That’s a wrap !
Gallery 10 of 10 is up for your viewing enjoyment. It’s a bit smaller than the others, but rumor has it that there might be some “bonus” additions to it soon, along with a couple triptychs (action-sequence shots).
Click the camera to view all ten galleries of photos from the 2007 AAU International Tournament, held January 18-21, 2007 at Disney’s Wide World of Sports Complex in Orlando, Florida.
After clicking the camera icon above, click the menu button on left for Gallery 10, or to jump directly to Gallery 10, click here.
Gallery 10 has a nice shot of the beautiful championship trophy. If you look through the pics from past AAU tournaments, you’ll notice that tournament director Alex Linares out-does himself every year. This one is my personal favorite. It will find a place of honor at the home at Mac’s sponsor, and organizer, Tom McAvoy.
Speaking of champions, there’s a shot of Mac’s Marauders, though you’ve seen that one before, as it graces the main photo gallery page that you’ve been looking at for the past ten (10) days.
Also one of the runner-up New York Gremlins, who had an outstanding tournament, piling up the most runs, if I’m not mistaken, and coming within three outs of taking home the gold.
You’ll find the MVP’s, Colin McKenzie as Most Valuable Pitcher, who picked up the win in the championship game, and Frank Perez, the Most Valuable Player for his efforts, including that dramatic, extra inning walk-off home run in the championship game.. (If there were an honorable mention, that would have to be their teammate Eduardo Leonardo, who hit the game tying home run to lead off the bottom of the 7th inning of the title game, then singled in the 9th inning to set the stage for Perez’s heroics.).
You’ll also find pics of ISC II broadcaster Joe Todd, who went down from Ontario, Canada to watch the tournament and wound up helping with the broadcasts, as well as yours truly and Kyle Smith. Kyle is the newest member of the Ballparkradio crew, having been signed as a “free agent” by ISC II Commish Blair Setford, to help with the ISC II Tournament of Champions broadcast program last summer. Kyl, a graduate of the broadcasting school at Mohawk College in Ontario, Canada, made his first visit to the AAU tournament, providing plenty of levity on and off-the-air. We’re working on arrangements to have Kyle on hand to broadcast at the Red Rock Tournament in May. He is a natural behind the mike, and judging from the bag of email received, a favorite with the listeners. Not shown in the photos, is Bill Hillhouse who did a outstanding job as color man on the semi-final game on Sunday. Bill brings a wealth of knowledge of the game and the players (plus some juicy rumors) to the broadcasts and we hope to have him with the crew again before the season is over. The addition of Joe, Kyle and Bill to Ballparkradio’s AAU broadcast team enabled us to broadcast twice as many games as in prior years (a total of 8 games this year). We greatly appreciate their work.
And last, but anything but least, also not shown in these photo galleries, but appreciated by players and fans alike is the photographer that brought you over 300 photographs of the 2007 AAU Tournament, Maddy Flanagan. I am biased, of course, but I think this year’s batch of photos are her best work to date. Though “only” 300 appear here in the online galleries, she took just under 5000 photos during the three day tournament. I’m not sure where she finds the energy sometimes, but she is on the field from the first pitch to the last out, to capture all of the action, the players, the coaches, the staff, and the fans.
In her own words:
“I hope with my photos that you can see the game the way I see it. The way I have learned to love it.”
I only wish that all of you could have seen the 5000-photo slide show that I got to see on the world’s largest monitor (Maddy’s) . The triptych’s that you’ll see shortly convey some of the action-sequences, but watching them flash quickly on the monitor, is almost like seeing a movie of the action. Players sliding in, the dust flying up, the tag being applied, the umpire’s emphatic call, followed by the players’ reactions. Spectacular.
It looks like Softball Magazine will once again be carrying our feature story on the AAU tournament, along with some of Maddy’s photos, so watch for that when the magazine hits the newstands sometime early next month. This will mark the fourth year they are including full color coverage of the AAU International tournament.
We wanted to say thanks to all who sent emails to Maddy about the photos, including those providing picture ID’s. We’ll be adding those now, so at some point, you’ll be able to “mouse over” and see the name(s) of the people in the photos. Please keep those emails coming, by the way. This is the first time that we posted the photos one gallery at a time, rather than all at once. I’ll be curious to hear if our readers liked that approach.
Well, since you’re all used to finding new photos here every night……no point in stopping now. Keep an eye out for those “bonus” shots, but also a couple of new galleries that Maddy has waiting in the wings, of the USA Jr. Men’s training camp, held in Chula Vista, California the weekend after the AAU concluded. Some great shots of the future of the game. “Stay tuned”.
p.s. In case you were wondering which photo is getting the most email, it’s got to be this one. And with all due respect to the St. Thomas Storm team, I don’t think it’s you, guys. 😉
