Little Leaguer heads to Hall of Fame

Chase Kleint is off to Cooperstown. photo by Jim Cornelius Chase Kleint of Sisters would like to make the Big Leagues someday. Whatever the future holds, the 12-year-old centerfielder can say he made it to the baseball Hall of Fame.

Kleint has been selected as a member of an Oregon club team that will compete this fall in the Cooperstown Dreamspark National Invitational tournament of Champions in Cooperstown, New York, home of baseball's Hall of Fame.

Selection to the Portland-based Metro Baseball Academy team is a signal honor. The coaches scouted hundreds of 12-year-old prospects and 97 players tried out for the 14 slots on the squad.

Kleint, who played for the Yankees in Sisters this summer, made the team with his combination of speed on the basepaths, contact hitting ability and fielding skills.

"I play centerfield," Kleint said, "but for this team I'll be playing right field."

Kleint, who moved to Sisters from Madras a year ago, also enjoys football and wrestling -- but baseball is his favorite sport.

"I'm good at it," he said. "Everybody likes something they're good at."

Kleint also likes the fact that baseball is a team sport.

Kleint is a speedster, which has put him in the lead-off spot in the batting order. He's excited by the fact that tournament rules will allow lead-offs and base stealing off the pitcher's move instead of Little League's more restrictive rules that don't allow a steal until the ball crosses the plate.

He describes himself as mostly a contact hitter, but allows that "sometimes I end up hitting a home run by accident."

Kleint left yesterday for his big trip, which includes stops in Chicago and Boston for baseball games and sightseeing before heading to New York for the tournament.

The tournament, which is second only to the Little League World Series in scale, features 64 of the top 12-and-under teams in the country. Kleint's team will play eight to 12 games over the course of a week.