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The 2026 Little League Intermediate 50/70 World Series rolls into Livermore this weekend, with the tournament taking place at Max Baer Park from Sunday through Aug. 9.
The tournament has been in Livermore since 2013, taking place every year, save for two years that it was not held due to COVID.
There will be 12 teams in the tournament, six teams from the United States, and six international teams.
Our local representative will be Bollinger Canyon Little League, the team that won the District 57 championship, thus securing the host team berth.
The tournament goes off like clockwork every year and the community embraces the event. But few understand the work behind the scenes that makes the tournament go each year.
Bill Aboumrad is the tournament director for the event, and he puts in 11 months out of the year getting ready for the tournament.
I talked with him at 9 a.m. last Saturday and he was already a couple of hours into the day, working on the field, like he had been doing for the last couple of months.
“It’s so rewarding,” Aboumrad said of the tournament prep. “I get people out walking their dogs, thanking me and telling me how much they are looking forward to the tournament.”
The teams arrive on Friday, with the opening ceremony set for Saturday. The tournament gets underway Sunday with the team from Australia facing the team from the Asia-Pacific region at 9 a.m. Bollinger Canyon will face the Southeast representative at noon.
The championship game is set for next Sunday (Aug. 9) at 6 p.m. with the game being televised on ESPN.
If not for Aboumrad, the tournament may have been lost to Livermore several years ago.
“Little League was happy with inside the field, but they were not happy with outside the field,” explained Aboumrad. “They wanted a better overall experience for the tournament.”
Aboumrad took over as tournament director in 2022 and went right to work, bringing in an outside company to set up the peripherals for the event.
His tournament committee of seven to eight people makes the event run smoothly but the key is not cheap.
“The event costs about $180,000 every year,” Aboumrad said. “The city of Livermore gives us $10,000 every year and Little League International gives us $25,000.”
Little League takes care of the flights, hotel and the transportation from the airport for the teams. The Livermore Area Recreation and Park District provides the chalk and dirt for the field, which eases the maintenance of the ballpark.
After that, everything else falls on the tournament.
That’s three meals a day, transportation to the hotel and the field, and entertainment for the players.
Aboumrad and his team have a hotel in Dublin where all the teams stay that also provides a hot breakfast and a lounge for the players.
The players get lunch at the field every day, and then the tournament team gets debit cards for the kids that they use for dinner each night.
Lunch is served in a player’s tent at the Max Baer complex.
Aboumrad gets local businesses or companies to sponsor lunch each day, with employees from the respective organizations coming out to staff the lunch.
A local transportation company handles the transportation from the hotel to the fields and back.
He’s also brought in a jumbotron for the tournament to enhance the player experience.
Everything adds up.
It’s $40,000 for transportation, another $40,000 for tournament facilities, and $40,000 for the debit cards so the players can have dinner each night.
“Making sure we get enough help and getting the money are the two biggest things for us,” Aboumrad said.
Secure the funding and everything is taken care of thanks to the team he’s put together.
“Our team is so dialed in,” he added “The volunteers go out of their way to make it the best experience for everyone.”
It’s an amazing event, one which not just the Livermore community, but the entire Tri-Valley embraces. If you haven’t taken the time to come out for the tournament, you need to make a point of it.
The tournament runs on a three-year-contract with Little League. This the last year of the current contract for Livermore, but Aboumrad feels confident they will secure another three years.
“Other than the rodeo, it’s the biggest event in Livermore each year,” he said. “There is no cost for parking, no cost to get in.”
For more information on the tournament, go to www.littleleague.org and click on the link for the Intermediate World Series.
Editor’s note: Dennis Miller is a contributing sports writer for Embarcadero Media Foundation’s East Bay Division. To contact him about his Pleasanton Preps column, email acesmag@aol.com.
