Beets claims 500th victory

The Ridgewood coach becomes the first from Pasco County to reach the milestone.

By JOHN C. COTEY
Published February 24, 2007

Moments after Larry Beets joined an exclusive club by winning the 500th game of his 29-year career Friday night, former Ridgewood principal Wendell Krinn put his arm around the coach he hired and smiled.

"You can stay," he said.

The Rams helped carve Beets his own little slice of county history by beating River Ridge 6-0 in a Class 5A, District 7 game.

Ben Koenigsfeld struck out 12, and Charlie Mohr homered for Ridgewood.

Beets, already the county's winningest baseball coach, downplayed the milestone and ran through an extensive list of people who helped him get there, starting with former players and school administrators like Krinn.

With the victory, Beets becomes the only Pasco County coach to reach that milestone. Zephyrhills' John F. Clements and Pasco's Lenny Cimador both won more than 400 games.

"What makes it special," Cimador said, "is that it separates you from everyone else."

Hudson's Lee Byers, who won 546 games as the baseball coach at Pinellas Park and East Lake, was on hand to welcome Beets to the club of 500-game winners. Ironically, Byers won his 500th against Ridgewood.

Beets tried to give the game ball away to Koenigsfeld, who gave it right back to the coach, who tried to give it away again. Eventually, the entire team signed it for Beets, leaving him little choice but to accept it.

For Koenigsfeld, the victory was extra special. The senior righthander is the son of former Beets assistant and current Ridgewood principal Randy Koenigsfeld, and his brother, Jon, was a standout for the Rams as a player.

Beets claims to have known Friday's winning pitcher "before he was born", and Koenigsfeld remembered growing up at the Ridgewood baseball field and even helping build the outfield wall as a toddler.

"This was definitely for him," said Ben Koenigsfeld, who allowed six hits in improving to 2-0.

"We just found out about it this morning when we saw it in the paper. We definitely wanted to get it done for him tonight.

Mohr lined a home run to right-center in the second inning to open the scoring for Ridgewood 5-0, and Mike Vavasis and Cory Patterson both singled and scored in the inning to make it 3-0.

The Rams, who beat River Ridge (2-3) in last Saturday's Tom Varn Invitational final, took advantage of some Royal Knight errors and some wildness from the mound to add three more runs.

Koenigsfeld's curve ball got him out of a few small jams, as did the fine fielding of shortstop Jay Mattos.

[Last modified February 23, 2007, 23:22:18]