LITTLE LEAGUE WORLD SERIES CANCELLED
The ongoing pandemic has forced the cancellation of the 2020 Little League World Series. On Thursday,
Little League International announced this summer's 75th annual Little League World Series, as well as all regional events, will not be played as scheduled. It is the first time in the organization's history the Little
League World Series has been canceled.
Little League International cites travel restrictions, the inability to play qualifying tournaments, and significant "testing and mitigation protocols" that would need to be in place as reasons for the Little League World Series cancellation.
Officials with Little League International say this does not cancel local plans for a 2020 season.
Washington County Little League President John Mabie says, this was expected:
"This announcement from Little League was expected given the global reach of Little League and the uncertainty around the world these last couple of months. It does help to finally have this part resolved so that we will know how to plan moving forward. The Little League state directors are now able to meet and make decisions regarding the state and sectional tournaments, which we should hear about in the next few days.
In the meantime, we are still waiting for direction from the state on when we can resume our local activities, as well as any guidelines we would need to follow once we resume."
LITTLE LEAGUE AMERICA where are you?
LITTLE LEAGUE started in in AMERICA did it not? Where did Little League International get the Almighy power.?
Okay, don’t play the WORLD SERIES! Why wouldn’t Little League America play and crown and AMERICAN Champion? There are plenty of small towns and some larger also, that don’t have ANYWHERE near the problems that a few cities and States have. And besides the corona virus is said to be especially bad for the old folks like ME. Okay, we old folks CHOOSE FOR OURSELVES whether we want to risk dying to see our grandkids competing in baseball or if we would rather possibly (or maybe not) take that chance and stay home..
Is it REALLY about protecting us or is it REALLY about CONTROLLING us?
Larry – Believe me that I want the kids back on the baseball and softball fields as soon as possible. I feel absolutely horrible for the kids who won’t have a chance to go play at Williamsport, but I think that this was the correct decision. Even ignoring the safety concerns, there are many potential issues with having even a national tournament later this summer. We don’t even know at this point when playing regular season games will be permitted and the kids haven’t played a single regular season game – we aren’t willing to sacrifice the regular season for the 85% of the kids in our league who won’t be playing all stars. There is a significant time and financial commitment for the families as they advance through the all star tournaments that would be very challenging for families – a number of parents in our county have been out of work for 6+ weeks, and many of them are still not able to go back to work. Delaying the tournaments is also a challenge, because many of the 12 year olds will be playing 7th grade football this fall, and it is imperative that kids to go back to school once the schools reopen.