Sports

Palmer, Wasilla Legion baseball teams forced to combine squads

A lack of players has forced a pair of American Legion baseball teams in the Mat-Su to once again combine into a single squad.

Legion Posts 35/15 manager Jamie Mayo said Tuesday that a plan to have two teams in the Valley – one representing Palmer (Post 15) and another in Wasilla (Post 35) – had to be scrapped after neither team could field a team.

"The bottom line is the Palmer Post 15 and Wasilla Post 35 had to combine because both of us had three different tryouts and Palmer had I think 10 guys, and at one point we had 14 guys that tried out," Mayo said in an interview June 30 from the North Slope, where he works two weeks on, two weeks off as a security guard.

Mayo said Legion rules require at least 12 players on an active roster, meaning two teams wasn't viable.

"Neither of us had enough players," he said.

Mayo said he and Palmer manager Gary Skan did everything they could to recruit players, to no avail.

"We were talking to everybody we could talk to," he said.

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The combined team now wears the uniform previously worn by the Wasilla Road Warriors, which for about 15 years prior to this season was the only team in the Valley.

Steve Nerland, President of the Alliance for the Support of American Legion Baseball in Alaska, said Wednesday that the league ideally would like to see two teams in the Mat-Su. He pointed out that there are high school baseball programs at Wasilla, Palmer, Colony and Houston High, and a fifth program is expected to start next year when the new Redington High opens off Knik-Goose Bay Road.

"We just want to give more kids an opportunity to play," Nerland said.

He said it's hard to speculate why both the Wasilla and Palmer teams weren't able to get the numbers needed for two squads.

"It's a big-time commitment, so sometimes there are players that are not able to make that kind of commitment," he said.

Nerland said the team was granted a one-year waiver to combine teams

Nerland said the plan next year is to again try to field a pair of Mat-Su sides.

"That's a one-year-only thing," he said.

The move was the latest in what's been a rocky patch for baseball in the Mat-Su. The Post 35 team was removed from the 2014 state tournament after using an ineligible player. And this spring, Myrl "Boone" Thompson was removed by the post as manager, a situation Mayo said has left lingering divisions within the local baseball community.

"There are still some people still upset with how that situation with removing Boone came about," he said.

Mayo said he and his staff – which includes Skan, longtime Houston coach Kelly Lyle, Caleb Palmer and Mayo's son, J.D. – are trying to focus on moving his players forward through the turmoil.

"Their only concern should be what we do on the field," Mayo said.

The off-field issues, he stressed, have nothing to do with the players.

"That's not their fault and they have nothing to do with it," he said.

Contact reporter Matt Tunseth at 257-4335 or mtunseth@alaskadispatch.com

Matt Tunseth

Matt Tunseth is a former reporter for the Anchorage Daily News and former editor of the Alaska Star.

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