My favorite baseball player is 5’4″. He has a great swing and an even better personality.

He still has a few things to work on before his first contract, but if you do the math in your head, that will take at least another eight years.

So, yes, I take DeMarco’s bad as he is today.

Smile, clench, comfort and win.

That goes for Garrett Rohozen and JJ Feliciano and the rest of the Lake Mary Little League All-Stars. This group of 11- and 12-year-olds just completed one of the most miraculous runs in the Little League World Series, becoming the first team from Florida to win the title after defeating Chinese Taipei 2-1 in overtime early Sunday night.

That’s the headline, of course, but it’s not the best part.

What was truly unforgettable – what will stay with me long after the result and every other detail – was the joy and camaraderie of this team from a small suburb between Orlando and Daytona. Their journey, which was shown extensively on ESPN and ABC this past week, was a wonderful reminder of the innocence of youth.

And when they won by walkoff on Sunday after an eighth-inning error, they flooded the field to celebrate, as expected. But then the craziest thing happened. As the cameras followed them across the field, several Lake Mary players stopped to hug the young Taipei players, who had fallen to their knees in grief.

The moment was pure. The lesson was timeless.

This wasn’t the chest-thumping and the displays of superiority that we unfortunately expect from too many athletes, entertainers and politicians. These were kids leading with their hearts and showing the rest of us what that looks like.

No ego, no trickery, no quid pro quo. Just two groups of young people from opposite sides of the world sharing something meaningful.

Keep this in mind the next time you read a tweet mocking a teenager with a learning disability.

The passion of Lake Mary’s players should have been clear from the start. This team lost 4-1 to a Texas team on Monday and had to play in the losers bracket of the double elimination tournament. That meant five straight win-or-lose games in six days.

On Saturday, they played against Texas again in the US Championship and were down 7-5 at the start of the last inning before catching up with five runs.

And all this was just a foretaste of what was to come on Sunday.

Lake Mary trailed 1-0 from the first inning, leaving 12 runners on base after seven innings. The Florida team was on its last out in the sixth inning with runners on first and second when Mieses, the team’s youngest player who just turned 11, hit a liner to left field to score the tying run.

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Florida had runners on third base when the last out was made in the sixth and seventh innings.

Once the game reaches the eighth inning, Little League rules require a runner to begin the inning on second base. When Taipei failed to score in the eighth inning, Lake Mary was able to score a single run in the bottom of the inning. Hunter Alexander, who was 1-for-15 in the tournament, hit a bunt to move Lathan Norton to third base.

The Taipei pitcher caught the bunt cleanly and turned to throw it to first base. However, the first baseman had also come up for the bunt and the second baseman had not covered the base, so the ball sailed into right field, giving Norton the win.

Lake Mary was the ninth team from Florida to reach the finals since the Little League World Series began in 1947. The previous eight teams, including three from Tampa and one from St. Petersburg, all failed in the finals.

Top Bay Area players who participated in the tournament in Williamsport, Pennsylvania include Vance Lovelace (1975), Gary Sheffield (1980), Derek Bell (1980-81) and Rays manager Kevin Cash (1989).

And now, after all the near-wins, Florida has its first Little League World Series champion.

“I told them history is being written. Let’s finish the story, we’re in the last chapter,” Lake Mary manager Jonathan Anderson told reporters in a postgame press conference. “And, oh, what an ending to a story this is. My goodness, those last two games on Saturday and Sunday have to have been the best two games you could ever see. My goodness. My goodness.”

You can reach John Romano at [email protected]. Follow @romano_tbtimes.

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