In the Sandlot League, it’s baseball for the sake of the game
FREEPORT — The sun has gone down, and the light is fading. For hitters stepping into the batter’s box now, the baseball looks like a shadow speeding at them now that the sunlight is embers. What little light glows from the scoreboard beyond the left field wall or the streetlights lining the path that runs along the field between L.L.Bean’s parking lot and Freeport High School is not sufficient. The home plate umpire has seen enough, or rather, can’t see enough.
Shortly after 8 p.m. Friday night, this Sandlot League playoff game between the Frogs and the Crawdads is suspended due to darkness. They’ll come back and play the bottom of the seventh inning at 10 a.m. Sunday with the Frogs leading 14-11, before the scheduled losers’ bracket game of the Sandlot League playoffs. The loser of this game will jump right into that one, while the winner will get a break until the afternoon championship.
They’ll happily do it, driving to Freeport from points across southern Maine and beyond, because the Sandlot League is all about squeezing in more innings of the game they love.
“It’s the perfect balance of fun and competitiveness,” said Nate Rogers, the player/coach for the Crawdads.
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An injury limits Rogers, who completed his college baseball career at St. Michael’s College two years ago, to coaching these days, but he fills out the lineup card diligently. If you show up, you’re in Rogers’ lineup. Players rotate through positions on the field and as extra hitters.
In this game, his lineup includes South Portland’s Richie Gilboy, who became an internet sensation when he was 12 and a member of the South Portland Little League team nine years ago at the New England Little League tournament, telling the ESPN viewing audience that he takes big daddy hacks. Now Gilboy takes big daddy hacks for St. Michael’s, where he’ll be a senior next season, and the Crawdads.
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Crawdads first baseman Ben Seguin, of Scarborough, played a few years of baseball at Thomas College. In 2025 he got 12 at-bats for the Terriers.
“In college, I didn’t play a lot. This league made me love the game again,” Seguin said.
Crawdads Caleb Viola delivers a pitch during a Sandlot League tournament game Friday in Freeport. Viola played high school baseball at South Portland didn’t have a college career. The Sandlot League allows him to continue to play the game he loves. (Anna Chadwick/Staff Photographer) Purchase this image
Caleb Viola was the Crawdads starting pitcher Friday, and he didn’t play at all in college. Neither did his right fielder, Aidan Blakely. Unlike leagues for college age players like the New England Collegiate Baseball League, in which the Sanford Mainers will play for the title starting Sunday, being on a college roster is not a prerequisite for playing in the Sandlot League. Love the game and be a good teammate. That’s all it takes.
That and $185, which helps pay for umpires and baseballs. What does that work out to, a few bucks per inning? We’ve all spent $185 in worse ways.
“I’m very proud of what we’ve built without squeezing the players,” said Peter Wagner, who founded the league in 2020 to give players who lost their spring season to the pandemic an outlet to play. With players spread across the field, baseball is a natural for social distancing.
In describing the joy he gets from playing for the Crawdads, Viola mixed his metaphors. He was minutes from taking the mound in a playoff game, so cut him some slack.
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“It’s great to know I’ve still got some bullets left in the tank,” Viola, who played high school ball at South Portland, said.
Near the first base dugout, Frogs first baseman/outfielder Tommy Joyce prepared for the game. At 27, Joyce is one of the league’s elder statesmen (the league allows players between 18 and 30). Joyce, an assistant coach with the Portland High baseball team, played college ball briefly at the University of Southern Maine and the College of Staten Island.
“It’s hard to give it up when it’s been a part of your life for so long,” Joyce said. “Before I started playing (here), I hadn’t touched a baseball in three years probably. Each year, I feel like I’m getting progressively better. I don’t like to be bad at things.”
Tommy Joyce is an assistant coach for the Portland High baseball team and plays first base and outfield for the Frogs in the Sandlot League. He said he keeps playing because, “it’s hard to give it up when it’s been a part of your life for so long.” (Anna Chadwick/Staff Photographer) Purchase this image
Joyce homered in the top of the fifth inning. That swing had definitely returned.
The love of the game is why Will Spratt made the 200-mile round trip from his hometown of Dexter all summer to play for the Frogs. When the team plays at Southern Maine Community College, the league’s other field, it’s even farther. It’s why Frogs starting pitcher Joseph Clouse made the trip from Bar Harbor. Spratt and Clouse are teammates at UMaine-Farmington, and the Frogs are the Beavers’ unofficial summer squad.
The reason they’ll resume this game Sunday morning is Brady Vincent. An Auburn native, Vincent’s two-run home run in the top of the seventh in the dying light gave the Frogs a 12-11 lead. It was his third home run of the game.
“This is great,” Vincent said as he watched his teammates tack on two more runs for the three-run cushion they’ll take into Sunday. “I love this.”
It was getting dark fast, but baseball shined brightly.
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Tagged: Sports Columns, travis lazarczyk
Travis Lazarczyk has covered sports for the Portland Press Herald since 2021. A Vermont native, he graduated from the University of Maine in 1995 with a BA in English. After a few years working as a sports. More by Travis Lazarczyk
