Washington County aiming to end Pony championship drought
Colman McGuinness was sitting in the front row at Lew Hays Field for last year’s Pony League World Series Championship game between Washington County and Chinese Taipei.
Cameron Jobkar was there too, and so were many of the other players that are on this year’s Washington County team.
They saw how close that team was to breaking the now 71-year drought for a championship from a Washington County team.
Washington County had a lead, but a four-run rally from Chinese Taipei in the fifth inning gave it a 6-4 win and left many in attendance experiencing heartbreak.
“I was crushed…we all were crushed,” McGuinness said. “We thought (Washington County) might make a comeback at the end and we got all hyped up, but it didn’t happen.”
Last year’s result has driven the hunger within a new group of players as they get ready for the Pony League World Series, which begins Friday.
Washington County’s first game is Saturday Aug. 8 at 5 p.m. against the winner of Friday’s game between Paderborn, Germany, and Hidalgo, Texas.
A team from Washington County last won the World Series in 1955.
“It’s an honor to play for Washington County, especially, because I grew up here and have been here all my life,” Jobkar said. “I think we definitely have a chance to win this year and hopefully we can get it done for everyone who comes to watch us.”
John (JP) Przybylinski returns as the Washington County manager for a second consecutive year. He is in his third year with the organization after serving as an assistant in 2024.
The loss in last year’s championship still stings, but it’s also a motivator to try and finish the job this time.
“I think about that (championship) game more than I’d like to admit,” Przybylinski said. “After every game from last year I’d go back and rewatch the games. Still to this day it’s the only game I haven’t gone back and watched fully. It creeps up on me a few times a week honestly, but you can’t live in the past. You can learn from it though.
“At the beginning of the year we had a team meeting and I had the newspaper article from last year from the championship game where we felt short. I had them pass it around and look at it and I told them that we don’t want to repeat history from last year. We want to rewrite history.”
Przybylinski had two players from last year’s team, Keegan Wiedenhofer and Carson Simmers speak to the team before a practice this week.
The second-year manager is excited about the group he has.
Jobkar and McGuinness are two of a handful of players from Canon-McMillan.
Other Big Macs are Carter Rukavina, Max Taczak, Blake Westfall and Carter Enrietti. There are three players from Trinity: Brock Morgan, Evan Campbell and Caedon Markley, two from Charleroi: Dylan Carpenter and Logan Caughman and Grady Kuzior of Burgettstown, Collin Beattie of McGuffey, Cameron Shaw of Chartiers-Houston and Blake Komenda of Seton LaSalle round out the roster.
Having ample pitching in the Pony League World Series is important, and like last year, the majority of Washington County’s roster can pitch.
Przybylinski said Carpenter, Kuzior, Jobkar, Taczak, Westfall, Morgan, Campbell, Enrietti, Komenda, Beattie, Shaw, McGuinness and Coughman can all pitch.
One difference from last year’s team is all of the pitchers on the team are right-handed.
“Every single one of those guys I trust in that moment,” Przybylinski said. “It’s good. It makes our lives both easier and harder at the same time, because you’re trying to fill pieces behind them.
“It’s probably surprising that we don’t have any lefty pitchers, because we had so many last year, but every lefty bat we have on the team throws right handed.”
Przybylinski is equally confident in Washington County’s offense. He said this group is comparable to last year’s, it not a little better.
“We have a lot of good sticks,” Przybylinski said. “It sucks that I only get to play nine guys in a batting order, because we have more than nine guys who deserve to be in there. It’s a good problem to have, but it’ll make for some tough decisions for us as coaches. It’ll come down to who’s swinging a hot bat and all of these guys are capable of doing that.”
When Washington County plays its first game, there will probably be some nerves, but also some dreams coming true.
McGuinness has been going to the Pony League World Series for seven years as a spectator and now he’ll get to play in the tournament.
“I love to see all the different teams come together and play in a tournament like this,” McGuinness said. “A lot of teams around the world play baseball differently. The teams from Asia like to bunt a lot and they field really well. Puerto Rico and the teams from the south always seem to have great pitching. It’s really just fun to watch all the different teams and the way they play the game.”