2007 Little League World Series

Infobox LLWS
Year=2007
Start_date=August 17
End_date=August 26
Teams_participating=16
Champion=Warner Robins American Little League
flagicon|USAflagicon|Georgia (U.S. state) Warner Robins, Georgia
Runnerup=Tokyo Kitasuna Little League
flagicon|JPN Tokyo, JapanThe by|2007 Little League World Series, held in South Williamsport, Pennsylvania, was held August 17 through August 26. Eight teams from the United States and eight from throughout the world competed to decide the winner of the 61st installment of the Little League World Series. It was televised on ESPN, ESPN2, and ESPN on ABC. On August 26, 2007 the USA champion from Warner Robins, Georgia defeated the international champion from Tokyo, Japan 3-2 in 8 innings on a walk-off home run by Dalton Carriker to win the 2007 Little League World Series. This is the second straight year a team from Georgia has won the championship after Columbus, Georgia won last year.

Games were held in the two stadiums located at Little League headquarters in South Williamsport:
*Howard J. Lamade Stadium — the main stadium, opened in 1959, with seating for 10,000 in the stands and hillside terrace seating for up to 30,000 more
*Little League Volunteer Stadium — a newer facility, opened in 2001, that seats slightly over 5,000, primarily in the stands

Groups

Between five and sixteen teams competed in regional tournaments to progress to the Little League World Series, which varied from straight-knockout competitions (Japan) to the group/elimination format used in the United States. 2007 was the first year that Japan received its own regional playoff, with the Asia (Japan's former home) and Pacific regions merging to create the new Asia-Pacific group.

Infobox LLWSQualifiers
A1=flagicon|Massachusetts Walpole, MA
New England Region
Walpole American
A2=flagicon|Oregon Lake Oswego, OR
Northwest Region
Lake Oswego
A3=flagicon|Georgia (U.S. state) Warner Robins, GA
Southeast Region
Warner Robins American
A4=flagicon|Ohio Hamilton, OH
Great Lakes Region
West Side
B1=flagicon|Maryland Salisbury, MD
Mid-Atlantic Region
West Salisbury
B2=flagicon|Arizona Chandler, AZ
West Region
Chandler National
B3=flagicon|Texas Lubbock, TX
Southwest Region
Lubbock Western
B4=flagicon|Minnesota Coon Rapids, MN
Midwest Region
Coon Rapids National
C1=flagicon|Curaçao Willemstad
Caribbean Region
Pabao
C2=flagicon|JPN Tokyo
Japan Region
Tokyo Kitasuna
C3=flagicon|CAN flagicon|British Columbia Surrey, BC
Canada Region
White Rock/South Surrey
C4=flagicon|SAU Dhahran
Transatlantic Region
Arabian American
D1=flagicon|MEX Mexicali
Mexico Region
Seguro Social
D2=flagicon|TWN Taichung
Asia-Pacific Region
Li-Shing
D3=flagicon|NED Apeldoorn
Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) Region
Windmills
D4=flagicon|VEN Maracaibo
Latin America Region
La Victoria

Results

Pool play

The top two teams in each pool move on to their respective semifinals. The winners of each met on August 26 to play for the Little League World Championship. Teams marked in "green" qualified to the knockout stage, while teams marked in "red" were eliminated.

Ties are broken based on records in head-to-head competition among tied teams. In the event of a three-way tie for first place, the tie is broken by calculating the ratio of runs allowed to defensive innings played for all teams involved in the tie. The team with the lowest runs-per-defensive-inning ratio is ranked first and advances. Second place is determined by the head-to-head result of the other two teams. If the three-way tie is for 2nd place, the runs-per-defensive-inning ratio rule is used. The team with the lowest run ratio advances, the other two teams are eliminated.

USA

International

Elimination round

Round8-with third
23 August - 12:00 - Volunteer "(7 inn.)"|flagicon|VEN Maracaibo, Venezuela|2|flagicon|CUR Willemstad, Curaçao|4
23 August - 17:00 - Volunteer "(10 inn.)"|flagicon|JPN Tokyo, Japan|4|flagicon|TWN Taichung, Taiwan|3
23 August - 15:00 - Lamade|flagicon|Texas Lubbock, Texas|8|flagicon|Oregon Lake Oswego, Oregon|2
23 August - 19:30 - Lamade "(5 inn.)"|flagicon|Georgia (U.S. state) Warner Robins, Georgia|16|flagicon|Arizona Chandler, Arizona|6
25 August – 12:30 - Lamade|flagicon|CUR Willemstad, Curaçao|4|flagicon|JPN Tokyo, Japan|7
25 August – 15:30 - Lamade|flagicon|Texas Lubbock, Texas|2|flagicon|Georgia (U.S. state) Warner Robins, Georgia|5
26 August – 15:30 - Lamade "(8 inn.)"|flagicon|JPN Tokyo, Japan|2|flagicon|United States of Americaflagicon|Georgia (U.S. state) Warner Robins, Georgia|3
26 August - 12:00 - Volunteer|flagicon|CUR Willemstad, Curaçao|0|flagicon|United States of Americaflagicon|Texas Lubbock, Texas|1

Television coverage

For the first time, all 32 games of the tournament, from the opening pitch to the final out, were scheduled for a live telecast in the United States. All but one of the broadcasts were to be on either ESPN, ESPN2 or ABC. (The remaining game, the August 19 Pabao vs. Arabian-American game, was to be shown online on ESPN360, then shown the next day on ESPN2, but the rebroadcast on ESPN2 was canceled and replaced by live coverage of the rain-delayed NASCAR 3M Performance 400, and part of the game was shown live on ESPN due to a rain delay in the scheduled St. Louis Cardinals-Chicago Cubs game). ABC was to have its most comprehensive coverage ever, with games on both weekend days in the preliminary rounds, as well as both semifinals and the championship game for a total of five games. ESPN had 15 games scheduled for broadcast, while ESPN2 had 11. A number of games (yet to be announced) were to be shown in high-definition. [http://www.littleleague.org/media/tv_lineup_07.asp]

The expanded coverage was part of a new eight-year contract between ESPN, Inc. and the Little League organization that started with this series.

No international broadcast plans were available, but possible outlets included ESPN International and TSN (Canada).

Although the Western region champion came from the Phoenix media market, its local affiliate, KNXV, did not show Chandler's first round-robin game on August 18. Instead, ESPN interrupted its normal feed on Cox Communications and other local cable providers to air the game live in that area. KNXV was then to show the game on tape delay at 4:30 p.m. local time. [http://www.littleleague.org/media/tv_lineup_07.asp] Similarly, the game was also not seen on KTRK-TV in Houston, ironically an owned and operated station. Both KTRK and KNXV instead showed the National Football League preseason game between the Houston Texans and the Arizona Cardinals.

Play of the Series

The first game of the 2007 Little League World Series featured Walpole, Massachusetts going up against Hamilton, Ohio. The Hamiton struck first, scoring a run in the third inning. The score remained 1-0 until the sixth, when the Walpole team struck back, scoring 3 runs. Going into the bottom of the sixth inning the score was 3-1 in favor of Walpole. Hamiton responded by scoring a run. With two outs and a man on John Cornett stepped up to the plate. He got hold of a pitch and took it to center field. It looked like a sure walk-off home run, but Michael Rando was right there. He jumped, his back to the wall, and robbed the home run to give Walpole the win.

Notable sportsmanship

The walk off home-run by Dalton Carriker that won Warner Robins the LLWS was followed by the team coming over to embrace and comfort the losing Tokyo team. This event was given considerable press coverage [ [http://sportsbusinessjournal.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=article.main&articleId=57841 Little Leaguers find spotlight brings demands, responsibilities ] ] [ [http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/7555470 FOX Sports on MSN - MLB ] ] and was considered a breath of fresh air in a summer that saw the spotlight focused on the misdoings of Michael Vick and Barry Bonds [ [http://deseretnews.com/article/1,5143,695209242,00.html Deseret News | Little kids made it a moving moment ] ] .

Rules change

*The 2007 Series was the first to feature a new rule limiting a pitcher to 85 pitches a game and extending rest periods. Little League Baseball hoped that the rule would diminish stress put on pitchers' arms. [cite news |first=Genaro C |last=Armas |title=World Series Arms Race on Hold |publisher=New York Daily News |page=58 |date=2007-08-12 |accessdate=2007-08-12] The rest requirements are as follows: [ [http://sports.espn.go.com/sports/llws07/columns/story?columnist=kreidler_mark&id=2984633 New pitch-count rules have changed Series strategy] ]
** 85 pitches¹ - Maximum allowed for a single game
** 61 or more pitches - Three calendar days of rest.
** 41-60 pitches - Two calendar days of rest.
** 21-40 pitches - One calendar day of rest.
** 20 pitches or fewer - No rest required.

¹ If a pitcher reaches the limit while facing a batter, the pitcher may continue to pitch until that batter reaches base or is out.

Measles outbreak

One of the players on the runner-up Tokyo Kitasuna team was reported to have contracted measles before coming to Williamsport. The player, whose identity was not made public, contracted the virus from a sibling back in Japan in late July and was infectious while traveling. As a result, six people across three states were infected. The boy directly infected four people: a friend from Japan, an airport officer in Detroit, a woman who sat near the boy on the flight from Detroit to Baltimore, and a sales representative in Pennsylvania. The man subsequently infected two Houston-area college students. [ [http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5707a1.htm?s_cid=mm5707a1_x "Multistate Measles Outbreak Associated with an International Youth Sporting Event --- Pennsylvania, Michigan, and Texas, August--September 2007"] Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. February 22, 2008 / 57(07);169-173]

Coon Rapids hand spit incident

Two players on the Coon Rapids, Minnesota, club reportedly spit on their hands following their elimination from the tournament during pool play. Upon hearing of the incident, which took place as they got ready to shake hands with the victorious Chandler, Arizona club and was televised throughout the US on ESPN, manager Mark Lowe apologized for the incident. [cite news |title=MN Little League Club: Sorry For Spitting Players |publisher=WCCO-TV |url=http://wcco.com/local/local_story_237123725.html |date=2007-08-25 |accessdate=2007-08-26]

Notes and references

External links

* [http://www.littleleague.org/series/2007divisions/llbb/series.htm Official site with results and statistics]