Pacific Southwest Feature: Rain Can’t Delay The Dirtbags
By: Charlie Hooper
Team Pacific Southwest’s loss to Southeast yesterday was a very unique game, mostly because of the hour-long rain delay that sent the fans and player off of the field.
There were actually two rain delays, the first only lasted 18 minutes and when they called off play, Coach Maurice “Mo” Matsuzaki looked at me and said, “We play in this all of the time in Hawaii, this is nothing.”
It became clear that the team from Hawaii was no stranger to rain and even welcomed the thunder and lighting. While most of the fans and Team Southeast left the field and went to the concourse to wait out the delay, Pacific Southwest stayed in the dugout the entire time.
Coach Daryl Kitagawa told his players, “I don’t want anyone to leave the dugout, we will stay and focus on what we have to do.”
Before the delay, Pacific Southwest had put two runners on base with no outs and trailed 5-2. Coach Daryl huddled his players together and said, “Let’s shock the world, Dirtbags don’t die!” He and his players were oozing confidence during the delay and never doubted themselves. Coach Daryl even wrote 4 runs on his score sheet, predicting a comeback victory for Pacific Southwest:
The rain delay proved to be a blessing in disguise for me, and was easily my favorite moment of the tournament. It was during the delay that you really saw how close the players, coaches, family and friends from Pacific Southwest are.
Casey Kitagawa didn’t hesitate to take his Bluetooth speakers out of his backpack and play the teams favorite songs. Each player sang every word together and danced in the dugout waving their rally rags as if they were winning by ten runs. Whenever there was a crack of lighting you could distinctly here Stanley McKenzie yell, “There it is!” welcoming the storm and making the most of it.
Family and friends went to the concourse and brought down countless burgers, corn dog bites, homemade snacks and local Hawaiian favorites. It was like Thanksgiving dinner for me as I had about seven different courses, from homemade energy bars, rice cakes, coconut sunflower seeds and I couldn’t even finish it all!
It was so exciting for me to observe and get a taste of the Hawaiian culture that I otherwise may not have seen.
I was amazed to find out that every player on the team had at least one family member make the trip to Aberdeen. When I asked Coach Mo how they were able to get so many people to make the trip he said, “People gave us money and gifts so that we could make our trip to Aberdeen and it is customary in our culture to then bring something back from the states that they could not get anywhere else.” He went on to say, “We have been collecting gifts at the World Series that will bring back home to everyone who helped us make it here.”
Before the World Series, I asked Coach Daryl what he was looking forward to most and he said, “We are just looking forward to soaking in as much of the experience as we can.” Pacific Southwest’s joy, confidence and positive attitude during the rain delay showed that they were making the most of their time in Aberdeen and at the end of the day, that’s all that matters.
All week I was hearing about how most of the players grew up together and have played together for close to six years and it showed. In my post game interview with Stanley McKenzie he kept referring to his teammates as “brothers,” and I truly believe that the Dirtbags are like a second family for most.
It’s hard not to be happy and positive around Team Pacific Southwest. Even after a emotional loss to Southeast in the U.S. Semi-final, you could see the players picking each other up which shows character beyond their years. I know just hours after their loss, the boys from Manoa Hawaii were back singing their favorite songs and dancing as if they were World Champions.