Carman-Ainsworth Boys Headed To National Baseball Tournament In Texas
This past week three young boys from the Carman School District were headed to the
2014 Mickey Mantle World Series for the nation's best 16 and under baseball teams, which is
staged in McKinney, Texas. They play for Foutch's Strike Zone.
Cooper Betencourt and Jawanza Edwards are both 16 years of age and will be juniors at
Carman-Ainsworth High School. Cooper is a catcher on the team and Jawanza is a utility
infielder. Malaki Edwards is 10, will be a 5th grader, and is the teams bat boy.
Cooper is the son of Rudy and Mandy Betencourt. Jawanza and Malaki are the sons of
Andre and Clara Edwards.
Foutch's Strike Zone won the North Carolina Regional Championship in mid-July during a five-day tournament in Coldwater. The Flint club beat the Illinois state championship team and
the Indiana state championship club, along with defeating the perennial Michigan powerhouse
Michigan Bulls, a program that has more than 50 players drafted by Major League Baseball
clubs and dozens more go on to play college baseball.
Ben Almassy, Head Coach of Foutch's Strike Zone, called the Mickey Mantle World
Series appearance a "chance of a lifetime" for his boys and said: "The wins do not compare to
the character and class of the individuals on this team … we decided to pick a team of solid ball
players in our area, but we all agreed, that the most important skill we wanted to recruit was
character. This season, I think we hit a HOME RUN. I'm glad to have Cooper, Jawanza and
Malaki as part of our team."
