Koert hopes international swansong is golden

February 22, 2013

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ORIGINAL STORY - by Jim Mason, Stoufville Sun-Tribune

Photo : YRMG file photo

Paul Koert of Stouffville will pitch for Canada at the world fastball championships beginning March 1 in New Zealand

Paul Koert enjoyed Family Day by taking his young family tobogganing.

The Stouffville resident said good-bye to them for three weeks yesterday. He hopes to enjoy more smooth sledding on the other side of the world.

The 34-year-old is a pitcher on the national team hoping to bring Canada its first gold medal from the International Softball Federation’s world championship in 21 years. The 16-team event runs March 1 to 10 in Auckland, New Zealand. Canada plays Argentina on opening day.

Canada, which took bronze at the most recent world championship held in 2009 in Saskatoon, last won gold at the ISF worlds in the Philippines in 1992.

Fellow Stouffville pitcher Andy Skelton, who led Canada to gold at the Pan-Am Games in Colombia in September, is also on the team. There are four other players from Ontario on the squad.

The rebuilt team features a younger roster than usual after a wave of retirements after the 2009 tourney.

“I think we have a faster, more consistent team than before throughout,” said Koert. “And it’s the best hitting team Canada has put together in a long time.”

Reigning world champion Australia and the hosts, who won the previous three titles, are favourites. Canada is ranked third. Japan and Argentina are solid, too, he said.

Koert’s been pitching since picking up the game in Unionville as an eight-year-old.

“They put me into pitch and I never looked back,” he said. “As a pitcher, you reap the rewards but also the repercussions. I like being the centre point.”

When his family moved to Ballantrae two years later, he started a run with some talented Stouffville teams. He’s since played for Owen Sound, Jarvis and Kitchener in Ontario and a tournament team out of New York City.

Stouffville Menno fans have seen him throwing for the opposition during mid-week outings in Memorial Park during recent years, including a perfect game that ended the Mennos season last fall in Aurora.

Internationally, he’s represented Canada at the under-19 worlds and Pan-Ams and his native United States at the 2009 ISCs.

Koert and Skelton have been working out weekly this winter with area players at Stouffville District Secondary School and the Home Run Academy in Ajax.

“I’ve done everything else, won national and (North American club) championships,” said Koert, national sales manager with a veterinarian supply company. “This is the only thing that has escaped me. It would be nice to go there and win the holy grail of fast pitch.”

It would also mean going out a winner.

“This is probably it, the final straw, for me,”  he said Monday. “I’ll keep playing with local teams, but this should be it for club and international play.”

Mennos’ supporters will also know Skelton, who no-nit the home team last summer on behalf of the powerhouse Scarborough A’s.

He promptly left for the Pan-Ams where he personally dominated Venezuela in the final

The 25-year-old tossed a complete game, surrendering just four hits while striking out eight and had two hits of his own, one of which was a towering three-run home run in the bottom of the sixth inning, to lead Canada to a 4-1 victory and its first gold medal since 1993.

He is a director at Skelton Truck Lines on Davis Drive.

The Canadians are playing exhibition games with local teams and countries on the opposite side of the draw at the worlds before starting for real March 1.

-With files from Torstar News Network