Did you know that former BlueClaw Michael Bourn and Carl Crawford were Little League teammates in Houston?

Peter Abraham in today’s Boston Globe has the story.

HOUSTON — Ray Bourn wasn’t one of those Little League coaches who considered it a successful day if all the kids had fun. He wanted to win.

So after his Mt. Zion Angels won the first game of a district tournament in 1990, Bourn stuck around to scout the two teams playing in the same bracket. That was when he spotted Carl Crawford for the first time.

Crawford was a 9-year-old first baseman, a player so precociously talented that he was supposed to be on a team with older boys that day. Instead, he stuck with a team sponsored by the Salvation Army that was culled from residents of Houston’s gritty Fifth Ward.

“He had one hit and then another,’’ Bourn said. “I stuck around and kept watching and he had a hit the third time he came up. I loved how he swung the bat. I’ll never forget that day.’’

Ray is Michael’s dad, and then-coach. Read the rest of it. Really cool story.

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