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Todd Frazier on Little League glory, Yankees love and Frank Sinatra

Yankees Todd Frazier

By Steve Serby

July 30, 2017 | 12:48am

New Jersey native Todd Frazier, recently acquired by the Yankees in a trade with the White Sox, takes a swing at some Q&A with Post columnist Steve Serby.

Q: What are your favorite Toms River memories growing up?
A: Oooh man. … We won the national junior peewee Pop Warner championship when I was 8. I won the Punt, Pass and Kick when I was 9. When baseball comes around, it’s crazy. I remember having 2,000 people at our Little League games at 12 years old when we played against the rival Toms River … going to the high school football games which were unbelievable, to scoring 1,000 points. I remember when I scored 1,000 points, both my brothers did the same things, in basketball. Just the friendships I made, and just the love I have for that city.

Q: Why is Toms River so special?
A: I don’t know, man, it’s crazy. It’s a who-knows-who there, to be honest with you. You go to a regular grocery store, everybody’s asking about you, “You’re doing a great job,” this and that. Everybody takes pride in what they do, and especially when it comes to baseball. We run camps all the time in the offseason. We try and give back, me and my brothers, as much as we can, so we can have, hopefully a couple of more Todd Fraziers coming up (smile). It’s just a fun town. It’s a town filled with excitement every day, and sports plays a big role there,

https://nypost.com/2017/07/30/todd-frazier-on-little-league-glory-yankees-love-and-frank-sinatra/

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Hall of Fame catcher Ivan Rodrigues at Bookends on July 25th

Hall of Fame catcher Ivan Rodrigues

July 21,2017

the staff of the Ridgewood

Ridgewood NJ, Hall of Fame catcher Ivan Rodrigues ,will sign his new book Tuesday, July 25th @ 7:00pm  at Bookends in Ridgewood .

Rodrigues, played with six organizations but entered the Hall Fame as Ranger. He signed with the Rangers in 1988, made his debut with them in 1991 at the age of 19 and was with them for 12 years before leaving as a free agent.

Ivan Rodrigues will sign his new book: They Call Me Pudge: My Life Playing the Game I Love

Each person attending must purchase one or more books

Due to the popularity of our events, many of which sell out, we require that you preorder your books ahead of time by visiting our website https://mkt.com/bookends or calling the store at (201)445-0726.
As always, Books for our events MUST be purchased from Bookends Bookstore.
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Ridgewood Baseball Softball Association Championship Saturday June 10th

RBSA

June 10,2017

the staff of the Ridgewood

Ridgewood NJ, Ridgewood Baseball Softball Association Championship Saturday schedule for Baseball and Softball Teams – June 10th.

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Mike Just Today Sunday, May 21st at 3:00pm at Bookends in Ridgewood

Mike Jusr, Bookends Ridgewood

May 21,2017

the staff of the Ridgewood blog

Ridgewood NJ, Mike Just ,Former Pro Baseball Player and Owner of Just Hits in Westwood,NJ, Mike Just, will sign his new book: Just Baseball
Appearing authors will only autograph books purchased at Bookends and must have valid Bookends Receipt.

Availability & pricing for all autographed books subject to change.
First In Line Certificate use is the the discretion of Bookends. Blackout dates may apply.
Bookends cannot guarantee that the books that are Autographed will always be First Printings.
Autographed books purchased at Bookends are non-returnable.

While we try to ensure that all customers coming to Bookends’ signings will meet authors and get their books signed, we cannot guarantee that all attendees will meet the author or that all books will be signed.  We cannot control inclement weather, author travel schedules or authors who leave prematurely.

Bookends, 211 E. Ridgewood Avenue, Ridgewood, NJ   07450   201-445-0726

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How Derek Jeter’s N.J. roots made him Yankees diehard

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By Brendan Kuty | NJ Advance Media for NJ.com
on May 14, 2017 at 6:00 AM, updated May 14, 2017 at 6:01 AM

You know the story: Derek Jeter always wanted to be a Yankee.

Jeter, whose No. 2 the team will retire Sunday, dreamed of playing shortstop at Yankee Stadium when he was a kid. He dreamed of wearing pinstripes. And he accomplished that goal.

But why? Why the Yankees?

Thank his family.

In an interview with the “MLB Tonight,” Jeter’s mother, Dorothy, said he became a fan because of summer trips to see family in New Jersey as a kid.

“I’m from Jersey, and my mom was a diehard Yankee fan,” Dorothy Jeter said. “The kids used to go visit my mom with my other nieces and nephews and stay the summer. They used to watch Yankee baseball. They used to go to Yankees games. So, Derek was a diehard Yankee fan, mainly because of my mom and he just fell in love.”

https://www.nj.com/yankees/index.ssf/2017/05/how_derek_jeters_nj_roots_made_him_yankees_diehard.html

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They Can Hit 400-Foot Homers, but Playing Catch? That’s Tricky

baseball_layout

By BILL PENNINGTONAPRIL 1, 2017

In the 40 years that Jack Thomson has been coaching high school baseball, he has seen a noticeable rise in the talent of players trying out for his team.

They scorch line drives, they hurl blazing fastballs.

But something is often missing.

“They can’t play catch,” said Thomson, a coach in California, one of the more fertile grounds for future major leaguers. “They’re bad at it. You’d be surprised how bad it looks. We have to teach them how to play catch.”

In modern youth baseball, where the culture has been transformed by the pursuit of the holy grail, a college athletic scholarship, the fundamentals are falling by the wayside in favor of flashier skills like big-league-style hitting and pitching.

Private coaching and specialized camps are proliferating along with travel teams whose primary goal is putting players in a position to display their batting and pitching skills at college recruiting showcases. These events are cattle calls, with everyone trying to impress.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/01/sports/baseball/they-can-hit-400-foot-homers-but-playing-catch-thats-tricky.html?partner=rss&emc=rss&smid=tw-nytimes&smtyp=cur&_r=0

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Baseball Scorekeeping Joins the 21st Century with GameChanger

20120330_baseball_33

February 26,2017

the staff of the Ridgewood blog

Ridgewood NJ, There was a time when nothing was more sacred than going to a baseball game, getting a hot dog and keeping score in the stands. Children from past generations would enter the gates at their favorite baseball stadium and immediately ask their parents to get a scorecard and pencil, so that they could track every play. In the days before YouTube, Wikipedia and baseball reference sites, keeping score was one of the only ways to look back on games and remember what happened – batter to batter.

As technology advanced the art of scorekeeping faded from popular use, and now many fans don’t know what a backwards “K”, “HPB” or a “6-4-3 DP” means. To help bring scorekeeping back to the 21st Century, GameChanger has launched apps for iOS and Android. GameChanger, available for free, is the leading digital scorekeeping app that also helps amateur baseball and softball teams stay organized and informed.

GameChanger features an easy-to-use tutorial that guides even the most inexperienced users step-by-step and pitch-by-pitch. With one click, users simply have to select the virtual field on the screen and a set of dropdown menus will allow them to input the play. The app keeps track of all the action, so that users can review the game anytime, anywhere. In-game stats include everything from pitch counts to first-pitch strike percentage.

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Hitting Glory – A Baseball Bat Adventure

Hitting Glory - A Baseball Bat Adventure

Hitting Glory – A Baseball Bat Adventure

by Robert J. Skead

Ridgewood NJ, The heartwarming story about Lou Gibson, an 11-year-old boy who finds an old, wooden baseball bat engraved with the initials LG on its handle in his school’s basement. When Lou recalls that the most famous graduate of his school, Public School #132 in New York City, was Yankee great Lou Gehrig, he immediately sets off on a mission to prove that the bat once belonged to “The Pride of the Yankees.” Lou’s search sends him on a journey of triumph, tragedy and discovery when he finds out that when he uses the bat he magically becomes an amazing hitter.

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THE STORY OF THE 100 YEAR OLD BAT

In April 2000, I was fortunate enough to purchase a 100 year-old, wooden baseball bat at a bargain price. When the old Spalding® bat arrived, I immediately displayed it on the wall in our family room. I never imagined the bat would generate a story. Here’s what happened:

The bat’s unique, old-fashioned shape and brown patina mesmerized me. I noticed there were initials – RM – carved on the bottom of the bat. I wondered who RM was. How old was he when he received the bat? Did he hit any homeruns with it? What if RM became a major league player later in life and this was his bat when he was a kid?

That last question hit me like a line drive between the eyes. I imagined that the bat once belonged to Lou Gehrig when he was a kid. I then imagined what would happen if a child had the bat today and started using it in his games. Could the bat have special powers in the hands of an imaginative child?

The result of all this imagining is HITTING GLORY – A BASEBALL BAT ADVENTURE

https://www.robertskead.com/hittingglory.php

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RHS Baseball players and their dads will be heading down to play some ball, but more importantly, to bring donations !

RHS Baseball players and their dads

November 27,2016

the staff of the Ridgewood

Ridgewood NJ, The annual trip to the Dominican Republic is fast approaching. RHS Baseball players and their dads will be heading down to play some ball, but more importantly, to bring donations of new or used baseball gear to the children of the village and much needed supplies to the local orphanage. We are looking for baseball clothing, gloves, cleats, batting gloves, diapers, wipes, cans of tuna, and vitamins. All donations are greatly appreciated. The deadline is 1/20/17 and drop-off locations are 519 Fairfield Avenue or 226 Phelps Road. Thank you in advance for your continued generosity.

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Little League Softball: Ridgewood’s run to Junior East Regional finals a team effort

14U softball team for winning the Junior Softball State Championship!

BY RON FOX
CORRESPONDENT |
THE RIDGEWOOD NEWS

Little League rules mandate that every player on a team’s roster must have at least one at-bat in a game.

That was no problem for Tony Barbera, manager of the Ridgewood Under-14 Little League softball team, which roared to district, sectional and state championships this summer and missed by one game of moving on to the Junior Little League World Series in Kirkland, Wash.

https://www.northjersey.com/sports/high-school-sports/girls-softball/ridgewood-s-run-to-regions-a-team-effort-1.1640298?page=all

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Youth Baseball: Ridgewood squad resumes last summer’s success

RBSA

BY MATTHEW BIRCHENOUGH
ASSISTANT SPORTS EDITOR |
THE RIDGEWOOD NEWS

Just over 11 months ago, the Ridgewood Raiders 14U baseball team returned to a hero’s welcome in the village after the squad’s successful season culminated in a trip to the Junior League World Series.

The same group of boys had another strong campaign this summer but without any of the fanfare that accompanied last year’s triumphs. That was perfectly fine with them.

https://www.northjersey.com/news/village-team-resumes-last-summer-s-success-1.1636940

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Ridgewood Baseball Softball Association

Ridgewood   12U boys take the District 4 Little League title!

Ridgewood Baseball Softball Association 12U boys take the District 4 Little League title!

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13U Raiders win the 2016 NJ Section 1 Intermediate (50/70) Championship!

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14U take the District 4 Junior League title in a 1-0 thriller

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14U Girls are Section 1 Champions!

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Baseball Hall of Fame Pitcher Jim Palmer will be appearing Wednesday at Bookends in Ridgewood

Nine Innings to Success

June 1,2016

the staff of the Ridgewood blog

June 1st @ 6:30pm  at Bookends in Ridgewood

Jim Palmer, will sign his new book:
Nine Innings to Success

Click on the link below to pre-order:
https://squareup.com/store/bookends

Ridgewood NJ, Baseball Hall of Fame Pitcher Jim Palmer will be appearing Wednesday at Bookends in Ridgewood. James Alvin “Jim” Palmer (born October 15, 1945) is a retired American right-handed pitcher who played all of his 19 years in Major League Baseball (MLB) with the Baltimore Orioles (1965–67, 1969–84) and was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1990. Palmer was the winning pitcher in 186 games in the 1970s, the most wins in that decade by any MLB pitcher. He also won at least twenty games in each of eight seasons and received three Cy Young Awards and four Gold Gloves during the decade. His 268 career victories are currently an Orioles record. A six-time American League (AL) All-Star, he was also one of the rare pitchers who never allowed a grand slam in any major league contest.

Palmer appeared in the postseason eight times and was a vital member of three World Series Champions, six AL pennant winners and seven Eastern Division titleholders. He is the only pitcher in the history of the Fall Classic with a win in each of three decades. He was also the youngest to pitch a shutout in a World Series at age 20 in 1966. He was one of the starters on the last rotation to feature four 20-game winners in a single season in 1971.

Since his retirement as an active player in 1984, Palmer has worked as a color commentator on telecasts of MLB games for ABC and ESPN and for the Orioles on Home Team Sports (HTS), Comcast SportsNet (CSN) Mid-Atlantic and the Mid-Atlantic Sports Network (MASN).
Appearing authors will only autograph books purchased at Bookends and must have valid Bookends Receipt.

Availability & pricing for all autographed books subject to change.
First In Line Certificate use is the the discretion of Bookends. Blackout dates may apply.
Bookends cannot guarantee that the books that are Autographed will always be First Printings.
Autographed books purchased at Bookends are non-returnable.

While we try to ensure that all customers coming to Bookends’ signings will meet authors and get their books signed, we cannot guarantee that all attendees will meet the author or that all books will be signed.  We cannot control inclement weather, author travel schedules or authors who leave prematurely.

Bookends, 211 E. Ridgewood Avenue, Ridgewood, NJ   07450   201-445-0726

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Play Ball ,Ridgewood Baseball/Softball Association Opening Day

RBSA

April 23,2016

the staff of the Ridgewood blog

Ridgewood NJ, the Ridgewood Baseball & Softball Association (RBSA) held its 66th annual Opening Day Parade and Family Fun Day today from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Weather held and the parade started at 9 a.m. leaving the Ridgewood train station and heading down  East Ridgewood Avenue to Veterans Field. Grand Marshal Jim Griffith led the procession of over 1,000 players from the village’s youth baseball and softball teams . Opening ceremonies were held at Kasschau Band Shell, where Ridgewood High School senior Morgan Mastrangelo sang the national anthem.

New York Mets mascot Mr. Met made a special appearance and he was followed by a visit from the New Jersey Jackals mascot, Jack the Jackal.

Lots of food was available though gourmet  food trucks that were brought in . The lineup included the Mac Truck, Pizza Vita Brick Oven Pizza, Jersey Johnny’s Grill, Empanada Guy, Thai Elephant, the Taco truck, Waffles de Lys and Ben & Jerry’s.

As has been the custom in recent years many activities were available for children will including music, carnival games, face painting, spin art and a jumbo inflatable obstacle course and slide. In addition, Veterans Field will have a pavilion showcasing 40 vendors with a mix of unique wares and sports-related items.

Ridgewood Police shut down East Ridgewood, Maple Ave and Franklin Ave by 9am for the Baseball Parade for approximately 45 minutes. This in turn backed up NJT buses and caused a few delays for passengers.

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Dan Schlossberg and Erik Sherman at Bookends in Ridgewood Saturday

Bookends Ridgewood

April 22,2016
the staff of the Ridgewood blog

Ridgewood NJ, Dan Schlossberg will sign his new book: When the Braves Ruled the Diamond along with Erik Sherman with his new book: Kings of Queens. Bookends in Ridgewood , Saturday, April 23rd @ 1:00pm.

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Appearing authors will only autograph books purchased at Bookends and must have valid Bookends Receipt.

Availability & pricing for all autographed books subject to change.
First In Line Certificate use is the the discretion of Bookends. Blackout dates may apply.
Bookends cannot guarantee that the books that are Autographed will always be First Printings.
Autographed books purchased at Bookends are non-returnable.

While we try to ensure that all customers coming to Bookends’ signings will meet authors and get their books signed, we cannot guarantee that all attendees will meet the author or that all books will be signed.  We cannot control inclement weather, author travel schedules or authors who leave prematurely.

Bookends, 211 E. Ridgewood Avenue, Ridgewood, NJ   07450   201-445-0726