{"id":6077,"date":"2014-04-02T15:32:50","date_gmt":"2014-04-02T19:32:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/?p=6077"},"modified":"2014-04-16T17:44:11","modified_gmt":"2014-04-16T21:44:11","slug":"aurora-jays-are-eager-to-get-back-on-thebaseball-diamond-with-their-top-coaches","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/aurora-jays-are-eager-to-get-back-on-thebaseball-diamond-with-their-top-coaches\/","title":{"rendered":"Aurora Jays are eager to get back on thebaseball diamond with their top coaches"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Jeff Doner<\/strong><\/p>\n

After a great season in 2013, the Aurora Jays of the North Dufferin Baseball League (NDBL) are eager to get back on the diamond.<\/p>\n

The NDBL recently held their annual general meeting and the Jays came out with some positive news.<\/p>\n

Jay\u2019s veterans Rob Wilson and Mike Keon shared the coach of the year award as the league\u2019s top skippers.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt felt great,\u201d Wilson said of the award. \u201cFor a team that the core at least has been together since we were 12 years old, playing and coaching with your peers is challenging, but to be able to have the success that we\u2019ve had is obviously in large part due to the guys themselves. If Keon and I can contribute in some small way in terms of strategic decisions or leadership and making sure that we\u2019ve got a team on the field, it\u2019s nice to be recognized for that, but really it\u2019s about the guys that are playing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wilson also added that Mike Wallace of Bolton deserved kudos for coaching his Brewers to a league record of straight championships.
\nLast season, the Jays finished the season in third place with a 19 \u2013 6 \u2013 1 record in the 14-team senior league.<\/p>\n

This year, Wilson said the bulk of the team will be back, but there will be a couple of familiar faces both coming and going.<\/p>\n

Nate Drury and Kevin Buck are leaving to be a big part of a returning Orangeville squad and a couple of ex-Jays will also be making their comeback with Aurora.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got two guys coming back from the past,\u201d Wilson said. \u201cWe\u2019ve got Jake Pinnigar, who took last year off, and then another player who played with this team for a lot of years into his teens, Fab Dolan. He\u2019s got some CIS experience and he was quite the ball player in his prime, so we\u2019re pretty pumped to get him back. He\u2019s a catcher too, so we\u2019re happy to get [Chris] Fafalios out from behind the dish.\u201d<\/p>\n

Fafalios will be coming home for the summer after playing some college baseball in the U.S.<\/p>\n

The other big news for Aurora baseball coming out of the NDBL\u2019s AGM was the announcement that Aurora will be forming its own junior team this year.
\nAs past-president of the NDBL, Wilson said the addition of a junior team is great for the sport in Aurora by giving young players the chance to make it up to the next level and bounce back and forth.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s kind of a win-win, because I look at that as a really strong opportunity for our younger players to double dip and I\u2019m sure we\u2019ll be\u2026making sure the boys are happy and healthy and playing as much ball as they can, so that\u2019ll be great.\u201d<\/p>\n

The executive also discussed the possibility of pushing back the start of the season due to the seemingly everlasting winter.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s all likelihood that the season start will be pushed back,\u201d he said. \u201cThe fields are so wet and there\u2019s still snow sitting on them. We understand with the municipalities, they want us to play too, that\u2019s why they build the facilities, but if we get out there too early and destroy it, we\u2019re going to be the ones out there complaining in August.\u201d<\/p>\n

Wilson said possible solutions will be to cut back the 28-game schedule, add more doubleheaders or simply push back May 3 opening day.<\/p>\n

For more information, visit www.ndbl.ca<\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"mail\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After a great season in 2013, the Aurora Jays of the North Dufferin Baseball League (NDBL) are eager to get back on the diamond.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":6040,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6077","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archive"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/04\/2014-04-03-13.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p3D2k4-1A1","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-04 06:00:30","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6077","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6077"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6077\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6040"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6077"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6077"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newspapers-online.com\/auroran\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6077"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}