Frazier's Role In Yankees' Playoff Run Adds Magic To Toms River Baseball Documentary

TOMS RIVER, NJ — "C'mon Todd!" "Let's go!" The urgings came from different points around the room, like kernels of corn starting to pop in a hot popcorn maker.

One out, Starlin Castro on first base, Greg Bird on second. Todd Frazier eyes up the 0-1 pitch from the Astros' ace Justin Verlander and swings, driving the ball deep to center field at Houston's Minute Maid Park. As the ball arcs closer and closer to the wall, the excitement and energy ripples through the bar at the Office Lounge, hoping, willing the ball to keep soaring.

In a corner at the front of the bar, Sandra Levine is peering through the eyepiece of her camera, taking in the sounds and the faces of the bar patrons pulling for the ultimate hero moment for Frazier, the hometown boy playing for one of the most storied baseball franchises in the major leagues. A home run would tie the game 3-3 for the Yankees, decided underdogs this entire postseason. It would be a life come full circle for Frazier, whose home runs helped propel Toms River East American into to the 1998 Little League World Championship against Japan, where his lead-off home run set the tempo for the Toms River championship.

It would be a signature moment in an unexpected chapter of the documentary Levine is compiling, one looking at Toms River's passion for baseball, with a focus on the incredible level of success of Toms River South baseball coach Ken Frank, the winningest baseball coach in New Jersey and fifth-winningest in the country.

Frazier, who played for Frank at Toms River South, is a central thread of the story, Levine said.

"He's a great role model for younger kids," she said. "They see what he's achieved and it gives them hope of reaching that dream."

On this Friday night, the collective dream and hope is for Frazier to make another trip to the World Series — this time as a member of the New York Yankees. A home run here, in the seventh inning, off the Houston ace, would turn the tide and might finish off the Astros. But George Springer has other ideas, and with a leaping grab, snatches the hero robe from Frazier's shoulders, just a couple of feet shy of the home run.

The room lets out a collective "ohhhhhhhh" of disappointment.

"That was the play," Levine said later, shaking her head, knowing the crowd in the bar would have erupted if that ball had cleared the fence. "That was the play."

Levine, the independent filmmaker who produced "Heartbreak & Healing After Sandy," the documentary on the devastation wrought by Superstorm Sandy and some of the initial work to rebuild from the storm, said the Toms River baseball project is something she's been working on for more than 18 months. It started with a chance meeting with Frank, who's been coaching at Toms River South for more than 40 years.

Frank's first year at Toms River South was the year Levine graduated from the high school, 1978. "He was a gym teacher," she said. Some years later she met Frank when her daughter attended his baseball camp at the age of 8 or 9. Then came 2015, when she ran into him and was startled to learn he was still coaching.

"I don't really follow sports that much," Levine said. "I didn't realize he was the winningest coach in New Jersey and fifth winningest in the country." The more she learned — about Toms River South's five NJSIAA Group championships, its multiple Shore Conference Class A South titles, its Shore Conference Tournament success — the more she wanted to know.

"I knew about Todd Frazier," Levine said. "I just became obsessed with doing a piece on how he (Frank) had so much success."

"If a story strikes me as something I really feel compelled to do, I can see it in my mind instantly," she said. That was how she had felt about the Sandy documentary, and it was how she felt about Frank and the story of Toms River's passion for baseball. The timing was fortuitous; Frank's 40th year of coaching was ahead in 2017 when she got started. It took some convincing.

"Ken was a little shy about all the attention that would come with this," Levine said. "He eventually came around."

So far, she's filmed about 100 hours of footage of Frank, of Toms River South and of various interviews, including a sitdown with Frazier, who graduated from South in 2004 with 26 home runs in his four-year high school and was a key part of Indians' state championship teams in 2002 and 2003.

"I shot every game of the 2016 season," Levine said, and ended up doing the same with the 2017 season as the Indians put together a special season, winning Class A South for the second straight year, and reaching the semifinals of the Shore Conference Tournament.

She's also talked to opposing coaches and other locals who have insight into Frank's years and success, such Kevin Williams, the longtime sports broadcaster for WOBM, now Townsquare Media.

Levine, who was a reporter and producer at NJN for 23 years, said she'd done hundreds of short features during her career at the public broadcasting network, which shut down in June 2011. She also did three 30-minute documentaries while she was there.

The Sandy documentary, which was shown earlier this month as part of the Toms River Regional Schools' Big Read program, was the longest she had done before now.

"That (the Sandy documentary) was definitely one of which I was most proud," said Levine, who spent two years working on it. "It was very important to me." She lives not far from the Toms River, and while her family's home was unscathed, her father, who lives on Kettle Creek, had as much as 2 feet of water in the first floor of his home.

"I was born and raised here," she said, and had many friends whose homes were partially or severely damaged. Then the photos began trickling out, showing what had happened on the barrier island.

"When I saw Ortley, that's when I knew I was going to do a documentary (on Sandy)," Levein said.

The Toms River baseball documentary similarly gripped her. But as an independent filmmaker, the vast majority of the work falls squarely on her shoulders.

"I've shot everything myself except when I was interviewing Todd," Levine said. For that occasion, she hired a cameraman so she could concentrate on the interview itself. She has had help for other parts, enlisting both her husband and her daughter on some occasions.

That included during one of the tournament games, where she used three video cameras and a still camera. She and her husband each had a camera, and she lashed a GoPro to the backstop to get three angles on what was happening. Her daughter, meanwhile, was shooting still photos.

She was preparing to start writing and doing a rough edit of the film when the Yankees got on their surprising playoff run, which has added elements she didn't expect. It's a change she embraces.

"It makes it that much more special," Levine said, because it underscores some of the conversations she had with Toms River Little Leaguers in the last two summers.

"They talked about how they follow him (Frazier)," she said. "They say he gives them hope they can reach the major leagues." She's hoping to get some footage of Frazier from the Yankees, but as of the weekend, had not yet been able to achieve that.

Once she does the writing and rough edit, Levine said, she will be hiring an editor to do the final polish, as well as a colorist, a graphics person, a music composer and an audio sweetener to put the finishing touches on the documentary.

"I have a rough outline and I'll look at the footage multiple times," she said, looking for just the pieces to capture what she's looking for and tell her story. "I like viewers to be engaged the whole time. It's about the flow."

She's aiming for a spring showing of the film, but some of that is dependent on finding more sponsors for the project to cover the costs of the final editing process. It is a sponsored project through the New Jersey Media Arts Center, which helps independent filmmakers, by being a place where tax-deductible donations can be made and through showcasing their work in film festivals. She has some local sponsors as well, she said.

"I can't do these projects without the support of the community," Levine said. Sometimes that support comes quietly, as it did Friday night while Levine filmed at the Office Lounge. Some of the wait staff were surprised, but word quickly spread about what she was doing, and they went back to serving customers, many of whom were intently watching TVs, all of which were tuned into the game. While the end of the game wasn't what she hoped, the enthusiasm for baseball still came through on Friday night in the middle of high school football season.

In the end, tracking Frank, the Indians and Frazier has been a learning experience. "I played softball for one season in high school but I didn't know about the strategy, the mental game," she said. "It's been a lot of fun."

And Frazier's run with the Yankees — where she, like many others, hopes he will remain for at least another year — has made it simply magic.

If you're interested in supporting Levine's project, visit her website by clicking here. You also can email her at sandy@sandralevine.com.

Photos provided by Sandra Levine; used with permission