Little League World Series

#TBT: ESPN fathers Kornheiser, Colantonio recall sons’ Little League regionals glories

(L-R) Don Colantonio, Trey Colantonio, Michael Kornheiser and Tony Kornheiser are seen at Bristol’s A. Bartlett Giamatti Little League Complex during the Little League World Series regional games in 1998. (John Atashian)
(L-R) Don Colantonio, Trey Colantonio, Michael Kornheiser and Tony Kornheiser are seen at Bristol’s A. Bartlett Giamatti Little League Complex during the Little League World Series regional games in 1998. (John Atashian)

The 2015 Little League World Series regional games continue through Sunday on ESPN as teams compete for a chance to play in the Little League World Series in Williamsport, Pa. Aug. 20-30. The Mid-Atlantic and New England Regionals are currently taking place in Bristol, Conn., just a line-drive from the ESPN campus.

In 1998, ESPN’s Tony Kornheiser and Don Colantonio each had a son competing in Bristol. Michael Kornheiser played for a Washington, D.C. team and Trey Colantonio played for Simsbury, Conn.

In this week’s #TBT, the two ESPN dads share their memories of the event with Front Row.

“I did my radio show up in Bristol and went to all of the games. I was working at The Washington Post at the time and I wrote a daily diary about the D.C. team from Capitol City Little League – how the team did and I made sure to talk to every single kid at least once and quoted many of the parents throughout the week that we were there,” recalled Kornheiser, longtime co-host of ESPN’s Pardon The Interruption.

“I was enormously proud to see my son introduced and in the uniform out there playing. I don’t know that we won any games, but it was great fun, and I look back on it very fondly. I was just thrilled to be there and to be part of the pageantry of it,” continued Kornheiser.

“We came within a whisker of going to Williamsport, but we were beat by [current Cincinnati Reds star] Todd Frazier and the Toms River, N.J. team [1-0] which went on to win the Little League World Series. Frazier was the first batter of the game and hit a 3-2 fastball over the centerfield fence,” remembered Colantonio, ESPN’s senior director, production enhancements.

“I’m really proud of the kid in that picture. He went on to go to West Point and served our country in Afghanistan as a platoon leader and is currently in medical school training to become a military surgeon.”

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