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Hundreds of young ballplayers participated as Noon Optimist Little League had its opening ceremony March 26 at Noon Optimist Park, and parents were on hand to watch their kids play.
“We have all the kids out here just to recognize them for the season,” Noon Optimist Board President Caleb Grant said. “We have about 440 kids this year and about 35 teams in total in all age groups. We are trying to get those numbers back to pre-COVID. We haven’t been able to have an opening ceremony in the last two seasons because of that. So we are excited to get back out here, get things back to normal and watch Roswell baseball.”
Grant is the head of the Noon Optimist board that organized the opener.
“We are kicking off our season for spring ball and we’ll play from now until June for the regular season,” he said. “There will be some postseason tournaments and some all-stars that will go into July.”
E.J. Martinez is one of the Little League coaches for the Majors Cubs team. Along with him was Mark Dodson.
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“We have a great turnout today,” Martinez said. “There is a ton of parents out here, grandparents supporting the kids. Awesome group of kids and all of them are learning. We got kids at different levels. It’s been great just to work with them and help them develop. We’ve just been blessed with a really good group of kids.”
Dodson thanked the entire Noon Optimist board for the event and the amount of work put into the opener.
“From the equipment managers to the field guide, to the uniforms, it takes a lot of work to put this together in a short amount of time,” Dodson said. “They all do it free of charge as volunteers. It’s really cool. None of this would’ve happened without them.”
Dodson has been involved with Noon Optimist Little League for 30 years and said he’s been playing on the Noon Optimist field since he was a young child.
“I’m 43 years old and I’ve been playing on this field since I was seven,” Dodson said. “We’ve been doing opening ceremonies since then, so it’s been a long time. I bet you it’s been going for 50 years.”
Alex Trujillo is a grandfather who came to see his grandson play in the opening ceremony. Trujillo drove all the way from Albuquerque to support his grandchild.
“For the grandkids, we do it quite often,” Trujillo said in regard to the 3-hour drive from Albuquerque to Roswell. “We are here this weekend and we’ll be back again next weekend. We try to get here as often as we can to watch as many games as we can while we’re here.”
Austen Hargrave is a parent who came to watch his son play for the Majors Cardinals. Hargrave said he hopes to see development in his son’s game.
“I hope to see some development in his skills in the field, especially in the outfield and his batting,” Hargrave said. “He’s worked hard on it in the last few years and it’s good to see his improvement.”
Hargrave has been keeping up with his son’s baseball since his son was 6 years old.
“I like seeing the kids grow together,” Hargrave said. “You really see it click with the kids and you see that fire when they learn to love baseball. It’s here. It’s not watching it on TV. Not watching it in person. It’s growing up playing the sport.”
Sports reporter Blynn Juliano Beltran can be reached at 575-622-7710, ext. 304, or sports@rdrnews.com.
The Link LonkApril 03, 2022 at 11:01AM
https://www.rdrnews.com/2022/04/02/noon-optimist-little-league-holds-opening-ceremony/
Noon Optimist Little League holds opening ceremony - Roswell Daily Record
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