From a shoddy field to White House lawn

The boys don't notice that most of their practice field is bare dirt. Or that they use a tree behind the backstop instead of a toilet. Or that their parents sit on the ground instead of bleachers to watch them play.

They just know that they're playing baseball tomorrow in a very important place, and that a very important man plans to cheer them on.

Camden's Cramer Hill Little League, the largest youth sports organization in one of the nation's poorest cities, will send its Red Sox T-ball team up against a squad from Puerto Rico at the White House.

It will be the 18th T-ball game to be held on the South Lawn and, since starting the tradition in 2001, President Bush has sat in the front row for every game.

But for the league, the thrill of watching 5-, 6-, and 7-year-olds play the biggest T-ball game in Camden history will only temporarily overshadow its years-long battle with the city to bring the team's facilities up to suburban standards.

"I appreciate the fact that we got chosen. I feel very happy for the league," said Luis Neco, league vice president. "But once this is over, we'll be back in the same spot again. . . . These kids will have a great memory, but the trouble begins the very next day."

Volunteers for the 407-player coed league are hoping that publicity from the game shames city officials into fulfilling long-standing promises to build a clubhouse with bathrooms, a meeting area, storage, and a money-making concession stand.

And they hope that Camden County, which runs the park, puts up lights so games don't end when the sun sets, sometimes in the fourth inning.

Nerves are so frayed that parents voted not to invite local government officials, including the City Council president who cofounded the league, to Washington.

"A lot of people think this is just baseball," Neco said. "It's about being a part of a community."

Without a clubhouse, the league can't store equipment. Without a concession stand attached to that clubhouse, it can't sell hot dogs. And without bleachers to sit on, fans wouldn't buy those hot dogs.

Concession sales would cover the registration fees of its players, many of whom come from poor, immigrant families. This year, the league waived fees for 40 percent of its athletes.

"Get that ball!" screams Neco, after he hits a fly over an outfielder during a recent practice. "It's expensive!"

Neco is standing at Von Neida Park, home of the league's five fields in Cramer Hill, the center of the Latino community in Camden. There are two portable toilets, but they are shared with basketball players and playground kids.

Located on a creek, the rocky field with patches of grass looks "like a soup bowl" after it rains, league president Pete Perez said. About half of the games this season were canceled due to poor conditions.

This year 23 teams played on the league's five fields, and if there were more fields and coaches there would have been even more players. Sixty children were turned away. Those who made it range in age from 5 - the T-ball kids, who hit a ball off a tee and learn the basics of the game - to 17, members of the traveling senior division.

None of the home fields meet Little League standards, Neco said, because the backstops are too close to home plate. And though the nearby basketball and handball courts have lights, the baseball fields don't.

Camden County doesn't light its baseball fields, a county spokesman said, but officials are looking for money for field improvements at Von Neida Park.

Jose Urena, 13, remembers the first time he saw a real Little League field four years ago in Magnolia, a tiny town in suburban Camden County. He had never seen grass on an infield before.

"I'll never forget that day," he said. "I was so shocked. . . . I was on the top of the world."

He was introduced by his name and number on a public-announcement system. During home tournament games - there's usually just one in Camden each year - a generator powers the P.A. system. Sometimes, the generator also powers a vacuum to remove excess field water. A better field, with a place other than the local bodega to get a drink, would be motivating, the teenager said, and would help to bring out fans.

Instead, the kids become their own fans. Jose announces his teammates from the bench. And before each game, they pray.

"I learn to be grateful for what we have - baseball and community," he said.

City Council president Angel Fuentes cofounded the Cramer Hill Little League 17 years ago to replace the Cramer Hill Boys Club. That group ran youth sports programs in the neighborhood from 1954 until the 1980s, when its clubhouse at 29th Street and Tyler Avenue burned down.

The concrete footing that survived is the planned site for the Little League's clubhouse, and Fuentes said he has worked tirelessly for six years to get it built.

"I understand their frustration," he said.

Fuentes said he was the reason that the city set aside $400,000 for the facility. And he added that he helped reunite former board members of the Boys Club so they could sign the property over to the city, allowing Camden to bid on construction.

Fuentes met with league parents last week and showed them plans for the 1,525-square-foot clubhouse. He said the city would award a construction contract in August. Four months later, weather permitting, the building will be up.

"I've got enemies, and they'll unfortunately poison the minds of the parents," he said. "But I know when I call these parents and they see the construction, they'll be smiling."

The problem, league officials say, is that they've heard this all before. Lobbying began about 10 years ago, and promises followed. Players brought signs to a council meeting in 2006 and heard the promises themselves.

"The people are tired of politicians and meetings," said Perez, the league president. "Unless they see it being built, they're not going to be happy."

In the meantime, the league is sustained by a small core of volunteers, including James Haulsey, an 83-year-old Cramer Hill resident and Little League fanatic. For 15 years, he has stored the league's equipment amid assorted knick-knacks and his grandchildren's bikes in his backyard shed and garage.

Haulsey has boxes of uniforms, plastic crates of balls, and an old wall unit filled with trophies that players never get to see.

Catchers' masks hang on nails, or "wherever I can keep them," Haulsey said.

He ran out of space for his own things "a long time ago." He also ran out of faith that the city would build a clubhouse.

"You just get to a point where it's not going to happen," he said. "So you just put it aside and say, 'Just do it yourself.' "

Both Red Sox coaches work overnight jobs, and neither has a child in the league.

"I'm giving back to the community - trying to, at least," said coach Angel Nieves, 49, a former Cramer Hill resident who travels a half-hour from Mount Ephraim for games and practices.

Nieves has three daughters, but always wanted a son. "So I got 13 now," he said.

"Why do I do it?" asked assistant coach Daniel Whitehouse, 36, a Cramer Hill resident who drives a taxi in Camden. "These kids are our future. If they're taught the right thing, they'll be here next year. It keeps them off the streets. It gets them interested in something so they know there are other ways out of the city besides the bad things."

Whitehouse says the boys learn hand-eye coordination, how to work with peers. And last week, they got a special lesson: how to greet the leader of the free world.

After practice on Wednesday, the team lined up and shook Whitehouse's hand. "No kicking in the shins," he warned.

Abner Garcia, 6, plans to say "Nice to meet you" to President Bush and to let him know that the White House is a "pretty cool place."

Then he'll "take a picture, and play baseball," he said.

The team is entirely Latino - Dominican, Puerto Rican and Peruvian. The White House and Little League Baseball wanted a Hispanic theme for the game, which is the reason Cramer Hill and Puerto Rico were chosen, according to Chris Downs, a spokesman for Little League Baseball.

Many parents and siblings are going to the game on charter buses paid for by local businesses and civic leaders.

Already, Abner is getting the celebrity treatment from friends. "They always want my autograph," he said.

There are neither winners nor losers in T-ball. There aren't outs, there's only one inning, and the entire team bats around.

The coach's main jobs are to keep the second baseman from drawing in the dirt with a stick and to stop the runner on third base from spinning around in circles.

"Watch the ball! . . . Don't look at Mommy! . . . Yes, we're almost done!" yells Nieves, the skipper, in two languages.

Regardless of the lax rules, Whitehouse plans to quietly keep score tomorrow, and to "play to win."

As he talks, a state police helicopter overhead momentarily distracts the kids. It dips down and tips to the side, in an apparent search for someone involved in a crime.

"I bet you don't see that in the suburbs, either," Whitehouse said.

For more about the nonprofit Cramer Hill Little League, including how to make a donation, go to http://go.philly.com/chleague

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