Cooperstown 2006 - What week are you going?

We will be there July 1-8.

I wish were going
good luck to al that go.

Rob, Garrett is having his best fall ever this year.

Sadly, we have outgrown (or outaged?) that venue!

Best of luck to all!

Yes, we are going the week of Aug 4. Can't wait!

If anyone on here has a spot for CDP 2006 but is NOT using it, please let me know. We are wait-listed and trying to get in.

Thanks!

Adam Farb
North Bay Xtreme Baseball
415-377-9716

XtremeBB,
If you can't get into CDP you can check into Cooperstown All-Star Village which is a 2 year old facility right outside of Cooperstown (Oneonta). Everything is brand new there.
Also there is Cooperstown Basebaball World which is held on the Oneonta State Univ Campus. There was a 15U Extreme Team there a few years back.

Cong,
Copperstwon Baseball World has events for team up to and including 16U.

We will be at CDP July 1-8. This is my oldest son's team so this is our first visit...and we're quite excited about it.

Jon

You guys enjoy yourselves. CDP was a GREAT time! The kids still talk about it. Are some of you coaching and staying in the bunkhouses with the team? All baseball, all day, all week, in an awesome setting. Doesn't get much better than that.

Some tips:

Bring some room fans. It can get real hot in the bunks. One year we needed them and good thing we brought 6 or 7. The next year we didn’t really need them much.

Bring a couple big coolers with bottled water and ice. It’s just very convenient. You can get ice there to re-fill it.

Bring some medium size padlocks. Everybody gets a plastic trunk to put stuff in. You should lock them. A padlock will go through eyes in the top and bottom, but too small and it won’t work, too large doesn’t either. But don’t be too trusting that everyone is gonna be honest and upright. We didn’t have anything real valuable stolen, but a couple kids had all their pins ripped off while we were playing a game.

Thanks for the suggestions. I take it the bunks aren't air conditioned.

Oh no. It's like summer camp in the old days. You can open windows, but it can get pretty hot if there is no breeze.

Also, and I might take some flak for this, since it sort of suggests violating rules, and some do-gooder will likely say that's a bad example to set, but they have a 'no outside food policy'. I can see why, you can't have all sorts of garbage and trash brought in, but I couldn't find any fresh fruit snacks or other healthy snacks there. They do serve a rather nasty fruit cup at breakfast. But alot of junk snacks. If you regularly eat healthy - stash a bag of apples or something in your cooler or batbag, but be sensible about it. Don't bring all sorts of snacks along, that would be taking advantage of the situation and they could get confiscated.

Again, thanks for the suggestions. I started another CDP thread in the General Items forum to try to get more suggestions on what to expect and what to bring.

Thanks.
Jon

Last summer we stayed in a house about a mile north of the park. We booked thru Cooperstown Accommodations from the Dreams Park website. If you are flying there I found the cheapest way to go was using the travel link on the Dreams Park website. I tried every travel website I could find and I didn't find anything better. Good Luck and have fun.

willj1967,

We have been there the last 2 years...I can answer any questions you may have...ask away.

Ok, you asked for it....

Is there actually downtime during the week or do the games, meals and other activities fill the calendar? Is there time to take the team to the Hall of Fame or anything else for that matter?

Can I give my son a cell phone so I can stay in touch during the week?

How do we do the team's laundry? Uniforms, sliding pants, regular clothes, etc.? It's going to be a lot of work.

It sounds like the pin exchange is a big deal. Do you order pins from a CDP-recommended organization or do the teams just have their own hometown company make them?

Is it a true tournament with brackets? Or do you just play roundrobin against some random teams? I'm thinking maybe you play 4-5 games and then they perhaps seed the teams for a tournament the second half of the week? How does that work?

Do they play little league rules (small barrel bat, can't lead off, can't steal until the ball passes the batter) or major league rules (big barrel bat, lead off and steal when you want)?

One more for now.....Are you (redbird) a Cards fan?

Thanks.
Jon

will,

The kids can go to the HOF, in fact they get passes to do so I think. Usually they go as a team, they have to wear their uniforms and they'll get the discount.

Don't worry about uniform laundry. It's done by a contract service which I think you pay for upfront as part of the price, or a small add-on depending on how your organisation handles it. The coaches collect all the laundry and pack it up and deliver it to the main pavilion and leave it, and miraculously it returns the next day.

Make sure you MARK/INITIAL YOUR LAUNDRY with magic/permanent marker, so you know what belongs to who. Regular clothes are probably more easily identified, but if you have something that alot of kids have then mark that as well.

I think the only thing you really have to provide yourself is white BB pants and whatever colour belt your team decides, black works for both uniform colours. Every team has to wear the CDP Jersey (Red and Blue, they provide).

Brackets. hmmm... There are 80 teams, or there were a few years ago. You play 6 or 7 games, and then you get seeded for the playoff rounds. Playoffs are single elimination. You will play a variety of teams, some small town teams, some stud travel/select teams. We've done both, it was fun both times. Town teams generally don't have the firepower to go a long way, some do. But it won't matter, the kids will have a great time. The town team we went with did fairly well but lost our first playoff game, so we got in 8 games I think, going 4-4 overall. The select team we took went to the semi-final so we were in the top 4 and played oh, 11 or 12 games going 10-1 or 11-1. You will need pitching.

Rules are typical PONY/NFHS rules with leading/stealing/pickoffs/balks and LL bats or big barrel Senior league bats or HS bats, whatever you want, but not wood, wood is illegal.

What else . . . .

I think cell phones are ok. I don't remember. If you're just a parent and not a coach, you will have somewhat limited time with your player. You have to fill out a form in order to take him/her away for some personal time with the family. Generally speaking, the kids don't usually want to be away, no offense, they're having a great time with the team, and from what the parents say, it's pretty cool for them coming to the games and then not having to worry about laundry and kids. Parents are free to have a good little stress-free kid-free vacation.

The teams take a few outings, I think we did a go-cart place and one night I think a parent who rented a cottage had all the team over for a supper. It gave the coaches a well deserved (and needed) time off. They're with the kids 24/7 and have ALOT of responsibilities, so if you and some other parents can get that together your coaches will love you for it.

Excellent. Thanks for the info.

Oh, and some good parent should extend the invitation sometime mid-week for the coaches to stop over and take a good shower. You never really feel clean after showering in the coaches/umps community shower.

My sons team is set for August 18-24, but he just joined the league travel team and might be going twice. The town team usually goes in July to baseball world and his other team is going to all star village. Only reason I'd let him do both is it's a month apart and it's at two different places.

Wow, you must be loaded!!! LOL, I heard it costs a ton to go there per kid.

While I do ok I'm not loaded. I live in NY so travel is not a real expense . I have free lodging in my brothers summer house, all it will cost me is my sons expense, which fortunately the teams do some fundraising.

We're going HOF weekend, July 29th. The wife and I are taking our camper and staying at a nearby campground. About $250 for the week which I think is pretty reasonable.

I think most teams do fundraising to cover the expense of the players and coaches. We covered them all through fundraising so the only expense is for the wife and I. We did a trivia night and raised over $10K.

Good luck to all the teams going this year.

Will anyone be there this week for the U10's ? My kid is the little lefty playing for Frozen Ropes of Rochester. We are looking forward to a great week of baseball !