Making Hawaii Proud

They’re just kids who love playing baseball, but after winning a world title they’re learning to live with fame

Wednesday - September 07, 2005
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much admiration, made us so proud. I had grandmas crying to me that don’t even know them, saying that they are so proud of these boys. The way they were so composed, full of honor and strength at such a young age.”

Mayor Mufi Hannemann also honored the World Champs with the city’s first Parade of Baseball Champions held on Monday in Waikiki.

“I’m proud of the fact that they showed that in life if you really want something you go for it and you don’t give up,” says Hannemann, whose brother-inlaw’s brother is Mack Memea.

“That’s why I said they’re going to be my first inductee into the No Scared Um Go Get Um Hall of Fame, which is for people who never give up.”

The parade also recognized the Oahu All-Stars, who won the Cal Ripken World Series, and the Hawaii Warriors, who won the Continental Amateur Baseball Association’s 9-and-under World Series.

“It feels great (to be the world champs),” says Layton Aliviado, team manager and head coach, whose son Layson “Kaeo” was the team’s leadoff hitter and first-baseman. “It feels awesome, great, good. What else words got? Stoked, superb, every good word there is, put it in. That’s how it feels. But it’s not for me, I don’t like all the attention to me, it’s for the kids.”

The team entered the U.S. championship game with a 11-0 record. They went on to a 6-1 victory over Rancho Buena Vista of Vista, Ca., for the national title and then to a dramatic come-from-behind 7-6 win over defending champion Curacao for the world title.

“They worked hard this whole season,” says coach Tyron Kitashima. “We never expected this, but we knew they could do it.”

“It’s still unbelievable to think you’re the World Series World Champions,” adds first base coach Clint Tirpak, whose son Ty laid down a key bunt in the sixth-inning rally that tied the title game. “And I think we didn’t realize the impact of it until we got home. When we were there you hear that people are watching, but then you get home and realize that it’s pretty big.”

About 35 family members and friends joined the team on the trip. For many, it was a struggle financially, but everyone agrees that it was all worth it.

“I have no regrets, not a doubt,” says Myron Enos about quitting his job as a truck driver for a local concrete business after being denied vacation time with or without pay to be with his son, Myron “Kini” Enos Jr. “This is a once in a lifetime thing. To be there with my son, and to see it from the stands with 20,000 to 30,000 people, the feeling is unbelievable. I really cannot explain it. It’s unreal.

“I’ve got a lot of offers from different companies. So I’m going to have to see what the money situation is. I send my kids to private school, and I used to make $50,000, so anything less and we might be in trouble. I was making good money, but my son is more important. I’m very proud of him. Looking back, if I didn’t do this I’d be so mad at myself. When I was up in Pennsylvania, this one boy from Canada, he looked at me and he tell me, “Excuse me sir, are you the father who had to quit his job to come here?,‘and I said yes. And he said to me, ‘You’re a dedicated dad,’ and I just wanted to cry.”

Then there’s Vonn Fe’ao, whose firey eyes and muted comments to a batter during the sixth inning of the world championship game became the buzz.

“I told (the batter) let me see if you hit the pitch,” reveals Fe’ao.

And the facial expression?

“I don’t know, what look?,” he says.

“He lie, he knows the look,” yells his oldest sister Angie. “It’s the I’m not going to lose look.”

And his mom knows the look too.“When I saw him make that look I thought, oh my God such an ugly face,” laughs Heather Fe’ao. “But I knew it was his determined face, but nevertheless it was still ugly. I’ve seen it before in football. Vonn is very competitive. He won’t go down without a fight.”

Fe’ao’s return home was especially emotional for mom Heather, who was not able to be with the team.

“When I saw him at the airport, I just bawled,” says Heather. “It was hard because he’s never left my side for more than a couple of days. There was a time when he called home and cried because he was homesick.”

For Memea, he says his highlight of the game was just having his mom there: “She wasn’t there in San Bernadino (for the regionals). But she was there for the world championship.”

Being celebrities will take some getting used to, but the West Oahu boys say they are happy to be home and to be able to sleep in their own beds. They’ve returned to school. Some are playing football and basketball. All will likely continue to play baseball in high school. But no matter where they go, they will always be remembered as the World Champs who made Hawaii proud.

Oahu’s Other World Series Champions

By CHAD PATA

Imagine a group of 12-year-olds from Hawaii winning an improbable baseball championship by one run against the defending world champions. The governor would greet them at the airport and there would be Hummer limos, a police escort, and national disasters would be bumped from the front page by their smiling faces.

And such was the case for the West Oahu All Stars - but not so much for the Oahu Stars. They also went undefeated through their regionals, faced a two-time defending champ in Mexico and shut them out 1-0.

Their reward: a blip in one of the local papers’ sports section.

The difference: their games weren’t televised on ESPN and ABC.

Such is the nature of the world: If you see it on TV, it is a monumental accomplishment. If a tree falls in the woods and no one is there to hear it ...

“The adults know we were not on TV and that is why we didn’t get the press coverage,” says Gerald Oda, coach of the Oahu Stars, this year’s Cal Ripken World Series Champions. “But the kids don’t understand it and we try to explain that it doesn’t make their accomplishment anything less.”

This is a tough sell to kids. They see their local competitors accomplish the same victory as they have and instead of a small family party, they get their own baseball cards published in the paper.

The Oahu Stars get well-deserved hugs from their moms, while the West Oahu All Stars have local businesses climbing over one another to try to grab a bit of their starlight.

“I just keep telling the kids we started this because we love to play the game, not because we want press coverage or politicians to meet us at the airport,” says Oda, who carries no resentment toward the West Oahu kids. “We wish them the best and are so proud of the way they represented Oahu. It is because of what they accomplished that we are getting this attention now.”

So how are two Hawaii teams the world champs in the same age group, and why are they not playing each other here for total world domination?

In baseball there are two predominate leagues in the world: Little League (LL) and Babe Ruth League (BRL: Cal Ripken is the name of the 11 -12 year old division). LL is the granddaddy of them all with more than 200,000 teams worldwide, but BRL is no bush league with almost 50,000 teams of their own. The children of Oahu generally play in both leagues, with the BRL season running prior to the LL season.

But with both leagues’ playoffs running concurrently, each team has to decide its route, and both teams seemed to choose correctly. Yet, while young, local ball players will undoubtedly begin growing and dying their locks in the fashion of fire-baller Vonn Fe’ao, it is doubtful that the double zero worn by Kalani Lagoc-Crawford will be haggled over on uniform day.

After all, he only recorded 11 strikeouts to one hit against the Mexican version of the Bronx Bombers in the championship game and drove in the game’s only run with a one-hopper over the wall in right-center field. In the U.S. Championship earlier, he hit an extra-inning homer to propel them into the World Series.

But such is the fancy of fame, illuminating those who get caught in its light while leaving the rest in shadow despite their accomplishments.

And as for the second question, will we have an Oahu championship - they split two games in the regular season.

“For us we wouldn’t want to do it, because whoever lost, it would take away from their accomplishment,” says Oda, before finishing sagely.

“It’s a sports question that should be left to dads drinking beers to argue about for the rest of their lives.”

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