40 | SEPTEMBER 12 • 2024 
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li Katz admits he’d never heard 
of the JCC Maccabi Games 
until six months or so before 
they took place in Detroit this 
summer.
The Ann Arbor Pioneer High 
School freshman is glad he learned 
about the Maccabi Games, signed up 
and joined the 14U Detroit baseball 
team. Make that the gold medal-
winning 14U Detroit baseball team.
“I want to play in the Maccabi 
Games again next year,” Katz said. “It 
was so much fun to meet Jewish kids 
from around the United States and 
other countries who play the same 
sport as I do. It was an amazing 
event, run very well. It was great to 
have time to build relationships with 
other athletes at The J.”
Katz said he got to know Mexican 
baseball and soccer players who 
spoke English, Spanish and Hebrew, 

and he’s become friends with a few 
players on the Los Angeles 14U 
baseball team and is keeping in 
touch with them.
He has some bragging rights with 
those LA baseball players. Detroit 
beat LA 11-8 in the gold medal 
game.
“That was a really good team. 
They beat us in pool play,” he said. 
“We thought we’d have a tough time 
beating them if we met in the gold 
medal game.”
As it turned out, the opposite was 
true. LA couldn’t beat Detroit in the 
gold medal game, played at West 
Bloomfield High School.
Detroit led LA from start to finish, 
but there were anxious moments. 
After scoring 10 runs in the top of 
the first inning, Detroit scored just 
once the rest of the way and LA 
climbed within 10-8 after six innings 

of the seven-inning game.
Ryan Rubin hit a home run for 
Detroit on the second pitch of the 
game. Katz was the starting and 
winning pitcher. He pitched four 
innings and left the mound with 
Detroit ahead 10-6.
Katz had a great tournament. 
He was the Detroit catcher for 19 
innings even though he hadn’t 
caught in games for several years, 
and he threw out 33% of runners 
trying to steal. On the flip side, he 
stole nine bases.
Chris Chesney was Detroit’s 
coach. 
“Baseball is all about the little 
plays during a game that are easy to 
overlook,” he said. “The walks that 
the bottom of the order works, the 
nine-pitch at-bat that results in an 
out but gives your teammates an 
opportunity to see all of the pitcher’s 

pitches, the hits behind a runner that 
allow the runner to advance a base.
“We had many of those plays.” 
Chesney’s team played seven 
games in four days and won five of 
them, including the last four in a 
row.
Detroit went 2-2 in pool play July 
29-30. After beating St. Louis 5-2, it 
lost 5-2 to Los Angeles and 11-6 to 
Team Ohio but rebounded to defeat 
Team Mexico 8-7.
In single-elimination bracket play, 
Detroit beat St. Louis 8-5 in the 
quarterfinals and Team Boston 12-3 
in the semifinals July 31 before its 
gold medal win over Los Angeles on 
Aug. 1.
Aside from the gold medal game 
win, Chesney said, the victory over 
Mexico was his team’s biggest and 
most important accomplishment. 
Down 5-0 in the bottom of the 

That’s what the Detroit 14U baseball team did at the 
JCC Maccabi Games to win the gold medal.
Beat LA!

STEVE STEIN CONTRIBUTING WRITER

SPORTS

ALL PHOTOS ARE SUBMITTED PHOTOS

Happy Detroit 
14U baseball 
teammates Eli 
Katz (left) and 
Josh Dorfman.

The Detroit 14U baseball team 
celebrates winning the gold medal 
at the JCC Maccabi Games.