ITEM PHOTO BY KATIE MORRISON
The seven teams competing in the Babe Ruth 15-year-old regional tournament, the North Shore Navigators starting lineup and the Lynn English junior ROTC stand on the field during the national anthem prior to the Navigators’ game Thursday night.
BY STEVE KRAUSE
LYNN — The city’s baseball legacy was on display at Fraser Field Thursday night as the Greater Lynn Babe Ruth welcomed the seven other teams playing in this weekend’s New England 15-year-old regional tournament.
Teams from Medford and Pittsfield will join those from Somersworth, N.H., Brattleboro, Vt., Apple Valley, Maine, North Providence, R.I., and Trumbull, Conn., beginning today at 10 a.m. The tournament, which concludes Tuesday with the regional title game, determines which one goes to the Babe Ruth World Series in North Dakota.
The welcoming ceremony was held prior to the Futures Collegiate Baseball League game between the North Shore Navigators and the Brockton Rox. It gave Navigators General Manager Bill Terlecky the opportunity to introduce players from all eight teams and have them run out onto the field. There, they listened to one of Lynn’s most renowned baseball players and coaches, Frank Carey, talk about the city’s athletic history.
“The great Harry Agganis played on this field,” Carey told the players who were circled around him on the basepaths as he spoke from a spot near the pitcher’s mound. “He was, and still is, a legend. He had a great career with Lynn Classical, Boston University and the Red Sox before he died tragically at the age of 26.”
Carey went on to tell the players that his high school teammate was the late Tony Conigliaro, another Red Sox standout who was the youngest player in Major League history to reach 100 home runs.
“I am proud to have played on this field with him,” said Carey, who, as the varsity baseball coach at North Reading High School, won more games than any other coach in the state’s history.
Carey also urged out-of-towners to go to the beach and to explore Lynn Woods.
After Carey spoke, Terlecky alluded to Ben Bowden, a Babe Ruth graduate who was selected in the second round of last month’s Major League Baseball draft by the Colorado Rockies.
“He couldn’t make it,” Terlecky said. “He’s pitching for the Rockies’ minor league system.”
Lynn’s Katie Burt, starting goalie for the national runner-up Boston College women’s hockey team, threw out the first pitch. Burt played on three Babe Ruth baseball All-Star teams when she was 13, 14 and 15, one of which made it to a state championship. In addition to having played for Babe Ruth, her cousin, pitcher Christian Burt, is on this year’s Lynn 15-year-old team that earned the right to play in the tournament by virtue of its Eastern Massachusetts championship it won last weekend.
It’s fitting that Terlecky was the emcee of the opening-night festivities. Terlecky was very instrumental in enabling the organization to use Fraser Field to run the tournament, according to Jim Beliveau, Lynn Babe Ruth president.
“He bent over backward for us,” said Beliveau. “He’s done so much.”
Beliveau and Terlecky share the view that hosting this tournament is a way to showcase Lynn in a positive light.
“People who don’t know any better seem to have an awful lot to say about Lynn,” Terlecky said. “This is an opportunity to show off the city to other communities, not only in Massachusetts but throughout the region.
Beliveau praised the kids of Lynn.
“There are a lot of great things being done here, especially when you look at these facilities (Fraser and Manning fields),” he said. “This is huge for the city. People can come in see what we’re really like and ignore all that other stuff.”
The state Babe Ruth commission considered Lynn’s application to host the tournament because Lynn is very deserving, said Bill Amenti, one of the commissioners, a former Wyoma Little Leaguer who now lives in Westfield.
“They’re one of our most solid organizations,” he said. “They’ve hosted tournaments and won a lot of them. This is very deserved.”
Still, the Lynn organization had to go through hoops to satisfy the state commission that it was up for this.
Beliveau and the committee had to submit pictures of the Fraser Field facility, the seating, the parking and the overall area.
“And then, for whatever reason, we had to give them more stuff,” said Leon Elwell, manager of the 15-year-old team that will compete in the tournament.
There will be four games daily today through Sunday at 10 a.m., 1, 4 and 7 p.m. The semifinal games are scheduled for Monday at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m., with the championship game Tuesday at 11.
Lynn’s first game is tonight (7) against Western Mass. champion Pittsfield.
Steve Krause can be reached at [email protected].