Bryce Shafer and Marty Coyle are ready for some rest, and who can blame them?
Shafer threw 145 pitches over two relief appearances on back-to-back days, and Coyle caught all 47 innings the Beecher Muskies played in the NABF Charles Blackburn Major World Series — including 25 innings in a 30-hour span.
But the thirty-something veterans will be resting easy after leading the Muskies to their second national championship overall and first in 15 years.
Shafer, who earned three of the Muskies’ five wins in the tournament, and Coyle, who hit .474 across six games, were named co-MVPs after Beecher beat the Berea (Ohio) Blue Sox 10-6 for the title on Aug. 3 at North Central College’s Zimmerman Field in Naperville.
Also nabbing an award was left fielder AJ Lee, an Orland Park resident who had the tournament’s best batting average at .545 (12 for 22).
Muskies manager Fred LeSage was able to pull Shafer after three innings and 52 pitches in a 13-0 win over Erie Buffalo on July 31. That proved crucial when Shafer was needed after the Muskies fell behind by five runs both in the semifinals against the Chicago Clout and in the final.
Shafer pitched the final four innings in a 10-9 win over the Clout on Aug. 2 and threw four shutout innings against the Blue Sox before having to leave the game with an injury in the top of the ninth.
“I was feeling OK,” said the 36-year-old Shafer, a former pro pitcher who is the head coach at Kankakee Community College. “And then I think the third hitter (in the ninth), I got to two strikes. And then I threw one and my hamstring popped. I was like, maybe I can throw some stuff up there and they found a couple holes (for hits). And then at that point, there was one pitch that it really went and I was like, it’s not fair to the guys for me to try to gut this out. Let’s bring in somebody that can do it.”
That was Manteno’s Ben Carlile, who got the last out to earn his second save of the season and trigger the Muskies’ victory celebration.
Coyle, 38 years old and in his 18th season as the Muskies’ longest-tenured current player, is a national champ for the second time after also being on the 2010 title team.
How did he feel after catching six games in five days?
“My body’s pretty beat up, but I’m on cloud nine right now,” Coyle said. “I don’t really know how to feel after winning this. It’s been so many years for me. … We’ve had so many years we made it to that final game, we made it out of pool play and we thought we had it and just something didn’t go our way, you know? … It takes so much to get to that last out.
“So yeah, this is incredible. As it was happening in that last inning, I’m like, ‘Are we going to do this? Like, are we going to win this?’ And we did.”
Shafer and Coyle weren’t the Muskies’ only veteran heroes in the title run. Kris Honel, a 42-year-old in the second year of his comeback after a 10-year layoff, pitched a five-hitter over seven innings for his first complete game in 15 years to beat the Addison Braves 6-1 in the quarterfinals on Aug. 2.
“Coming out here today, I knew our backs were against the wall,” Honel said after his win. “… Knew I had to bring the energy here for the guys today and get them back on track … and came out and did it.”
Some of the Muskies’ younger players also played starring roles during the title run. Tyler Brody, a 2019 Beecher graduate who entered the title game as a pinch runner in the seventh inning, singled home the go-ahead run in the eighth. Zac Ruzich, another Beecher grad, was 2-for-3 with an RBI off the bench in the final.
And Le, who is heading into his senior season at Milwaukee School of Engineering, was the best hitter in the tournament. But afterward, he was focused on the team’s achievement, and the veterans’ contributions.
“These guys are a bunch of animals,” he said. “Man, I can’t even put words to it. …
“It’s funny. … I went to a little high-school camp at Tinley Park High School and Marty coached me, and he remembered that and I remember him. I look up to Marty. He carries himself very well. And ‘Shaf,’ man, every time he comes in the game, all we have to do is score runs. He’s not gonna let up anything else. We knew just as soon as he came into the game today — I had a feeling we were gonna win.”