BANGOR – The Maracaibo, Venezuela All-Stars can only hope to have the same sort of success shared by the two previous winners of the Senior League Baseball World Series since the event came to Bangor in 2002.

In 2002, Willemstad, Curacao, dropped its first game of pool play, but went on to win the world championship. Last year, Hilo, Hawaii, bounced back from an opening-game loss to win the title.

This year, Maracaibo dropped a 2-1 decision to San Antonio, Texas, in its first game, but has battled back to win three straight games to earn the Pool B championship, a run capped by Thursday’s 4-2, nine-inning thriller over previously undefeated Freehold Township, N.J.

“We never lost faith,” Maracaibo pitcher-third baseman Renzo Urdaneta said through an interpreter. “After that first game we had a team meeting in the hotel, and we decided just to go out and play baseball. We have faith in our team.”

Pitching depth has been at the forefront for the Latin American champions, who have allowed just 18 hits and three earned runs in four games. Urdaneta has a pair of victories as a reliever, while starters Jose Ramon Gonzalez, Kevin Soto, Victor Galue and Eudondar Gonzalez have been as stingy as any rotation in the SLWS.

“The pitching has been strong since we’ve been playing in Venezuela and then in the Latin America tournament,” said Maracaibo manager Gustavo Marcano. “And now we’re showing it here.”

Tribute honors Hawaii coach

Senior League Baseball World Series officials held a moment of silence Thursday in memory of Charles Haasenritter Sr., who helped coach Hilo, Hawaii, to the 2003 SLWS championship but died of cancer on April 27.

Haasenritter, a native of Honolulu, was considered one of the leaders of Hawaii’s youth baseball movement, having been active as a coach on the Big Island since 1991.

Last summer, he was part of the coaching staff that guided the Hilo All-Stars to the Senior League championship, upending 2002 champion Curacao in the semifinals and then defeating Central Chesterfield, Va., 16-8, in the championship game.

Among the players on that Hilo squad was Haasenritter’s son, Matt, who was one of the team’s top pitchers and hitters.

The elder Haasenritter reportedly became ill during Hilo’s quest for the 2003 championship, and later learned that he had cancer.

According to the Honolulu Advertiser, Haasenritter had been a building inspector with Hawaii’s Department of Accounting and General Services since 1986.

Venezuela helps Rotterdam

Europe-Middle East-Africa manager Paul Roodenburg said his team got a bit of help from the Latin America squad Wednesday.

Tim Roodenburg, who was set to be the starting pitcher for EMEA winner Rotterdam, the Netherlands, in Thursday’s game against the U.S. Central team from Chicago, had a sore arm Wednesday. Gustavo Marcano, the son of the manager of Latin America representative Maracaibo, Venezuela, and a translator for the team, apparently has experience as an athletic trainer and volunteered to work on Roodenburg’s arm.

“I think everybody here [does] something for each other,” Paul Roodenburg said. “That’s important. We all have the same cap on. The root of Little League is doing something for the kids.”

It was good of Marcano to look at Tim Roodenburg’s arm, but there was something to be gained from getting the Rotterdam pitcher in better shape.

A Rotterdam win over Chicago would have helped Venezuela in the standings if it had lost to the U.S. East team from Freehold Township, N.J., Thursday morning.

Paul Roodenburg said Marcano good-naturedly conceded the bit of self-interest on the part of the Venezuelans.

“He said, ‘OK, it may be important for us, too. It may be a surprise that we need a win from you,'” Roodenburg said with a smile.

Venezuela ended up beating Freehold Township, so the Latin America team didn’t need any help.

Paul Roodenburg said his team forged a bit of a bond with the Venezuelan team because Rotterdam coach Frans Solinier speaks fluent Spanish. Marcano is the only member of the Venezuelan team’s entourage who speaks English.

Solinier, Roodenburg said, has connections with the Red Sox and serves as a scout in Europe.

Dutch set record straight on drugs

After the Rotterdam team played its final World Series game Thursday afternoon, the Dutch players were seen handing out key chains with small wooden shoes attached on a chain.

Most of us imagine those wooden shoes, fields of tulips or canals when we think of the Netherlands.

But apparently a few of the teen-age spectators at Mansfield Stadium are curious about something else the nation is known for – its open drug policy.

Rotterdam manager Paul Roodenburg said his team has been approached by youngsters who have asked the Dutch players questions about drugs.

“The kids are asking, do you have drugs with you? No, of course not. Do you smoke drugs? No, of course not. Do you see it [in the Netherlands]? Yeah, of course we see it. We smell it,” he said.

Since 1976 authorities in the Netherlands have tolerated the sale of small amounts of marijuana, according to an Associated Press story from March 30 about a move to legalize marijuana in Nevada.

According to the official Web site of the Netherlands Board of Tourism and Conventions and the Netherlands Foreign Trade Agency, the use of so-called soft drugs like marijuana and hashish are not offenses and certain shops can sell soft drugs as long as they follow a set of rules.

Roodenburg emphasized that his team is clean.

“Those kids are completely free of that and not using anything,” he said. “In Holland [drug use] is in the open so we can control it. Here [in the U.S.] it is something behind the curtains, I think. It’s in the closet.”