This is when you know youโre in a Big Game: Baseball commissioner Peter Uberroth and All-Star ballplayers Dale Murphy and Johnny Bench were special guests of ABC at the championship game of the 1986 Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pennsylvania.
Of the more than 180,000 Little League baseball teams in America, the final team standing after a month of city, district, state and regional playoffs โ and three games at the World Series โ was from International Little League of Tucson, which only had seven teams of boys aged 9-12.
What were the odds?
The International Little League had never been considered a powerhouse in Tucson โ nothing to compare to the talent-rich Little League programs that fed Canyon del Oro, Rincon, Sahuaro and Sunnyside high schools.
The International Leagueโs boundaries were 22nd Street to the north, Wilmot Road to the west and Irvington Road to the south. Most of its players would someday enroll at Santa Rita High School.
The International teams were coached by house painters, refrigeration specialists, firefighters and laborers.
Yet in early August 1986, the 14 International League players completed an impressive sweep of state champions from California, Montana, Utah and Washington in the West Regionals in San Bernardino, California, and caught a flight for the World Series in Williamsport.
The head coach was Sam Tullous, a house painter who I had met that season when my son, Ben, was a rookie 9-year-old on the International Leagueโs New Life Health Center team.
I clearly remember a night at the old Vista del Prado ballpark on Prudence Street when our coach, Bill Walker, said that he had never seen so much talent in the league.
โIโve been coaching for years,โ he said. โIโve never seen so much talent and so many 12-year-olds who have matured to the point they look to be 14 or 15. I really believe they are going places this year.โโ
Indeed, if there had been a Little League All-American team in 1986, International pitchers Danny Fregoso and Philip Johnston and power-hitters Troy Kelly and Rich Barcelo probably wouldโve been on it.
The rest of the leagueโs All-Star roster was filled by an advanced shortstop, Scott Foster, and talented teammates like Marty Walker and Eddie DeBaca.
They won the Arizona state championship in Nogales by scores of 12-1 and 8-0, beating Phoenix powerhouses in the semifinals and finals. In Williamsport, they beat teams from Illinois, Florida and Maryland to reach the championship. They would go 16-2 in the postseason before losing to perennial global champion Taiwan, which won nine Little League World Series titles from 1971-86.
The game was televised live on ABC before 22,000 fans at Williamsportโs Lamade Stadium.
The International Little League team received a hero's welcome when it returned home from the Little League World Series.
Tullous had a wise approach after his team lost to Taiwan, 12-0 โ a two-hitter. โIโm sure the kids are a little bit down now,โ he told the Starโs Jay Gonzales in Williamsport. โNo good, young All-American kid likes to lose. But as soon as they think about it a little bit, theyโll realize how far they went and how much they accomplished.โ
The big unknown was what would happen to those 12-year-olds and their baseball futures, if any.
Bill Walker, my sonโs coach, said: โItโs too hard to predict what will happen to these players. Some kids mature early, some late.โ
Only Fregoso, the dominant right-hander, became a pro, the cityโs player of the year in 1991, pitching Catalina High School to the state finals. He was a sixth-round draft pick of the Baltimore Orioles but only pitched 41 games in the low minor leagues before his career ended in 1994.
International Little League of Tucson and Tainan Park, Taiwan square off in the 1986 Little League World Series.
Johnston was an all-city pitcher at Santa Rita and pitched briefly for Pima College. Otherwise, the only player off the โ86 team to make a living off sports was Barcelo, a basketball and golf standout at Sahuaro who went on to become an all-conference golfer at Pima College and the University of Nevada, reaching the PGA Tour in 2004, spending three full seasons in competition with Tiger Woods and Phil Mickelson.
Barcelo is now the head golf instructor at Woodsโ Bluejack Country Club near Houston.
When the โ86 International Little League team returned to the Tucson airport in late August 1986, they were greeted by about 300 fans. They received communications from Arizona baseball coach Jerry Kindall, whose Wildcats had won the NCAA championship two months earlier, and from Arizona senator Dennis DeConcini and congressmen Mo Udall and Jim Kolbe.
Ultimately, the โ86 International little leaguers won city, district, state, region and American championships. It was a magic carpet ride not to be forgotten.
