An era has ended in Fargo, ND. The team that began as the Fargo KC's 27
years ago has reached
the end of the road. After the KC's we also played as the DMS Knights,
IS Knights, and finally
as the MinnDak Millers. Most of those years were spent playing at the ASA
Class "A" level using
local players and playing 75 games a year. So much of the fun was giving
players the opportunity to
compete and watching them develop in the game, reaching their potential.
In 1998 the team became the first North Dakota team to win an ASA
National Championship.
From then on we played in the ISC tournament as well. We were a small
budget team that just
loved to compete. But we enjoyed spending time together even more. We
were known for our
"Circle of Friends" get togethers at the end of the day. It was typical
for our team to be the last ones
at the tournament on Sunday night even though we had by far the farthest
to drive.
Over the years a high percentage of our funds were earned through team
fund raisers. This meant a
lot of off season time together too planning and promoting events.
But eventually Father Time catches up with us all. To continue to play at
the top level OOA players
were needed and started to replace local retirees. Of course this
launched us into todays reality of
of continually needing more funds.
The fun this team had playing this great game we love for 27 years never
subsided.
It just got too expensive!
For all of you who had any association with the team over the years,
sponsors, fund raisers, players, fans,
umpires, tournament organizers, those associated with the ISC, ASA, &
NAFA, and to the teams
we played against; we say THANK YOU!!! The memories and the friends we
made will never be forgotten.
Without you it just wouldn't have been the same.
Hopefully we'll see you around the diamond!
Paul Lybeck
MinnDak Miller Manager
plybeck@juno.com
