Little League Coach Stays In It For Kids, Smiles

Pete Mancini is very familiar with little leage baseball starting with his playing days in the 1960s. Mancini has a love of the game and was an assistant for his son’s teams starting when his son played in the pee wee’s and continuing all the way to the majors.

When his son's little league years were over, Mancini was asked if he was interested in a major league manager's position by Fort Lee American Little League president Rich Radorian.

Mancini was thrilled to be asked.

"I love the game of baseball, and it was a way to stay close to the game, so I brought in my very dear friend, Conrad Napoli, and we took over the Fairway Market team," Mancini said. "The first couple of years I really leaned on the people that have been here a lot longer than I have. They run the best organization around, they helped tremendously.”

Mancini’s Fairway Market team won the American League championship for the second year in a row but fell to the Fort Lee National Little League’s Fort Lee AC Tuesday night in the Mayor’s Trophy game.

Napoli, Mancini’s longtime friend from high school and current assistant coach, loves coaching the kids with Mancini.

"We love it because Coach Mancini played in the National League with the little league in the 60s, and I played in the National League also, so we have a little bit of remembrance of when we played," Napoli said. "We are living through them"

The kids love playing for Mancini as much as he loves teaching them the game and seeing them succeed.

"The friends that the kids make by playing youth sports can last a lifetime," said Mancini. "They receive discipline, teamwork and see what a group can accomplish by playing as one, but most of all, its the fun. Let's face it, its the fun or they would not be here, and that is my goal--make it fun. And if we happen to win along the way, that just makes it a little better.”

That type of approach to coaching is great for the kids of the community, and Mancini enjoys every second of it.

“I’ve been a manager for about five years now, and you can't forget the championships," he said. "But if everyone could experience the smile on a kid's face after he or she gets that big hit, believe me, it is a moment in a kid's life that they will never forget, and that is why I do what I do.”