In Williamsport, the Mets find connection and confidence

New York Times

15 hours ago

WILLIAMSPORT, Penns. — The town's unofficial motto adorns a hat in the team store at Bowman Park.
It all begins in Billtown.
Birthplace of Little League baseball, epicenter of the youth sports world each August. For 20 Little League teams, an unforgettable summer journey ends in Williamsport. For the Mets on Sunday, their hopes of a late-season sprint into an unforgettable autumn start here.
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Sunday was a chance to recalibrate for New York — to change the mood from a wretched recent stretch of baseball by changing the environs.
So pay a kid $10 to park in their yard, wrap a plastic patio chair around your back and tuck the sturdiest piece of cardboard you own under your arm. You'll hear a dozen languages, just as many accents and shouts for autographs and selfies around every turn. You'll wait in line for ice cream behind kids from Aruba, Tokyo and Fairfield — all of whom will get the same flavor.
Let's change it up.
No part of a day filled with planned interaction feels more choreographed than the way it opens. The Mets' team plane landed at Williamsport Regional Airport just ahead of 10:30 a.m. after a 35-minute flight. Once it taxied and the engines were shut down, a trio of buses toting Little League teams from Las Vegas and Venezuela pulled up to form a welcoming line.
Yet genuine moments can spring from that design.
As Carlos Mendoza worked his way down the line, he spotted the orange uniforms of the Venezuelan squad, the one in Monday's international quarterfinals.
'Barquisimeto?' he asks, his face lighting up.
He'd learned that morning that the team was from his hometown. And so Mendoza spent a little extra time in the line coming off the plane and a lot more later at Volunteer Stadium in the stands, finding common ground with another generation.
'It was really cool just to talk to some of the coaches and kids, asking what part of town they're from, sharing my experiences – 'Oh, I used to play on that Little League field,'' Mendoza said. 'It just brings you back so many memories when you were that age.'
Sitting in the stands while Canada mercy-ruled Australia, Mendoza was reminded of what those games sounded like as a kid.
'Just the joy even from the stands,' he said. 'Especially where I'm from, it's pretty intense. It's loud, we've got trumpets, we've got drums, mom is singing. Just listening around the kids and the atmosphere, it took me back. Way back.'
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The Little Leaguers did well to return the favor, peppering the major-league game that night with chants for specific players — and not always the ones at bat. Sitting right behind the Mets dugout, the Venezuelan team led the way.
'It took me back to where everything started,' said Francisco Lindor, who had three more hits in the game. 'It took me back to why I play the game.'
The hill is four flights of steps from concourse level, which is itself raised above the field. What looks simple enough on TV grows in your mind as you ascend those steps and as a kid excitedly hands you a slab of cardboard with grass stains on one side.
'When I got to the top and looked down,' Tyrone Taylor said, 'I was like 'Ooh.''
'I faced my fears today,' said Mark Vientos, who may have required a push to start down. 'That was a childhood dream of mine to go down that hill. But I was nervous.'
'I was a little nervous at first,' said Sean Manaea, 'but once I started going down, I felt like a kid again.'
You could even pinpoint the moment Manaea could let go, when he stopped gripping the sides of a cardboard car and raised his arms gleefully.
How did Mendoza feel about his players, including a starter who'd missed three months, sliding down a hill?
'Mixed feelings,' the manager laughed. 'They're being who they are and just having fun with the kids and interacting and going through the whole experience.'
'Maybe I probably shouldn't have done that,' Manaea said. 'But when in Rome, I guess.'
Few Mets embraced the festivities as much as the left-handed pitcher. Informed en route of the practice of pin trading, he decided he'd spend the day amassing as many pins as possible. They donned his royal blue jersey as he fist-bumped the kids from Honolulu during their introductions, and he proudly pulled out a small sandwich bag — '#59' in marker on top, like the ones that used to hold your lunch money — with at least 10 in there.
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'I got Dugout,' he said earnestly of the Little League World Series' mascot, 'which is pretty cool.'
Even after 4 p.m., he had his eyes out for more. When he was introduced along the first-base line, he wore those pins around his neck.
'I saw this on TV as a kid and thought it would be a lot of fun to go to. It's the first time I saw kids on TV competing,' Manaea said. 'I'm finally here. I just soaked it all in.'
The first Sunday at the Little League World Series is known, informally, as 'Stayin' Alive Sunday.' There are four games here, all in the losers' bracket of this double-elimination tournament, and so every loss ends a team's dream. Braintree, Massachusetts; Brisbane, Australia; Clarendon Hills, Illinois; and Arraijan, Panama all fell on Sunday. With seven days to go, the tournament is down to 12 teams.
The stakes were not as immediate for the Mets, but they too are hoping to make a tournament of 12. Playing a home game 200 miles from home served them well: Their 7-3 win was one of their crisper games in weeks, and it clinched a series win for the first time in the last six tries. Their offensive approach, Lindor explained, derived some from conversations with Little Leaguers about keeping it simple.
'When we're going well,' said Vientos, whose three-run homer opened the lead up, 'it's very simple.'
This can all be fun, Sunday reminded the Mets, especially when you win. The other motto of Williamsport, the official one? 'The will is in us.'
'When you have something that breaks up the day-to-day, it jolts you,' Manaea said. 'I find a lot of this stuff really fun, so I'm here for it.'
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