Chicago Little League team "still the champions," lawyer says

A day after after Little League International announced its stunning decision to strip a Chicago team of its national championship, the team's lawyer said they are "still the champions" until all the facts are gathered in the case.

Little League International announced Wednesday that Jackie Robinson West had been stripped of its title because team officials falsified boundaries so they could add ineligible players to the roster and that the officials then scrambled to persuade surrounding leagues to go along with what they'd done.

Victor Henderson, a lawyer representing the team, said the team has not yet received any details from Little League International explaining why it is being stripped of its title, and he wants to look into other cases of Little League teams allegedly violating residency requirements to find out if they faced similar punishment, so he can determine if Jackie Robinson West was treated fairly.

He said the team was never contacted by Little League International and its players, coaches and organizers "learned from watching TV" that officials had stripped them of their title.

Bill Haley, whose father launched Jackie Robinson West 41 years ago, said that Little League International had dismissed the residency allegations last year, and he encouraged the team's supporters to "stick with our boys."

Henderson was joined at Thursday's news conference by Haley, the Rev. Jesse Jackson and the team's suspended manager, Darold Butler. Butler did not comment Thursday but the day before he told the Chicago Sun-Times: ""They always will be champions in my eyes, and they'll always be champions in a lot of people's eyes. They did it on the field in between the lines, and I'm the proudest coach in the world to be a part of a group of 13 boys like that."

Henderson said that there was no lawsuit in the works but that he intended to ensure that "whatever rules and regulations" that were applied to Jackie Robinson West were applied to every other Little League team.

Jackson, who on Wednesday suggested the decision to strip the team of the title was racially motivated, said on Thursday that "what we want is one set up rules" and an "even playing field."

Meanwhile, a Little League team from southern Indiana says it feels cheated by the revelation that Jackie Robinson West used ineligible players en route to a national championship last summer.

The New Albany Little League All-Stars lost to Chicago's Jackie Robinson West in the Great Lakes championship last summer after holding a 7-3 lead until the final two innings.

Team manager Josh Biven said the loss was difficult but is harder to take now that Little League International has stripped district, state, Great Lakes and national championship titles from Jackie Robinson West for using players from outside the league's boundaries.

"All I wanted to do was go to Williamsport," New Albany All-Star David Newbanks told the News and Tribune. "We played hard and we deserved to go. They took away the opportunity for us to go to Williamsport. That was the chance of a lifetime."