Fans Wave Little Leaguers Home

Grinning, dazed and blinking into a crush of television cameras, America’s new Little League champions returned home Sunday night to a raucous crowd of family and friends from Mission Viejo delirious to have them back.

“I don’t know if we can express in words how proud we are of them and what they’ve done for Mission Viejo,” said Marci Glidden, a Little League organizer and one of the 200 members of the screaming, flag-waving welcoming party at Los Angeles International Airport. “They’ve not only put us on the map, they’ve brought us together as a community. And we’ll never forget that.”

Outfielder Taylor Bennett, crushed in the throng of supporters and forest of television cameras, said, “It’s awesome. I haven’t been home in three weeks, and I didn’t sleep at all last night.”

Pitcher and shortstop Adam Sorgi said, “It feels like we’re heroes. I don’t consider it a loss. We’re national champions. We’re just happy that we made it to the world series.”

Sorgi said he planned to go home and “jump on the couch I always jump on, and have as much fun as I can for the next two weeks before school starts.”

The return home ended a long day that began in Williamsport, Pa., where the 13-member South Mission Viejo team had missed breakfast but made up for it at lunch. Then they were quickly herded to the now-deserted Howard J. Lamade Stadium, where, just hours earlier, they had lost the biggest baseball game of their lives in front of thousands who watched them cry.

For seven glorious days, the field had delivered their Little League dreams. Home runs, crafty steals and impossible catches had brought them the national title. Team Manager Jim Gattis didn’t want them to forget it.

“It’s easy to remember that last moment you had on the field, the disappointment and the hurt that you all felt, that we all felt,” Gattis told the flock of 11- and 12-year-olds who huddled quietly around him on the grass. “But you must remember everything you did to get here, that just being on this field meant you were better than most, and that while you were here, you were standouts all the way,” he said. “You must not, you cannot, forget that.”

It was all Gattis, 44, would say to his team Sunday about being in the Little League World Series or the painful loss to Guadalupe, Mexico, in the final championship game. Instead, he let the team he has coached since its birth more than two months ago enjoy their last day in Williamsport, from which every other team had already cleared out, before going home themselves for the first time in 19 days.

But it was enough for the young players, who seemed comforted, lighter even, after the private conference on the field.

“I don’t know, I just feel different, don’t you, Gary?” asked pinch-hitter Andrew Nieves, 12. “Like the pressure’s off a little. Like we don’t have to worry so much now.”

Third-baseman Gary Gattis, the manager’s 12-year-old son, nodded.

“Yeah, sort of like the last day of school or something. Now, we can go back to summer,” he said, grinning.

Team members passed much of the time before their flight home playing serious Ping-Pong in the recreation room and dragging chairs around a television set, where they watched a grand prix race, a golf game, a Nickelodeon show and a water skiing competition in a matter of five minutes. Only one show warranted more than a quick glance, and when its actors filled the screen, several players alerted their teammates by shouting, “Baywatch!” They laughed as the others turned to watch.

But despite their relaxed smiles and boyish games, the players admitted some wounds remained. Hoping to cheer up center fielder Ashton White, who still blamed himself for Saturday’s loss because he fumbled the hit that gave the Mexicans the winning run, the team agreed to spend the bulk of the day at nearby Reptile Land, where Ashton, 12, had longed to visit.

“Most of us wanted to hang around [the barracks] and play ball or something,” catcher Adam Elconin said. “But we’re the ones who feel a lot better today. . . . We want everyone else to too.”

The crowd of soon-to-be seventh-graders drifted loudly through the park’s displays of snakes, turtles and iguanas and took turns petting a baby alligator and an 8-foot-long boa constrictor, which they desperately wanted to see “eat a rabbit or something.” They goofed off with a pair of hungry ostriches, filling their hands with special feed and sticking them through the fence, each daring the other not to pull their hands away when the giant birds, both of which stood taller than most of the players, started pecking.

“It doesn’t--ouch!--hurt,” said Ashton, who, as usual, donned a scraggly red and white Santa Claus hat given to him three years ago by his father, former USC running back and Heisman Trophy winner Charles White. “I don’t know why I wear it all the time,” he said, touching the fuzzy rim.

Taylor Bennett shrugged.

“We quit asking him what the deal was about that.”

After a few rounds of taunting each other with rubber snakes and spiders in the gift shop, after a second lunch of submarine sandwiches and cookies, after an impromptu but impressive magic show put on by their coach, the players returned to their barracks for the last time. A few packed, but most headed to the dining room for chicken nuggets and whatever else the cook offered up. Some milled around outside, chatting about the late-night pranks they mastered while bunking together for seven days, how they still had two whole weeks left before school starts, how they couldn’t wait to get home.

“It was the best summer of my life,” Ryan O’Donovan said. “Getting here to the World Series and almost winning, it was all pretty cool.”

Ryan’s teammates agreed, and suddenly found themselves repeating what their parents had tried to tell them the night before, shortly after the big game, when they were all so low and nothing seemed to help.

“We are the U.S. champs, you know,” pitcher Gavin Fabian said. “We won that, so we’re winners. You can’t cry back a loss. You can’t cry it back so you have to get over it.”

They were beaming under their baseball caps as they boarded the plane at Williamsport Airport. The pair of National Little League workers, called “uncles,” who had spent the week guarding the team’s living quarters and keeping them on schedule, watched the boys file through the gate. One player straggled behind, fiddling with a hand-held video game. Uncle Bill Castle hollered for him to hurry up. The player turned and waved back, giving the men one last thumbs-up sign.

“See ya!” Ashton White said, pulling the Santa hat firmly down on his head. He smiled and trotted down to the plane.