Niagara Falls Men's League
2011 Wrap up
Another busy season completed in Niagara Falls
The league held its annual awards banquet Saturday evening. The league would like thank Al Greatrix, Mark Korten, Dave Rotella, Darrin Newson, Rich Vassos, Perry Bartley and Jay Paylove for their time in administering the league in 2011. Sometimes a thankless job but its the reason we all get to play fastball in Niagara.
On to the awards
League champs for the regular season, Niagara Snappers. The Snaps rejoin the league and edge the Fury out for the regular season title.
A large part of the Fury success is the play of their ace Scott Wagar, who is rewarded and recognized by the league as the regular season Most Valuable Pitcher. Wagar was also voted 2011 GHFL Most Valuable Pitcher and gives the Fury a chance every time he takes the ball.
The regular season MVP award was awarded to Kevin Newhouse of the Snappers. Newhosue is a big part of the dangerous Snapper lineup and his consistentency throughout the year in addition to his usual stellar defense earns him the award. Newhouse was also the 2011 GHFL MVP.
Playoff champs again goes to the Niagara Snappers. The Snaps defeated the Fury for the playoff championship. This leads to the award for Playoff Most Valuable Pitcher - Matty Lyons from the Snappers who gets the nod as he finishes 3-0 for the playoffs. Playoff MVP goes to Trevor Falk from the Snaps. Falk cashed some big homeruns during the Snapper playoff run.
The annual Rusty Dekker Memorial award was presented to the Tazco's Aaron Belding. In addition to contributing to Tazco's season year with his tremendous hitting Aaron also played a steady shot stop. Aaron was a big part of the Tazco lineup.
The annual Janet Greatrix Memorial award for sportsmanship and dedication to the NFMFL was presented to Darrin Newson of Hooligans.. News is a great young player in the NFMFL and respected by all the league's players and coaches. News took the reigns this year and helped rebuild Hooligans into a good young competitive team and is responsible for keeping Hooligans alive after the surprise retirement of Danny Duemo this year.
The league I believe was a great success for 2011. Lots of camaraderie between the players during and after the games. The league would also like to recognize from the GHFL in 2011 Niagara Falls teams and players:
Regular season champions and playoff finalists, Niagara Snappers
Most Valuable Player - Kevin Newhouse, Niagara Snappers
Most Valuable Pitcher, Scott Wagar, Niagara Fury
The league would also like to highlight Tazco's first place finish at the annual Niagara Falls Mens League touranemen this past August. The league would also like to thank Niagara Falls umpires, team sponsors especially Hooligan's bar, volunteers, fans, Ker Park grounds crew, City of Niagara Falls, GHFL executive and Niagara Falls players for their dedication to the game. It was indeed a busy year with three very successful tournaments running at Ker. In addiiton we ran the GHFL regular season games along with the local component and local playoff series.
Al as always thank you for posting Niagara Falls results and information and for your continued support of Fastpitch in Niagara.
Will be planning 2012 in the new year. As always any comments are welcome. I am sure I probably missed a thank you or perhaps missed recognizing someone's efforts and if so my apologies. Good luck everyone with their hockey seasons, best wishes for a safe winter and look forward to catching up with whomever is lucky enough to be in Florida at AAU in January!
thanks, Rob
