The seventh season of the New York Long Island Strat League got underway on Sunday, March 19, as the New Jersey Bandits and the Floral Park Flesheaters squared off in divisional play. The defending champion Bandits face a tough challenge in 2006, as an unbalanced schedule against two of the league's most experienced franchises (the Flesheaters and St. Jack's Demons) will make surviving the Stanner Division a difficult proposition.
It's one of the many changes the NYLISL has undergone in the off-season. The league has added a seventh member, Newark Star Ledger baseball writer Ed Price, while officially saying goodbye to two charter members, Tim Walsh and Joe Falzarano. Expansion came late in the 2006 Draft, so Price will be fielding a team of ineligibles and replacement players as he looks forward to full membership status in 2007. The league will feature two divisions of three teams each: the Stanner Division and the Redmen Division (featuring Jason Boland's Lindenhurst Hitmen, Jim Baumbach's Wellwood Scribes of Lindenhurst and Kevin Baumbach's perpetually unnamed franchise). The six established franchises will play 20 games against divisional foes and 10 against the adversaries from the opposite division. Price will play as an independent, with a 14 game schedule against each of the league's six members.
Jack Flynn, Jason Varvaro and Chris Forster pose for pictures during the Stanner Division Winter Meetings (aka Jay's wedding) in Long Island last month.
Posted by nylistratleague
at 9:02 PM EST
