If you wanted to see some great youth baseball action,then the Big League Dreams Sports Complex is whereyou should have been for the USSSA 4th Annual Bat

Wars Tournament over the weekend of April 30th throughMay 2nd. This bad boy had everything you could want for aweekend of fun including the world famous BAT WARS.That's right, SoCal was treated to a stop on the Bat Warsrollin' road show's 2010 tour. And what could make it better?How about prize packages for the winning teams fromLouisville Slugger?

“Our 4th Annual Bat Wars was our best yet,” remarkedJohn Gleason, Director of the tournament. “100 teams playedthe weekend of May 1st through the 2nd at all three Big

USSSA 4th Annual Bat Wars Tournament

Mid Valley Warriors

Tomateros de California

League Dreams parks in southern California. The weather was perfectand the Bat Wars event was amazing. With three previous years layingthe groundwork, word of mouth spread like wild fire. At Big LeagueDreams West Covina, the portable cages were packed with kids fromthe second the event opened right up until it ended at 5pm. Not only didmost of the 100 teams make their way from whichever park they playedat, but in addition to them, countless "walk ups" who were not even play-ing, made the trek to West Covina to try out the latest bats and checkout all of the vendors who were set up.

On behalf of Baseballfirst/USSSA Southern California, myself andCraig Ciandella, we would like to thank our partners at Baseball theMagazine and the people at Louisville Slugger who helped make thisanother great event. We look forward, as do our teams, to next year's

event.”In the 8U Kid Pitch bracket, the Mid Valley Warriors worked

hard for every win by defeating the Riverside Toros 17-2,Camarillo Storm 7-1 and Die Hards Baseball Club 3-1 to meetthe Tomateros De California in the championship game.Tomateros De California had a great weekend of their own byknocking out Damage Control 9-0, Die Hards Baseball Club 7-2 and the SoCal Outlaws 6-0 to make it to the final game. Thefinal game was a real nail-biter with each team scrapping foreach run. In the end, the Mid Valley Warriors took the trophy ina 4-3 contest.

Tomateros De California Team Mom Laura Gutierrez said,“Playing in the tournament was a good experience for ourboys. They love to play ball, they practice hard and put alot ofdedication and time into becoming better baseball players. Theteams we played that weekend were all good, competitiveteams and our boys all played very hard baseball. We thankour coaches for their hard work and time in making our teamstronger and we thank our parents for all their support!Together we all make a great team!”

The final results for the 8U were: 1. Mid Valley Warriors 4-0;2. Tomateros De California 3-1; 3. SoCal Outlaws 2-1; 4. DieHards Baseball Club 2-2; 5. Chino Hills Rays 1-2; 6. DamageControl 3-2; 7. Prime Time Stingers 1-2-1; 8. Camarillo Pirates1-2; 9. Riverside Toros 0-2-1; 10. Northridge Storm 0-3.

The 9U saw the Oakley Stingrays-Black take the bracket by

storm by defeating everyone they faced, including the ChinoHills Storm in the championship finals game by a score of 2-1.Final results for the 9U: 1. Oakley Stingrays-Black 5-0; 2. ChinoHills Storm 4-1; 3. Baldwin Park Roadrunners 2-1;4. SoCalOutlaws 2-1; 5. Bakersfield Renegades 2-1; 6. Riverside Toros 1-2;7. Murrieta Redhawks 3-2; 8. Oakley Stingrays 2-2; 9. Xplosion 0-3; 10. LQ Shockers 1-3; 11. SoCal Diablos 0-3; 12. SGV Cobras 0-3.

The 10U AAA bracket saw the OC Nitro go undefeated for theweekend and take out the Downey Gigantes in a 4-0 champi-onship finals game. Runners-up Downey Gigantes had a greatweekend by scoring twenty-seven runs and allowing twenty-eight.The final results for the 10U AAA were: 1. OC Nitro 5-0; 2. DowneyGigantes 3-2; 3. Renegades Baseball Club 2-1; 4. Game Over 2-2;5. SoCal Bulldogs 1-2; 6. Placentia Mustangs 0-3; 7. Red Raiders0-3.

In the 10U Major division, the SoCal Outlaws Elite took the driv-

ers seat and never looked back as they defeated the BakersfieldBombers 9-1, LV Hawks 1-0 and SoCal Stealth 1-0 to meet theOakley Stingrays in the championship finals. The OakleyStingrays were working hard themselves by knocking out theSoCal Stealth 9-8, Desert Dynasty Baseball Club 12-1 and LVHawks 5-4 to make it to the 'ship. SoCal Outlaws Elite still hadthe momentum as they beat the Oakley Stingrays 10-1 for thewin.

Coach Banales of the SoCal Outlaws told us, “We entered the2010 USSSA Bat Wars tournament in hopes of winning our thirdstraight Bat Wars title. The Outlaws are currently the #1 rankedteam in the Western Region and #3 ranked team in the nation.We started off pool play against a tough and scrappy BakersfieldBombers team and very good Las Vegas Hawks team. TheOutlaw defense and great hitting held both teams combined toone run while posting up thirteen runs to head in to playoffs withthe #1 seed. In the semi final game versus SoCal Stealth every-one watching knew it was going to be a great game and theboys did not let the fans down. The game was filled with greatdefense, outstanding pitching, and clutch hitting. It took theOutlaws nine innings and one run to defeat the SoCal Stealth 1-0 and head in to the championship game. In the 'ship theOutlaws started off on fire and never looked back versus a greatteam in the Oakley Stingrays. After four innings, the score was10-1 and ended in a mercy. The Outlaws accomplished yetanother goal with the 3-Peat Bat Wars title. MVP went out to Ian

SoCal Outlaws

Oakley Stingrays

USSSA 4th Annual Bat Wars Tournament

while Defensive MVP was awarded to TylerFreeman. It took every player on the Outlaw staff toget it done! Adrian Banales, Cody Freeman, ChrisJimenez, Nick Lugo, Mike Ortega, Gil Rodriguez,Elijah Vazquez, and Kyle Velazquez rounded off theOutlaw Roster. Next up, the Outlaws are headingout to Las Vegas and Texas this Summer in hopesto bring home another World Series title.”

The final results for the 10U Major were: 1.SoCal Outlaws Elite 4-0; 2. Oakley Stingrays 3-1; 3.LV Hawks 2-2; 4. SoCal Stealth 2-2; 5. DesertDynasty Baseball Club 0-3; 6. Bakersfield Bombers0-3.

In the 11U AAA, the Red Blaze burned up thebracket by taking out the Vipers 8-0 and theDesert Longhorn Baseball Academy twice (11-2and 3-1) to meet the SoCal Cyclones in the finalgame. The Cyclones, who were also undefeatedagainst Menifee Bulldogs 5-4, Desert Crush 8-3and SCV Titans 13-5, couldn't hold the Red Blaze.The Red Blaze took the final game 8-0 for all thebragging rights.

“This was our first Bat Wars and I was reallyhappy with the tournament until the end,” said CarlCruz of the Red Blaze. “The first game we reallyplayed good defense and pitched really well withCade Temple who threw two shutout innings andSamuel Subia who closed the game and we won8-0.The second game we started off slow with tworuns in the first three innings and then we finishedthe next two innings with a total of nine runs. ThenSunday, we knew we would be in a ball gameagainst the same team we beat 11-2. The kidsknew that the Longhorns wanted to beat them.They scored their first run and we came back withsome great defensive stops. Zachary Bushlingclosed the second inning with a 6-3 double play.Samuel Subia started the game and threw twoinnings. Reece Males came into the ball game anddidn't give up any more runs and we won the ballgame 3-1. In the championship game we knew theCyclones would hit the ball because they scored alot of runs in the tournament. I lost the coin toss sowe were visitors... we had the sticks. We scoredtwo runs in the first inning and four runs in the sec-ond inning, highlighted by Zachary Bushling's two-run homer. Then we scored two runs in the top ofthe fifth and closed the game. Cade Temple threw acomplete game only allowing two hits. We had agreat tournament and had a lot of fun.”

The final results for the 11U AAA were: 1. RedBlaze 4-0; 2. SoCal Cyclones 3-1; 3. SCV Titans 2-1; 4. Desert Longhorn Baseball Academy 1-2; 5.Meniffee Bulldogs 2-2; 6. SC Trojans 2-2; 7. DesertCrush 0-3; 8. Vipers 0-3.

In the 11U Major bracket, it was the SoCalOutlaws that took the trophy as they defeated theOakley Stingrays in their first game 6-3 thendropped the next game to the SoCal Xplosion 7-1.After picking themselves up, the SoCal Outlawswent on to win three in a row against the OCThunder 3-2, SR Valley Cats 9-3 and in the cham-pionship game, Oakley Stingrays in a close contestby a score of 4-3.

The final results for the 11U Major were 1.SoCal Outlaws 4-1; 2. Oakley Stingrays 3-2; 3.Team Anderson 2-2; 4. SR Valley Cats 1-3;5. SoCal Diamond Dawgs 2-1; 6. SoCal Xplosion 1-2; 7. OC Thunder 1-2; 8. Team Rawlings-Red 1-2.

In the 12U AAA, Mizuno Elite took the win in theChampionship game 6-0 over runners-up California Stars. Thiswin was one of many for the scrappy Mizuno team who defeat-ed the Palm Desert Scrubs 4-2, Desert Bulldogs 12-0 and theSR Valley Cats en route to the final game.

The final results for the 12U AAA were: 1. Mizuno Elite 4-0;2. California Stars 3-2; 3. Bakersfield Inferno 2-0-1; 4. SR ValleyCats 2-3; 5. Temecula Valley Heat 2-1; 6. Palm Desert Scrubs 1-2; 7. LV Desert Crush 1-2; 8. SoCal Arsenal 2-2; 9. Young Gunz2-2; 10. Desert Bulldogs 0-2-1; 11. OC Heat 0-3.

In the 12U Major, the Tomateros De California ruled supremeas they rolled over SoCal Bombers 11-0, SoCal Smash twice(5-2 and 2-1) and Bomberz Baseball 3-1 en route to the cham-pionship finals game. In the final game, Tomateros De Californiabowed up and took out the Las Vegas Warriors-Red 7-1 for thewin.

The final results for the 12U Major were: 1. Tomateros DeCalifornia 5-0; 2. Las Vegas Warriors-Red 4-1; 3. Palm DesertCrush 3-1; 4. Bomberz Baseball 3-1; 5. Temecula Irish 1-2; 6.Oxnard Sharks 1-2; 7. SoCal Centurions 1-2; 8. SoCal Smash0-2-1; 9. Tomateros-Maroon 2-2; 10. SoCal Bombers 1-2-1; 11.Santa Clarita Mudcats 0-3; 12. Santa Barbara Riptide 0-3

The 13U AA bracket was dominated by the Santa ClaritaCrush who scored forty-five runs and only allowed three runsfor the weekend. The Crush rolled over the Riverside Titans 4-3,Lake Forest Broncos twice (12-0 and 10-0) to meet the very

Red Blaze

SoCal Cyclones

USSSA 4th Annual Bat Wars Tournament

Page 1 • Baseball The Magazine • Issue 2 2010

tough Riverside Titans in a rematch for all the marbles in thechampionship game. The final game was a blowout with the SantaClarita Crush taking the win 19-0.

The final results for the 13U AA were: 1. Santa Clarita Crush 4-0;2. Riverside Titans 3-2; 3. CA Lookouts 2-1; 4. Lake Forest Broncos1-3; 5. SoCal Bandits 1-2; 6. Total Baseball 0-3.

The OV Kings took the win in the 13UAAA bracket by defeatingthe Santa Barbara Tides by one run in the final game with a score of12-11. Runners-up Santa Barbara Tide had a great weekend bybringing in thirty-two runs and only allowing eighteen in tournamentplay.

Final results for the 13 AAA were: 1. OV Kings 3-2; 2. SantaBarbara Tides 3-1; 3. HD Hit Squad 2-1; 4. Patriot BBC 1-2; 5. AltaLoma Storm 0-3.

The 13U Major bracket was led by the EMBA Elite who defeatedVictory Athletics 15-7, SoCal Stealth San Diego 11-4 and SoCalOutlaws 7-1 on their way to the ‘ship to meet the Victory Athletics ina second showdown. The second time was also a charm for theEMBA Elite who defeated the Victory Athletics 8-0 for the trophy.

The final results for the 13U Major were: 1. EMBA Elite 4-0; 2.Victory Athletics 3-2; 3. Tustin Knights Baseball Club 2-1; 4. SoCalOutlaws 2-2; 5. SoCal Stealth San Diego 0-3; 6. SoCal Rush 0-3.

In the 14U Major bracket, Lightning Baseball ruled the diamond inspite of dropping their first game to the Tomateros De California 6-1.The team dusted themselves off and went on to take the next fourgames in a row by beating the Palm Desert Valley Cats 7-4, Coyotes5-1, Tomateros De California (in a second meeting) 10-2 andDiablos in the championship finals game 15-9 to take the braggingrights for the next year.

The final results for the 14U Major were: 1. Lightning Baseball 4-1; 2. Diablos 4-1; 3. Tomateros De California 2-1; 4. Murrieta ValleyHurricanes 1-3; 5. Coyotes 1-2; 6. SoCal Mavericks 1-2; 7. PalmDesert Valley Cats 0-3.

SoCal Outlaws

Oakley Stingrays

USSSA 4th Annual Bat Wars Tournament