Boy, if conspiracies are reaching down into Little League, I guess they're everywhere:
Mike Burvan, the veteran manager of the Dyer Little League team that won last year's state title and hoped to win it again this year, said that's just plain wrong.Burvan was hopping mad Monday, a day after Dyer was eliminated from the competition at the conclusion of round-robin preliminaries.He accused Lebanon of throwing its final game in those preliminaries and not trying to score against New Castle in order to ensure a spot in Monday's semifinals.Winning by losing?
If I understand Burvan's conspiracy theory, it goes something like this: Dyer won the tournament last year and was considered the team to beat this year. When Lebanon beat Dyer, that left three teams -- those two plus New Castle -- with 2-1 records. Under the tie-breaker rules of the round robin tournament, New Castle and Lebanon could keep state champion Dyer out of the final if New Castle had the best runs-per-inning numbers, so Lebanon threw the game to get New Castle in and keep Dwyer out.
Let's assume the coach is right. If the object is to win in the end, and the best way to do that is to lose somewhere along the way in order to keep a stronger team out, is that going against the rules or using the rules to get your ultimate objective? Is the point to win or to do your best, whether you win or lose? Just wondering.
Comments
That's why the World Cup plays the last round of games for pools concurrently. Of course if there's only one field then that's not possible.
I would say that winning it all by losing on purpose is not winning with honor. But just like the NFL they can try to win that game while resting players which might lead people to criticize the format of the tournament rather than the team. They could have a tourney instead, perhaps seeded. Baseball has always seemed to have a screwy system in its playoffs formats from collegiate to below...
But it's not like the top seed never had control over their own destiny.
Here are the facts: 2 teams involved and affected 2 more teams....
Field of Schemes
Travesty at the Indiana Little League State Tournament
Managers conspire and fix game between Lebanon and New Castle
Here's how it went. After 2 nights at the Indiana State Tournament, Lebanon was 2-0, New Castle was 1-1, Dyer 1-1, and Gary was 0-2 in Pool A. Lebanon 2-0, was out of pitching after beating Dyer 9-8. To advance, they had to either win the game OR lose and score 0 runs to give New Castle the tie breaker edge in defensive runs allowed. New Castle simply needed a win to advance.
On the third night Dyer beat Gary to improve to 2-1 and advance, they thought, to the next round. The coaches from the other teams had other plans however. Lebanon
Nothing like a good old fashioned game of baseball to build character and instill some solid moral values.
Baseball = steroids, corked bats, illegal gambling, alcohol consumption, pine tar, philandering and drunken driving.
Character = rotten and odious