Phillies? Eagles? As it heads to the World Series, Media’s Little League team rules in the borough
"Everyone seems to be excited about it, even people who don’t have kids involved,” says a Media mother.
Media’s Little League team is World Series-bound, and it seems the whole borough has baseball fever.
At a long-planned movie night at Media’s Barrall Park on Saturday, residents decorated banners for the 12U District Team, which is headed to the Little League Baseball World Series in Williamsport, Pa., this week.
“I’m going to be watching the whole way through. I couldn’t be more excited,” said Phil Link, 54, whose 6-year-old son, Connor, plays baseball in one of the Little League’s younger divisions. Connor carefully wrote “Go Media” on the banner, with a baseball in the place of the “o.”
Other young fans carefully drew baseball diamonds and bats on the wide, canvas banners. Not long after a small group started playing with a Wiffle ball and bat on Barrall Field, a line had formed behind home base.
“They don’t usually play baseball during a movie night,” borough recreation coordinator Jennifer Metzger said, but everyone’s got baseball on the mind now. “I love the Delco spirit.”
The players won their ticket to the World Series on Friday at the Mid-Atlantic Regional championship in Bristol, Conn., against Northwest Washington, D.C. Trevor Skowronek hit a walk-off, two-run home run in the seventh inning.
Media’s first game in the series is at 7 p.m. Wednesday against the Southwest Region champions, from Needville, Texas. The 20-team, 38-game tournament includes 10 U.S. regional champions and 10 international region champions.
“This team is big. They have a relationship that allows them to act as one unit,” said Chris Owens, league information officer for Media Little League. “They have not let the excitement of what they have accomplished overtake them nor let it go to their heads.”
If the team has been focused on “one game, one inning at a time,” as Owens said, so has the town. The borough and local businesses have been reluctant to make concrete plans for the series until now, for fear of jinxing the team, said Metzger. But now the planning is in high gear.
The recreation department coordinated a bus charter to go to Wednesday’s game. Seats on the bus sold out within 35 minutes, and Metzger is trying to get another bus — the wait list is more than long enough to fill yet another.
Media Little League assured fans via social media on Saturday that team merchandise will be available by Wednesday’s game.
The Phillies will also be making an appearance in Williamsport during the Little League World Series, playing the Washington Nationals in the MLB Little League Classic. That game, taking place at Historic Bowman Field, is on Aug. 20 at 7 p.m., and the professional athletes will attend Little League games being played earlier that day. The Little League Classic is a relatively new tradition, dating back to 2017. The Phillies played in the 2018 Little League Classic against the New York Mets.
But for now, at least, another baseball team rules in Media.
“Everyone seems to be excited about it, even people who don’t have kids involved,” said Becky Hemphill, 43. Two of her three sons, ages 9 and 6, play Little League, and her 4-year-old will start T-ball next year. The older two will be going to Wednesday’s game with their dad, who is a Little League coach, she said.
Five teams from the Philadelphia area have won the Little League World Series, and 11 others have participated in the tournament since it began in 1947.
Several bars and restaurants on Media’s State Street have been holding watch parties throughout the Mid-Atlantic Regional championship, and they’re ready to keep the party going.
Adults and kids alike watched the games at State Street Pub, manager Caity Bramanti said. The bar will be having watch parties for every game until the team comes home, she said.
“It was like watching the Super Bowl or the World Series here again,” said Bramanti. “It was just as big, if not bigger.”
James Matika, bartender at Tap 24, said the bar was about as busy during Friday’s game as it was when the Phillies played in the World Series last year. “Just as loud, but a lot less swearing,” he said.
The Media Theatre had a free watch party for Friday’s game. The room was packed with “kids eating popcorn and grandpas drinking beer,” said Toni Nolek, who was at the theater Friday for the game and again on Saturday for an event.
“It worked out really well that we didn’t have a show going on,” said the theater’s executive director, Jared Reed. The theater does have a show on Wednesday, he said, so they won’t be able to screen the first game of the series.
“If they get to the end, we’ll cancel whatever else is going on,” Reed added.
Media Borough Mayor Robert A. McMahon said the town has already been celebrating for weeks. They had a mini-parade the Wednesday before the team left for Bristol.
“No matter what happens, we’re having a parade” when the team gets home, McMahon said.