that kind of experience.”

Keener comes down to watch the championship game when he can and his impressions of the people who make each year's series a success are “always terrific.”

“The World Series is our event; it's Little League International's event,” he said. “We're asking a volunteer group to kind of be our satellite arm and run this event for us. We're kind of asking them to do us a huge favor.”

Keener said the volunteers are outstanding from Tournament Director Jon Humphrey on down.

“Jon has built a very strong team,” Keener said. “They work hard, they put in long hours, but they do it with such enthusiasm. We'd be hard pressed to find another group that works as hard as they do and does as good a job as they do.”

Keener sees a bright future in Easley for the Big League World Series, which is awarded to the host city on an annual basis.

“Our intent is to be there for a long time,” he said. “As long as Jon is interested in leading the effort and the support from the community as its highest levels stays as it is , I can't see any reason in the foreseeable future why we'd want to relocate anywhere else.”

Mayor Larry Bagwell said Thursday that the Big League World Series generates about $700,00 in economic impact to Easley and the area each year.

“That is big time,” he said.

Keener said Little League is delighted that the host city benefits in such a way.

Easley also benefits from the media coverage of the event, Keener said.

“It's probably hard to put a dollar amount on what that means,” he said. “I would think it has to be viewed in a very positive way, the fact that Easley is the center of attention, in the eyes' of the communities that are coming here to play and , of course, on a national broadcast.”

“We get to be on TV all over the world,” Bagwell said.

Once again, the Championship Game will be televised, either on ESPN or ESPN 2, Keener said.

Keener said Little League International is currently in an eight-year contract with ESPN to televise the Championship Games.

“The quality of play at the Big League World Series is pretty good,” Keener said. “You're talking about some pretty talented teenage baseball players. You'll have some kids who are bound for pretty good Division I baseball programs, or kids who have been drafted or are going to get drafted at some point. From ESPN's standpoint, it fits into their criteria for what they put on the air. I think they really do like the Big League Baseball World Series because it's a pretty good quality of baseball at that age. It's a good event for them.”

ESPN's coverage provides exposure for that division of the Little League program, he said.

“Most people, when they think of Little League baseball, they think of kids that 12 years old,” Keener said. “They don't think of Big League. They don't think of Senior League or Junior League – they think of the kids playing.”

One of the goals of the organization is to find ways to “grow and promote the teenage divisions of our program,” he said.

“Certainly having the championship game of the World Series on ESPN goes a long way to help accomplish that,” Keener said.