Walnut Valley Pony Baseball: League News

Five of the six divisions now have their game schedules posted (Pony division schedule will need to wait for Charter Oak). You can view them by going to the Schedules page and selecting the division you want to view. Pinto, Mustang and Bronco divisions can also view their schedules via Google Calendar on their web sites. While Foal and Shetland Google Calendars are on the Division page.

The Game of the Week schedule is not included in the game schedule and will be announced at a later date. 

Opening Day’s start time has been changed to 8:30 AM. Same date and place, February 25, 2012, Creekside Park. Among the activities will be a Dodger guest speaker and recognizing the Shetland A All-stars from last year.

Team Moms/Dads, the “Game of the Week” forms are now online under handouts. Please have those filled out before your team’s game (schedules to be posted soon).

Managers, the practice schedules are listed in the Manager/Coaches section of the Handouts. There is also a map of which fields are which at Suzanne Middle School.

The Pony division has found a coach for the 4th team. Thanks and appreciation to Manager Sergio Gomez and well done to new Player Agent Jamie Arakawa! Also news from Jamie, they are working on continuing our long relationship with Charter Oak on inter-leaguing within the Pony Division. However, our league has decided to not inter-league with Pomona PONY this year.

All parents and players should have heard from their respective team managers by now. If not, please email the player agent or the web site coordinator and we’ll get it to the right person. Apology’s to any Foal parents for the late contacts with your teams. Both the Shetland and Foal Divisions have been huge this year and player agent Mario Ayala is working very hard to make sure all needs and requirements are met.

The player draft for Shetland, Pinto, Mustang and Bronco divisions were held this past Saturday, February 4th. All went well with only a couple of players needing to be placed on a waiting list and team names were passed out. Parents and players should start hearing from their respective managers this week, if they haven’t already, and practices should also be getting under way. Again, if you don’t hear from your player’s manager this week please contact your player agent or post a comment on our Facebook page.

Opening Day is scheduled for February 25, 2012 at 9AM 8:30AM at Creekside Park. The guest speaker has not been announced yet but as soon as it is, it will be posted here.

Coach’s Clinic that was supposed to take place on January 28th (originally 21st) will be rescheduled but no time or day has been set yet. It will most like take place at the Clubhouse Batting Cages.

Scorekeepers meeting is February 21st, 6:30PM at the Walnut Teen SENIOR Center. We are asking Pinto and Mustang teams to send two scorekeepers per team. The training is to understand the iPad scorekeeping program (ESPN iScore) that the league uses to scorekeep for Pinto, Mustang and Bronco division games. Bronco teams only need to send one scorekeeper per team. If you scorekept last year using the iPads, please go to the meeting too, some new procedures are in place. Shetland team scorekeepers please also expect to attend, although your instructions should be brief since the games are kept with a score book.

Field and Safety meeting will take place February 22nd, 6PM at Creekside Park. Parents who will be tasked with preparing the field before games and taking it down afterwards, should be at this meeting for some brief procedures on how to do that.

Team Parent meeting will also be on February 22nd at Creekside Park but will take place at 7PM. All Team Moms or Team Dads should be at this meeting.

Pony Division players and parents, we are still waiting on news about who is managing the second Pony team, the first team will be managed by Damien Rudolph and the other two are 12-year old travel ball teams. We are also waiting on news concerning inter-leaguing the Pony division with other nearby leagues.

Parents, there have been some questions about what the next step is after your son or daughter participated in tryouts. The player draft is tomorrow, Saturday, February 4, for all managers in Shetland, Pinto, Mustang and Bronco. At that time, a manager will select the players for their teams. Once the manager has his or her team completed, they will get the contact information of each player and begin contacting parents, most likely with a phone call.

You should hear from your team manager sometime next week. At that time, the manager will instruct you on what team your son or daughter is on and make future arrangements (meeting time, practice, uniforms, etc.). If you do not hear from the manager by February 13th, please contact whichever division’s player agent your player should be in (listed on the Board of Directors/Contacts page). Or leave a post on our Facebook page and we will contact you.

News coming out of Monday night’s board meeting is that there will be no Pony Division (13-14 year olds) tryouts held this year. While there will be enough players for four teams, most of the players are already locked into one of those teams. We are also still looking for a manager to take the fourth team. Please contact VP Jeff Calzadiaz if you’re interested. Since there are only four teams, the Pony Division will likely be the only division to inter-league with another city. With all games to be scheduled at Snow Creek.

Other news from the board meeting, no makeup date yet for the second Coach’s Clinic. It will be posted here as soon as it’s known. Also, while these numbers may change after Wednesday’s makeup tryouts, these are the current number of teams per division:

Foal (8), Shetland (8), Pinto (8), Mustang (6), Bronco (7) and Pony (4, probably more with inter-leaguing)

Reminder that the league is using college logo’s this year and the report is that the uniforms look great! Here are the team names:

Beavers (Oregon State), Gators (Florida), Hurricanes (Miami), Sun Devils (Arizona State), Tigers (LSU), Titans (Cal State Fullerton), Wildcats (Kentucky) and Yellow Jackets (Georgia Tech)

Walnut PONY Baseball received more registrations and had a much larger amount of players participating in tryouts this past weekend than was expected. We can look forward to a great 2012 season in Walnut with plenty of teams and players having fun! Thanks to all the parents who helped during a busy day of tryouts on Saturday.

Makeup tryouts will be held at 6PM, Wednesday, February 1st, also at Snow Creek Park for all 4 divisions (minus Pony). There will only be limited registrations. The player draft is this Saturday for all the managers. There should be more news on Tuesday morning about the Pony Division and how many teams will be in all the divisions.

Check back at this web site throughout the season and beyond for the most recent news, updates, schedules, scores, standings and stats.

Thanks to manager Tim Borgelt for sending over a better summary of the new bat rules:

• 2 3/4" bats are illegal in all divisions
• 2 5/8" bats are LEGAL in all divisions. IF a 2 5/8" bat is a -3, it must be BBCOR certified
• 2 1/4" bats are LEGAL in all divisions, IF they are manufactured to BPF 1.15 or less. IF the bat is newly manufactured, it must be stamped "approved for play in PONY Baseball" and "BPF 1.15" and with year of manufacture. 

Instead of the same old boring MLB team logos used by most baseball youth leagues, Walnut PONY will switch to college team logos for the 2012 season. Logos like the Titans, Yellow Jackets, Gators and more.

Be part of the fun and excitement of Walnut PONY Baseball by registering your child today online or at our walkup registration at Creekside Park, January 7th between 9am-3pm.

PONY has announced several new rule changes for the upcoming 2012 PONY Baseball season. Check the Handouts section for all changes. The below rules concern the new bat rules:

• (revision) – Rule 8 C Equipment: Wooden, metal, graphite or ceramic bats manufactured for baseball play, which are round and not more than two and five eighths inches in diameter at the thickest part, not more than 42 inches in length, are acceptable.
• (new entry) – Rule 8 C (1) Equipment: Bats manufactured specifically for use in tee ball play, shall not be used when the ball is pitched by a player, coach or pitching machine. Coach-pitch bats will only be used in coach-pitch using a safety ball.
• (new entry) – Rule 8 C (2) Equipment: Only 2-1/4” barrel non-wood bats which are manufactured to achieve a Bat Performance Factor (BPF) of 1.15 or less through the life of the bat are approved for play in PONY Baseball divisions. Effective January 1, 2012, all newly manufactured non-wood bats must be stamped “approved for play in PONY Baseball” and stamped with “BPF 1.15” and the year manufactured.
• (new entry) – Rule 8 C (3) Equipment: Effective January 1, 2012, all minus (-) 3 bats must be BBCOR certified. The bat which may be wood or non-wood product shall be not more than two and five-eights (2-5/8”) in diameter at the barrel and shall be a smooth implement, from the top of the cap to the top of the knob. All non-wood bats shall meet the Ball-Bat Coefficient of Restitution (BBCOR) testing protocol maintaining the length-to-weight difference of 0.50 limit regardless of length. All BBCOR approved bats shall be labeled with a silk screen or other permanent certification mark. (NOTE: 2 3/4” bats are prohibited in all PONY sanctioned leagues).