LITTLE LEAGUE WORLD SERIES : Rain’s End Brings Smiles to Fans, Wins for Taiwan, Shippensburg

With the early morning sun came smiles and nervous anticipation.

With the removal of the infield tarp, a collective sigh of relief.

And when the players finally took the field Friday morning at Lamade Field, a crowd of some 7,000 baseball-hungry fans stood and cheered.

The 44th Little League World Series, having endured two straight days of rained-out baseball blues, got back on track Friday to the delight of nearly everyone in this live-for-Little League town.

The local favorite, Shippensburg, Pa., finally put away Mobile, Ala., 3-1, in a game that was suspended Wednesday with Shippensburg leading, 3-0, in the third inning.

And Taiwan had little trouble eliminating Ramstein Air Force Base, West Germany, 14-0.

Both games set up today’s championship semifinals:

Shippensburg will play Cypress at 1 p.m. (PDT) for the American title, one that will be televised on tape delay at 4 p.m. today on ABC’s “Wide World of Sports.” (If rain is forecast for game time this morning, the game may be played earlier, but will still appear on ABC at 4.)

At 7 a.m. (PDT), Taiwan will meet Trail, British Columbia, for the international title. The game will be televised, but only in Taiwan by Taiwanese TV.

In the American championship game, Cypress (19-1) will be the home team, which is somewhat odd considering thatShippensburg is less than a two-hour drive south from Williamsport.

“There’ll be about 30,000 people here,” said Cypress Coach Ron MacDonald, “and 29,900 of them will be from Shippensburg.”

But Cypress, a team whose players say even now it’s difficult to believe they could get to Williamsport, is not complaining. Especially now that the weather has cleared.

“I’m just glad we have blue skies,” said Cypress Manager Gary Shelton, who has a bad cold. “I was starting to mildew between the toes.”

Cypress, which beat Brooklyn, Mich., 9-0, in Tuesday’s opening round, looks to have a tougher challenge in Shippensburg (16-0).

Although Shippensburg’s No. 1 pitcher, left-hander Bob Shannon, will not be able to pitch today because he pitched Friday (Little League rules state no one may pitch on consecutive days unless it’s to resume a suspended game), Shippensburg pitching coach Gregg Mellott said today’s starter, David Orndorff is just as effective.

It’s a scary thought for Cypress; Shannon (10-0) averages 15 strikeouts per game and had his fastball clocked at 75 miles per hour in Friday’s game.

“I’ve never seen two guys on the same team this awesome,” Mellott said. “It’s hard to believe sometimes.”

Cypress will start Bobby Brito, a 5-foot-2, 130-pound right-hander with power--he hit 40 home runs this year.

“Shippensburg was decent,” said Brito, whose brothers Gilbert, a standout senior quarterback, and Mike, a sophomore running back, will start at Western High School this fall.

“They have good pitching, but we’ve faced guys harder than that. We should be able to beat them.”

If so, Cypress would find itself in the World Series final, Sunday at 10 a.m. (PDT) , probably against Taiwan, which has won the title 13 times and finished second twice. One-hour highlights of the game will be shown tape-delayed on ESPN Sunday at 2:30 p.m. (PDT).

Cypress’ Shelton and MacDonald say they aren’t looking ahead. Today’s game against Shippensburg, they say, matches two similar teams.

“I think we’ll have a low-scoring game,” MacDonald said. “And we’ll need to be lucky.”

Said Shelton: “We’ll do our best, but even if we don’t, being No. 2 in the country won’t be such a bad thing. . . . Just the fact that we’re here in Williamsport is a great feeling. It’s like a dream. When you’re playing with the odds that there’s 2.5 million kids that play Little League baseball. . . . Getting here’s something.”

The rain delays forced a few position changes for Cypress. The team’s best pitcher, Kerry Cordero, who usually catches when he’s not pitching, was moved from catcher to third base.

Charles Cordero, Kerry’s father and Cypress’ pitching coach, said because a victory for Cypress today would put them in the final Sunday, and Kerry would start on the mound in the final, Cordero doesn’t want his son to wear out his arm catching.

“I don’t let my pitchers catch the day before they might play,” he said. “The catcher’s got to throw as many times as the pitcher, so we moved him to third base.”

Damon Katz, starting shortstop and relief pitcher, will catch.

While most of the Cypress players say they aren’t that nervous about today’s game--Shelton and MacDonald say they’ll go through a pack of antacids each--the team has grown tired of the intense media and fan attention.

Because of the rain, few teams have had any chance to practice, so when Cypress found a dry spot--under the bleachers--where they could at least throw, they went for it.

But after just a few minutes of practice, Shelton got a message that his team was to change into their warm-up jackets and caps, and report to the Little League complex’s dining room immediately for an interview with ABC.

“C’mon guys, back to the cafeteria,” Shelton said to his grumbling players. “ABC wants us.”

As it turned out, the players and coaches sat and waited for nearly 45 minutes before the ABC crew arrived.

“It was look in the camera and smile,” Shelton said. “Real important stuff. . . . We knew up front this kind of thing was going to happen; it’s just that we don’t really ever get a chance to practice.”

And when they practice, or eat, or swim in the pool, or do just about anything, the Cypress boys are often trailed by small packs of Williamsport girls.

“Groupies,” Shelton said with mock disgust. “They’re followed everywhere by 12-year-old groupies.”

Indeed. About six or eight girls followed some of the players for most of the afternoon. Many more were expected for Friday night’s dance held at the Little League complex.

“Yeah,” MacDonald said. “As one of the players put it, they’re busing in the babes.”

The attraction is mutual.

“They’re cuter than regular boys,” said 11-year-old Angela Shannon of Williamsport. “They’re cuter than Williamsport boys anyway.

“Oh, and I like the way they play baseball too. Good hitting.”

Not all Cypress players are impressed.

“Yeah, there are lots of groupies,” said Brito coolly. “But they’re not all that good-looking.”

In the stands, the fans at Williamsport have been understandably pro-Shippensburg. But they may even be even more anti-Taiwan.

In Friday’s game against West Germany’s Ramstein Air Force Base (all but one of its players is American-born), the crowd booed Taiwan often.

Especially when its manager, Wang Tzyy-Tsann, quickly replaced third baseman Hsieh Yih-Chieh after he made an error in the sixth inning. On ESPN, broadcaster Brent Musburger called the move “a little harsh.”

But, through a translator, Wang defended his decision.

“First off, he made an error,” he said. “And second, another player gets a chance to play. . . .

“The game of baseball is very beautiful--you can play it to perfection. That’s what we strive for.”