Babe Ruth team wins championship after losing field

When the Fairfield area Babe Ruth team lost its field, concerned parents and coaches stepped up to secure a season for the youngsters innocently effected by day-to-day decisions by adults.

'We formed the group, Operation Play Ball, after we found out we no longer were allowed use of the Babe Ruth field in town and there was no season scheduled in Fairfield for this year,” explained Michelle Manning who, along with Keeli Rubey, Catherine Miller and Chris Titus, became the players' organizational team.

'All Babe Ruth age players were welcome at practices and scrimmages,” described Manning. 'We worked with baseball team managers from Mt. Pleasant, Donnellson, Burlington and Keokuk to get us into their league and get us games. We had some initial help from an FHS graduate now living in Mt. Pleasant, Jill Adam, who with Shaun Blythe jumped on board when they found out we had nowhere to play and no one to play against as a Fairfield team.

After being allowed as a group from Fairfield, the boys named Team Top Dog won the championship with just one regular season defeat and one loss during the championship round.

Coaches for Team Top Dog were Paul Konczal, Michelle Manning and Cole Boatright with help from recent Trojan graduate Cooper Drish and others.

Message from leadership:

'A huge thank you for all those who helped coach and lead practices/scrimmages including Josh Allison, Todd Reifsteck and Steve Miller, all those who attended meetings and helped create ideas to make things work so these players could play together as a Fairfield team! Also a huge thank you to Team Top Dog parents who had to drive many extra miles to get their players to games that were out of town in Burlington, Mt. Pleasant and Donnellson, as we had no regulation size field to play on here in Fairfield. These were very late nights for the team and parents.”