By Anthony Paradiso
The heat of summer is upon the heart of the Village and that means Little League Baseball’s opening act is almost finished. Greenwich Village Little League is the heart of Spring for kids in the lower west side, its innumerable teams and players aged 4-18 are preparing for a grand finale to their spring season.
President Peter Marino has led the Little League for eight years and he described how getting things back to where they were pre-pandemic has felt like.
“All the games are going well, and we’re excited to be back at full power. We’re 90 percent of where we were two years ago, pre-pandemic and we seem to have bounced back solidly.”
The league has the luxury of having close to ten fields across Manhattan to choose from, but there are always a few times where field availability is not there, and Marino says they “work around it by working closely with NYC parks.”
Friday, May 27 kicked off the Memorial Day tournament where little league teams from the Harlem Little League, GVLL and several others compete for tickets to a Brooklyn Cyclones game. The representatives from GVLL this year include four baseball and two softball teams but first it is important to recognize one of the Little League’s greatest past figures. That man was Carlo Saldana, who passed away in 2020 after a career with GVLL that “spanned three decades” according to the Village Sun.
“Carlo was one of our most important Boarders and coaches of the past 20-30 years and we’ve been honoring him for 2 year during our opening day ceremonies and [throughout] the year. We’ve dedicated the Angels in our majors division to Carlo’s memory.”
Giving the little leaguers a goal to shoot for like the tournament that will judge their abilities against other leagues is a fine idea that gives the parents and players something to look forward to (cold towels, drinks and timeliness as the great New York Yankee Hall-of-Famer, Yogi Berra always expected from his players). All things considered; the tournament is really a celebration of the work that goes into the spring season as GVLL President Peter Marino described.
“We organize this travel league for kids who [want to] play at a higher level and this is the core of our Memorial Day tournament. We form these teams out of kids who are enthusiastic and that have been playing on this travel team during the spring and they represent GVLL at the tournament.”
Parents interested in learning more about GVLL’s travel baseball and softball leagues should contact the league’s board but that is not the only news WestView has to offer. Next week, registration for GVLL’s summer baseball and softball season will commence and that season will run from ‘Independence Day’ July fourth until the end of August.
WestView News will continue covering the Greenwich Village Little league and will feature articles by parents next month. Please consider subscribing to learn more about summer fun in the Village, here in the sports section!
