{"id":31368,"date":"2017-08-10T18:40:33","date_gmt":"2017-08-11T01:40:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/?p=31368"},"modified":"2017-08-10T18:40:33","modified_gmt":"2017-08-11T01:40:33","slug":"grande-prairie-alberta-pirates-to-compete-in-2017-isc-world-tournament","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/?p=31368","title":{"rendered":"Grande Prairie Alberta Pirates to compete in 2017 ISC World Tournament"},"content":{"rendered":"

From the Daily Herald Tribune<\/a><\/p>\n

\n
\n
\n
\n

By\u00a0Logan Clow<\/a>, Grande Prairie Daily Herald-Tribune<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\n

Playing internationally is a rare opportunity for Grande Prairie fastball players.<\/p>\n

From Aug. 12-19, the Grande Prairie Senior A Pirates are playing at the 2017 International Softball Congress\u2019 Men\u2019s World Fastball Tournament in Grand Rapids, Michigan.<\/p>\n

Shayne Milligan, team manager and player (third base\/outfielder), said the team is ecstatic about the opportunity. The team qualified over the May long weekend at a tournament in Kelowna.<\/p>\n

Their first game is Aug. 12 at 8 p.m. against the Waterdown Hammer \u2013 a fastball team from the Hamilton, Ontario area.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf we win that, and we\u2019re successful in that game… it\u2019ll be a good game… all teams are very close there… (so) if we win (our first game) it\u2019ll likely set up a date against the New York Gremlins, who are ranked fourth in the world or something like that,\u201d said Milligan.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis (tournament) is a huge deal (for us). This is what we play for. This is the season. This is what we look forward to every season is playing in this tournament because you\u2019re seeing all the best players in the world. It\u2019s basically the world\u2019s best of club teams, so it\u2019s the top club teams in North America and they pull players from New Zealand, Australia, Venezuela, Japan, Argentina, Europe…So, obviously these teams like the New York Gremlins have a payroll. Unfortunately, we\u2019re not that size. We\u2019re just a bunch of hard working guys who play hard, practise hard to compete against all those hired guns.\u201d<\/p>\n

Milligan said it\u2019s been quite some time since a Grande Prairie team has attended the world fastball tournament. Several years ago, he said the Grande Prairie Pride competed at the event.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s competitive,\u201d he said, of the team\u2019s approach to the tournament.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re always in there trying to make a name for ourselves and putting Grande Prairie on the map. We\u2019re in there competing hard, working hard to upset these so-called \u2018bigger squads\u2019. And, we\u2019ve got a few guys on our team chasing the invite to play for Team Canada.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Click here to continue reading<\/a> and to view photo of the Grand Prairie Pirates<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

From the Daily Herald Tribune By\u00a0Logan Clow, Grande Prairie Daily Herald-Tribune Playing internationally is a rare opportunity for Grande Prairie fastball players. From Aug. 12-19, the Grande Prairie Senior A Pirates are playing at the 2017 International Softball Congress\u2019 Men\u2019s World Fastball Tournament in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Shayne Milligan, team manager and player (third base\/outfielder), […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5,28,10,21,23],"tags":[779,692],"class_list":{"0":"post-31368","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-canada","7":"category-featured","8":"category-isc","9":"category-teams","10":"category-tournaments","11":"tag-grandeprairiepirates","12":"tag-iscwt2017","13":"entry"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31368","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=31368"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31368\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31370,"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31368\/revisions\/31370"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=31368"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=31368"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.fastpitchwest.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=31368"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}