Down on First Street in Bayonne — beneath the city’s signature bridge and across a park from boxing legend Chuck Wepner’s statue — sits the peninsula’s Little League complex.
Last week, after the dozen 12-year-olds on Bayonne’s All-Star team claimed New Jersey’s state championship, they all reported to the field for practice at 5 p.m. the next day. It was their last workout before departing for the Metro Regional in Bristol, Conn. When the official three-hour workout was done, Mason Rincon, the power hitter who blasted three home runs in the state title game, stayed another 90 minutes for hitting with three teammates.
“We had to just shut the lights off,” said Kenny Kopacz, an administrator. “Otherwise they wouldn’t leave.”
The boys’ staying power is now on display for a national audience. Once in Connecticut, the Hudson County kids won their first game, 8-2, on Saturday before drubbing New York, 12-2, on Monday afternoon with umpires ending the game in the fourth inning due to a 10-run mercy rule.
On Friday night, Bayonne will square off again with Darien, Conn., in the regional championship, which comes with a berth in the Little League World Series in iconic Williamsport, Pa. Only 20 New Jersey teams have qualified for the August classic. Toms River East was the most recent, in 2021.
“Bayonne has never seen anything like this, and I don’t know if New Jersey has with the run differential,” Kopacz said. “This is definitely once in a lifetime. It’s monumental.”
It is all unchartered water for the three-mile-long port community, which has had a Little League since 1951. No Bayonne team had ever won a state title before, but the tenderfeet have been building to this point over the last four years when five of the current players played together on the 8-and-under all star team that won the New Jersey’s North championship in 2022.
Since then, the group has managed to stay together amid the growing demands of travel teams while adding newcomers like Rincon. Despite losses in the state tournament the last two summers, the group broke through with the state title and has developed a disciplined approach, winning the first two regional games so decisively that they’ve had three days in between games while others negotiated the double-elimination process.
Bayonne’s boys have remained in Bristol, residing in a dorm at the Little League complex. To pass time, they trade pins with other competitors and keep up with family members and friends back home. OutfielderJoey Dwyer offers comic relief while shortstop Gabe Garcia Jr. and catcher Jett Bridges self-police when the lights-out order comes at 10 p.m. Garcia Jr. is said to do the best flips in the pool while Dex Zimmerman delivers the best cannonballs.
“Lots of ups and downs together, three-hour practices and all,” Garcia Jr. said. “I think we’re going to be recognized when we get home.”
Families are figuring out accommodations on the run, with some parents booking nearby hotels while others commute back and forth to New Jersey to store up P.T.O. in case the run goes longer. In the interim, manager Justin Smith, a Jersey City firefighter with a sandpaper wit, minds the laundry, medicine and meals for his players. Back home, his wife, Diana, a Bayonne firefighter, is herding their children. One son, Andy, broke his leg during hockey practice over the weekend.
“We’re batting a thousand this week,” Smith said dryly.
Smith’s brigade boasts a wide range of contributors. Rincon wears No. 1, and he is the team’s engine. He bounces between three positions — catcher, pitcher and outfielder — and his bat is one of the biggest in the country. During the regular season, he plays for a team sponsored by The Starting Point, a Bayonne bar and grill that stands among an industrial stretch around the corner from the Little League complex.
But it has not all been big shots over the fence that have propelled them. When key bunts are needed to advance a runner, outfielder Connor Reed executed on multiple occasions. From the mound, ace pitcher Chase Klimkowski confounded Darien in the regional opener with a nine-strikeout performance.
“Every player is contributing because every play has to,” Smith said. “We’ve needed everyone going the same way.”
Meanwhile, every evening this week, a familiar rhythm played out at Bayonne’s Little League complex. A father and son would show up with a bucket of baseballs and a bat, open the gate and proceed to the hitting cages. The father turned on the pitching machine while his son stretches and then more kids followed. Helmets go on, then the pitches start coming in. Misses occur; corrections are offered. Younger siblings throw tennis balls against cinder-block walls on the outside of the dugouts. A sign reminds all of groundskeeper John O’Brien’s golden rule:
Players DO NOT dig holes in the outfield GRASS!
On Wednesday, four of the six television screens at The Starting Point featured the elimination game between Connecticut and New York that concluded with a Connecticut victory.
Across town at the 16th Street Park, T-shirts emblazoned with the league’s logo and “Bayonne vs. Everybody” were being sold for $25 each at a concert. All proceeds are going to the players’ families to help defray costs absorbed by the unexpected travel. In all, 350 shirts were printed.
On Friday, at 1:30 p.m., three chartered buses with 50 Bayonne supporters each are scheduled to travel north to Bristol. First pitch is set for 7 p.m. on ESPN.
For those staying behind to work on their batting and fielding while everyone is away, there is a reminder of the protocol affixed to the chain-link fence by the exit:
MORE BY KEVIN ARMSTRONG
LAST ONE OUT
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