For teams from five western states, the road to the World Series in New York will go through Price, Utah. The Babe Ruth Regional tournament will return to Price the week of July 21- 26.

Teams of 13-year-olds from Arizona, California, Hawaii, Nevada, and Utah will descend upon Carbon County in late July for the opportunity to represent the Pacific Southwest Region at the World Series held in New York in mid-August.

Carbon County has hosted these events before, but there is still quite a selection process if you want to host the event. Jill Emerson, the Eastern Utah Commissioner for Babe Ruth, joined KOAL’s Drive Time Sports to talk about the selection process and what to expect from the influx of 450-500 extra visitors coming to the area.

“A lot of the years, since we’ve done such a great job, they’re asking quite a bit for us to keep hosting. It does take a lot of time and effort, so there is a fee that has to be paid just to represent Babe Ruth. Once we got that, we were committed from Babe Ruth, and we’ve had our foot in the door for the last probably six or seven years. They are always coming and asking, so we’re lucky that way.”

This time around, there will only be one age group, 13U, so that the whole tournament will be held at one location, Carbon High School.

With International Days taking place simultaneously, Emerson talked about getting the word out to let the restaurants, hotels, and stores in the area know there will be 400-500 extra people in town during the week.

“We need to get the word out. We need our restaurants to know that when we have 400-plus extra people on top of International Days, and we have our hotels/motels, we need people prepared so they’re not thrown off guard.”

One local team, the Battle 13U squad, will be coached by Darek Martinez, Rob Smith, Justin Powell, and Timmy Urbanik and represent Carbon County. Along with the Battle team, there will be one more team from Utah. There will be three teams from California, and one team each for Hawaii, Nevada, and Arizona. The winner of the Regional will advance to the World Series in New York in mid-August.

If you would like to be involved as a volunteer or if you are interested in being a sponsor, you can contact Jill Emerson at (435) 650-4636.