By Avonlea Cummings
Hometown Weekly Reporter
American Legion Baseball has been around since 1925; it’s America’s favorite pastime during the hot summer days. The Medfield Post 110 team has a fresh face this season, with many players still gaining new experiences on the field. The boys closed out their home game schedule Wednesday, July 5th, in a competition against Norton.
It is a season of growth and development this year for the Medfield Post 110 team, and head coach Robert Mintz couldn’t be prouder of how much the team has achieved this summer.
“These guys, I try to tell them to play within themselves, to try their best, and to learn each time they’re out there, having a positive attitude. I can say that this has been a successful season because these guys show up. It is tough to show up and play, knowing that when you make a mistake and dig a hole, it’s really hard to get out of it.
Baseball is a chance for opportunities; the best teams in baseball lose a third of their games. The worst teams of baseball have their days of brilliance. Of course, the goal is to win every game, but if you do it long enough, you might win it all,” said Mintz.
Norton made a fiery start to the competition in the first few innings at Schilling Field, although the Medfield boys began to make their comeback by the seventh inning with all bases loaded. Unfortunately, it wasn’t enough time to surpass Norton’s lead.
“I told the boys that yes, we lost, but don’t lose the lesson; there’s always something to learn every time. It’s a game of errors, things happen with physical and mental mistakes, and we made our share today, getting early outs, but all of a sudden, towards the end, we started getting guys on base. Every inning is a new opportunity; as I said, they all have had baseball experience, but none have had legion baseball experience; it can be a high-quality game. I’m just teaching so that they will be interested still later on,” said Mintz.
Mintz has been the head coach for the Medfield Legion Baseball team for 21 seasons now and has expressed the growth he has seen from teams similar to this year’s, and he showed excitement for what is to come ahead.
“We haven’t won a game yet, although we have been close on a number of games, tying, going to ten innings, etc. Apart from that is that all seventeen of our players are new to this game; we don’t have one veteran on our team this year; it’s the first time in 21 years. It reminds me of 21 years ago when I first took over; we had all sophomores going against high school seniors and college students. We showed up at every game, and two years later, we made the playoffs and knocked off number one Milton,” reflected Mintz.
