Jul 26, 2017 3 min read

Taking a page from Major League Baseball, the Pony League World Series will kick off Thursday, Aug. 10 with a Fanfest.

The event is kid-friendly, complete with interactive games, a visit by the Pirate Parrot and the Bucco Brigade and will be held at Dick’s Sporting Goods in Strabane Square, South Strabane Township from 6 to 7:30 p.m. Diamond Kinetics will present its “Smart Bat” and free hot dogs will be available courtesy of Washington County Tourism Promotion Agency.

“The Fanfest is in its second year and the Pirates helped us make that a great event,” said Bob Gregg, president of Tournaments Inc. “We’ve got additional entertainment offerings and some new entertainment acts with the Latin Jazz group, a classic rock cover group and Military Appreciation Night. A number of sponsors have come to us and said, ‘We want to help grow this.'”

The Pony League World Series begins Friday, Aug. 11 with three games at Lew Hays Pony Field in Washington Park. Sinaloa, Mexico, plays Levitttown, Puerto Rico, in the 5:30 p.m. opener and the East Zone champion will play the Host Area team at 8 p.m. Neither of those teams has been determined yet.

The Observer-Reporter will sponsor the Home Run Derby, which will be held at 11 a.m., Friday, Aug. 11 and will celebrate O-R night at the opening games.

Washington, which is the Host team, begins play against the European champion, The Netherlands at 2:30 p.m., Saturday, Aug. 12, in the middle game of three.

WPNT television will broadcast two games: the 5:30 p.m. game, Saturday, Aug. 12 between Korea, the Asia-Pacific Zone champion, and either Mexico or Puerto Rico; and the world series final, which is scheduled for 7:30 p.m., Wednesday, Aug. 16.

Five of the 10-team tournament have already received a spot in the world series: Netherlands (European), Sinaloa (Mexico), Levittown P.R. (Caribbean), Seoul (Asia-Pacific) and Washington (Host Team). The remainder of the field will be determined in the coming days.

“It’s always hard to pick against Puerto Rico,” said Gregg. “It’s always hard to pick against the Asia-Pacific team. I think I’m going to go with Puerto Rico or the West (Zone champion).”

The Champions League Game returns at 10 a.m., Saturday, Aug. 12 and the Breakfast of Champions at the DoubleTree by Hilton in the Meadow Lands will take place 10 a.m., Sunday, Aug. 13, followed by the 1967 Championship Anniversary Celebration that takes place in between the three series games.

Following the series on the internet? Go to PLWS.org, the home page for the series. The Observer-Reporter will cover games and tweet out scores. All series games will be streamed by MLB.com and broadcast by ASN (American Sports Network). WJPA radio will broadcast each game.

Gregg said the goal is to not only provide quality youth baseball but to also grow the tournament over time.

“My guess is as Pony grows … I can see us growing to 12, then 16 teams,” Gregg said. “I don’t know if I’ll still be running the world series when these come about. I also see some changes on the horizon for our facility. We’ve been adamant that this event belongs at Lew Hays Pony Field, which was built for this age group and this event. … We have challenges with parking, seating, and shade areas for those daytime games. All that is being developed in a master plan that will be coming.”