Many of the best high school-age baseball players in the state will be in action Monday when the Salt Lake Valley American Legion Baseball league begins its summer program.
Twenty teams will vie to be among the top eight that qualify for the Utah State American Legion Baseball Tournament which runs Aug. 1-12 at Ken Price Park in Murray. A Taylorsville squad that includes many of the players from the recently crowned state 4A high school championship team has to be one of the early favorites, along with teams from Bingham, Alta and Skyline.The Legion's board of governors voted this year to reduce the number of league games to enable teams to develop their pitching staffs for the state tournament.
"This enables the teams to play in more out-of-state tournaments without being pressured into makeup games at the end of the league schedule," said Dan Pattison, Salt Lake Valley League president.
"In the past, coaches have complained that they have not been able to develop their young pitchers because of the pressure to win games to make the state tournament. Then, while playing in the tournament, the coaches ran out of pitchers."
The Utah state tournament is the only 16-team, double-elimination American Legion tournament in the United States.