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Tuesday, November 24, 2009
LONDON GETS 2010 ELIMINATION TOURNAMENT
The Lakeside Lizards will, once agin, host the Senior
Elimination tournament, in 2010. The announcement was made on Friday, following a meeting of the Board of Governors
of Baseball Ontario in Cambridge. The Windsor Stars also applied to host the tourney, but the tourney was awarded to
the London group on a one year basis. You'll recall that Windsor was scheduled to host the tourney in 2009, but a city-wide
strike in Windsor led to the fields being unplayable. Lakeside came to the rescue, however, and did a fine job in hosting
the event, at the last minute. It seems that Baseball Ontario has rewarded them for their excellent gesture, and hard
work.
The Metros held their 2009 year-end meeting last week, and discussed many things of importance for next year,
and down the road. Not the least of which was returning and non-returning players, finances, and a rehashing of what
went right (and what went wrong) in 2009. It was a positive meeting with some very good suggestions by the players and
coaches. We'll be getting to work right after New Year's Day, to put these plans into effect. By the way, everyone
will be receiving an e-mail in the next couple of days, regarding a date for the Christmas party. With Christmas falling
on a Friday, things are a little screwed up this year, so we'll need your input on which day would work best for you.
Look for that, this week.
Finally, you have to check out our "Metros History" page. As promised
we have written a new story, and added it to the links available on that page. The story is a brief history of Senior
Baseball in St. Catharines...prior to the beginning of the "Metros" in 1985. It is a rich history, and you
can actually follow the "evolution" of Senior ball in our city from 1903, right up to our initial season in 1985.
We felt that our complete story could not be told without telling you a bit about the players and teams that came before us.
It's a great read. Just click on "Metros History" to the left of the page, and then on "St. Catharines
Sr. History - Prior to the Metros".
Talk to you next week!
Monday, November 16, 2009
DID YOU CHECK OUT THE NEW STUFF??
Always trying to keep the website
current, we've got some new stuff to tell you about, once again this week.
1. First off, we have posted our
Metros 25th Anniversary 2nd All-Star team. You'll recall that last week, we posted the 1st team...and now we have completed
the task. There's a lot of interesting reading about our great players from the past and present, on these pages.
Just click on "Metros 25th Anniversary Team" to the left of this page, and then on "2nd Team", to check
out the players that were named (and a little summary of their accomplishments.) By the way, congrats to all the players
who were named to either team...it's quite an honour.
2. We got tired of looking at the same group of pictures
on our "Archive Website", so we updated it. Just above this blog, you'll see a link (in gray) that says
to, "click here to visit the St. Catharines Metros Archive area". When you click on the link, it takes you
to our archive area, and you can check out our new front page photo montage. We think it looks pretty good!
3. Did you check out the new "Baseball Film Feature" on our Home Page? This week's
film is really spectacular...and very rare. We stumbled across some very old archival footage of Major League Baseball
in the "Deadball Era" (1900 to 1925). Some of the film is rough, but the clips are amazing...including quite
a bit from the 1919 World Series (the one that the White Sox threw), where you'll get to see many of the players that
were portrayed in the movie "Eight Men Out". The other aspect of this amazing footage is the fact that, while baseball
was certainly different at the turn of the century, the game was played much the same as it is today. This film in fact
proves the point..."the more things change, the more they stay the same". Just scroll to the bottom of
this page, and press "Play".
YEAR-END MEETING...ANOTHER REMINDER
We know we're sounding like
a broken record, but it's important. The Metros are holding their 2009 Year-end meeting, this coming Wednesday,
November 18th, at the Thorold Legion. We are asking all current members of the team, to do whatever they can to make
this meeting, as we need your input into decisions that have to be made, surrounding the Metros 2010 season (and beyond).
That meeting is scheduled for 7:30, in the upstairs hall at the Legion...on Ormond Street, in Thorold. See you there.
11:12 am | link
Monday, November 9, 2009
BIG GOINGS-ON, AT THE WEBSITE
Did you notice it? No? Look again.
If you go to the left of the page, you'll see a new link on the sidebar called "Metros 25th Anniversary Team".
You'll recall that, back in August, we named our 25th Anniversary 1st and 2nd All-Star teams. We named them, but didn't
have time to tell you their stories, and honour the players selected, properly. However, we have found the time recently,
and have 'righted this wrong".
If you click on the new link, you'll be taken to a page that explains the entire
process we went through to pick the teams...who was on the selection committee, what the criteria for selection was, etc.
Then, at the bottom of that page, you'll find two links entitled "1st Team" and "2nd Team".
This is where you can click to visit the pages with all the details on the teams (with pictures and a brief bio for each
player). The link for the "1st Team" has been activated, and you can check out that team right now.
The "2nd Team" should be completed within the next week. We'll let you know when it's available. These
pages make for some pretty interesting reading!
With the new "Metros 25th Anniversary Teams" link
in place, you might ask, "What happened to the old 25th Anniversary link?"...which led to the 25 yearly
summaries, and recaps, that were so popular, back in the summer? Well, those pages have been reassigned, and are now
available, by clicking on "Metros History". The old Metros History page was a 5 paragraph summary, that didn't
delve into too much detail, and we felt that the series of stories that we wrote earlier this year, would make for a much
better "History" page.
To mark this change, we re-wrote the story about our original team...the
"1985 Metros". The original story was short, and lacked in much of the detail that the subsequent stories
contained. We felt that, because the 1985 team (being our first edition) was such an important aspect of our history,
that we should do it the justice it deserves, and go into much more depth about that important year. Please check out
the "new" 1985 story, by clicking "Metros History" and then "1985".
FROM THE PAST TO THE PRESENT...
The Metros will
be holding their 2009 Year-end meeting, next Wednesday, November 18th, at the Thorold Legion. We are asking all current
members of the team, to do whatever they can to make this meeting, as we need your input into decisions that have to
be made, surrounding the Metros 2010 season (and beyond). That meeting is scheduled for 7:30, in the upstairs hall at
the Legion...on Ormond Street, in Thorold. See you there.
10:31 am | link
Monday, November 2, 2009
ANOTHER GREAT NIGHT AT C.O.M.B.L. BANQUET
Last Thursday, the Dundas Chiefs, once again, did a fantastic job in hosting the 2009 Central Ontario Major Baseball League
Banquet. The "prime rib" meal was awesome, and the award presentations (along with the comaradery of the baseball
fraternity) was, once again, a pleasure to be a part of.
Speaking of the awards, the Metros only received one on
the night...as Rocco Spano accepted the Ken Johnson Award, emblamatic of winning the Johnson Division Championship.
It was the 4th straight win (and 11th overall) of this prestigious award for St. Catharines. Dustin Turner, the Metros' finalist
for the League Top Pitcher award, finished 3rd in the balloting for the award. It was the 2nd straight year that
Turner was nominated for the award, only to finish as a runner-up.
Here are the results of all the award balloting,
as well as the Metros players to be picked as Johnson Division Year-End All Stars:
Ken Johnson
Division winners - St. Catharines Metros
Len Andrews Division winners - Erindale
Cardinals
Anson Buck Trophy winners (Overall Reg. Season Champs) - Erindale Cardinals
Barry Dobson Trophy winners (Playoff Champions) - Erindale Cardinals
Bill Graham
Award (C.O.M.B.L. "Iron Man") - Steve Lauzon, Milton Red Sox
Chuck Brown
Award (Sportsman of the Year) - Frank Coccia, Erindale Cardinals
Len Andrews Award (Batting
Champion) - A.J. Iafrate, Etobicoke Rangers (.422)
Andy Pearce Award (Home Run Champion)
- Geoff Cullen, Erindale Cardinals (9)
Ken Johnson Award (Executive of the Year) - Dave Smallhorn, Oakville A's
Todd Perkins Award (Rookie of the Year) - Justin
Butler, Erindale Cardinals
Jack Roberts Award (Pitcher of the Year) - Gord Robertson, Oakville
A's
Sam Leonard Award (Playoff M.V.P.) - John DeWolfe, Erindale Cardinals
Dick
Willis Award (C.O.M.B.L. 2009 M.V.P.) - A.J. Iafrate, Etobicoke Rangers
The
3 St. Catharines Metros that were voted to the Johnson Division Year-End All-Star team were:
Righthanded Pitcher
- Dustin Turner
Short Stop - Tim Collins
Outfielder -
Justin Czorny
Congratulations to these 3 dedicated players, on their outstanding
seasons...and congratulations from the Metros to all the winners listed above. Your great achievements spur
everybody on to a higher level of play...and we all win!
By the way...check out the New Photos
we posted on the website to document the event. Just click on "Photo Album", to the left of the page, to view
them.
And thanks again, to the Dundas Chiefs (especially Allen Rutherford, Mike Whitehead, and Charlie Holman)
for hosting a first-class event!
|
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. The Niagara Metros are very pleased to have Cat's Caboose Dining Coach and Bar Car as their
corporate partner in 2011.
|
| Click on the logo to visit the Cat's Caboose website. |
Located in the heart of Old Glenridge,
Cat's Caboose is one of St.
Catharines' oldest and most established restaurants. The place for LIVE ENTERTAINMENT and GREAT FOOD.
. .
. Check out our Showcase Film for the period of February 13 to February 27.
Just scroll
to the bottom of this page and press "Play".
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| Click to visit the "St. Catharines Standard" Website. |
Thank You: To the St. Catharines Standard for allowing us to use pictures and articles throughout this website.
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| Niagara Metros website reaches 100,000 hits on April 18, 2010. |
hits since December, 2004 Thanks for visiting 
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