The Expos of Quebec City gather for a post-game talk after rallying to tie the Bergen Crush.
By Rich Bevensee
The junior hockey season is heating up all across Canada, and for thousands of youths, it’s one of the most anticipated times on the calendar in a hockey-mad country.
And yet, somehow, Alex Fortin managed to convince a group of young Canadians to lay down their sticks for a weekend to play American baseball.
The South Shore Expos of Quebec City made the nearly nine-hour trip to Diamond Nation in Flemington last weekend for the 11U Fall Brawl and came away with a respectable record of one win, one loss and one tie.
“It’s the beginning of hockey season and more than half the team is missing big hockey games right now, but they love baseball so much,” Fortin said. “Us being Canadian, hockey is the No. 1 sport there, but I put together a team of kids who love baseball even more.
“It was my first question to the parents: ‘How much are your boys willing to give up hockey to go play baseball in America?’” Fortin said.
“And all the kids said, ‘Baseball is my No. 1 sport.’”
This was the very first tournament for the Expos, who just weeks earlier had to work through some rigorous practices to become accustomed to American baseball rules.
Fortin assembled the team – Quebec City’s first-ever travel team – and organized the itinerary. He was convinced that bringing the Expos to the U.S. and entering them into an American tournament would be the experience of a lifetime for the 12 boys who made the trip.
But Fortin, a former baseball player himself, said the team’s U.S. excursion was not just a sightseeing tour. It was a challenge for the boys to measure themselves against American ballplayers.
“For the kids who play baseball in Canada, it’s every kid’s dream – let’s go play against the Americans and see if we can compete,” Fortin said. “I trusted them to play well and they delivered.”
Fortin’s inspiration for creating the South Shore Expos began last summer when he and his son Mason, now 9, made a trip to Myrtle Beach, S.C., to visit family, and they made a side trip to the Ripken Baseball facility in town to watch a tournament.
South Shore Expos coach Alex Fortin poses with Jacob LaPiere, Justin Boileau and Theo Boisvert after the Expos rallied to tie Bergen Crush, 9-9.
“Watching that tournament, both my son and I thought it was pretty cool and said maybe we can do this,” Fortin said.
The process of starting a club team and bringing the team to Diamond Nation stemmed from two chance meetings.
Fortin, 42, is the North American Sales Director for a cucumber farm called the Toundra Greenhouse in St. Felicien, Quebec. He was in Boston for business last year when a colleague who was club baseball-savvy listened to Fortin’s desire to build a team and strongly suggested Diamond Nation as a possible destination.
“I checked Diamond Nation out online after the trip and I thought it looked legit,” Fortin said.
Another tie-in to Diamond Nation happened when Fortin met Diamond Jacks coach Chris Allen, who played for the Quebec Capitales of the independent Frontier League in 2009. Fortin was the Capitales art director for 10 years, including the season Allen was on the team, and he and Allen remained in contact through Facebook.
Quebec City’s South Shore, a general term for the suburbs of Montreal, Quebec, has a population of around 100,000 and is a three-hour drive from the city of Montreal. The local baseball organization is a federation called Baseball Region de Quebec.
Fortin’s inspiration for assembling a youth travel team was the easy part. He met with resistance from the federation, which would not allow any of its member teams to travel, unlike what is so common in the U.S.
“The way baseball works in Canada, there are no leagues,” Fortin said. “We have a federation and you can’t play out of that. My son asked why and I said that’s a good question, son. So I asked why and the answer was, ‘We don’t really believe in travel baseball.’”
Not one to back away from a challenge, Fortin decided to create his own independent team, one which would not be governed by the federation.
Once he culled his team together, Fortin and his staff – Jonathan Fecteau, Jerome Boivert and Dominic Bolduc – sought to train the boys how to play American baseball.
Expos catcher Charles St-Cyr and shortstop Edouard Martineau take in Times Square, NYC.
“We play a different kind of baseball in Quebec,” Fortin said. “We took six weeks to learn all the different things the kids had to be ready for – the distance between the bases, the pickoff moves, which we don’t do in Quebec, the dropped third strike, stealing home.”
Fortin said his parent group was extremely helpful with fundraising, which included selling Expos baseball hats. Another source of fundraising came from Fortin’s side business, the Nomad Soul Coffee Company, which he founded in 2022.
One of Fortin’s smartest moves was bringing his team to Diamond Nation well ahead of their first scheduled game on the evening of Oct. 16. That allowed the boys to gawk at the facility before getting to the task at hand, which was testing themselves against Americans.
The Expos players are all fluent in French and needed Fortin to translate into English their impressions of Diamond Nation, but one American word stood out among the boys who were asked what they thought of the facility with seven turf fields, dugouts, batting cages and a concession stand: “Cool!”
“They were blown away,” Fortin said. “Our parents knew what the reaction would be. We were on the field practicing and for the first half-hour they were wow-ing and ahh-ing. They couldn’t believe how good the facility is here. The kids were amazed by the batting racks and helmet racks in dugouts. I know it’s basic here but they were impressed. We didn’t want to get here for the first time for our first game and have them being too thrilled, too amazed. We wanted them to see it first so they could concentrate on the game.
“This place is world class, the best baseball facility I’ve ever seen, hands down. We’re not used to this in Quebec. We have some good fields but they’re all natural.”
In their first game on Friday evening, the Expos took a 10-2 lead against Diamond Jacks Gold 11U and eventually outlasted their host, 14-11.
Edouard Martineau led the offense by going 3-for-4 with two RBI and three runs scored. Charles St-Cyr was 2-for-3 with a double, two RBI and two runs, Raphael Marcotte walked three times and drove in three runs, and Jacob LaPiere had two hits.
On Saturday evening the Expos rallied for three runs in the bottom of the sixth inning to tie Bergen Crush of River Vale, N.J., 9-9.
At one point the Expos trailed 6-2, and faced a 9-6 deficit heading into the bottom of the sixth inning. Theo Boisvert and Justin Boiteau singled to start the rally before St-Cyr drove in Boisvert with a single to center. Marcotte walked with the bases loaded to bring the Expos within a run, and St-Cyr scored the tying run on Felix Bussiere’s RBI groundout.
South Shore Expos coach Alex Fortin and his son, Mason, with Diamond Jacks coach Chris Allen and his son Jameson. Allen played for the Quebec Capitales of the independent Frontier League in 2009 when Fortin worked in the organization.
Boiteau finished a home run short of the cycle as he singled, doubled, tripled, drove in two runs and scored twice. Boisvert went 2-for-3 with two RBI and two runs, and LaPiere tripled.
With a 1-0-1 record and 20 runs allowed, the Expos earned the third seed for the 11U Gold Bracket playoff and faced second-seeded Diamond Jacks in the semifinals.
With the Expos trailing, 3-2, in the bottom of the fourth inning, the Diamond Jacks put the game away with a six-run rally and eliminated the Expos, 9-2. The Diamond Jacks eventually beat Drip Kingz of Coatesville, Pa., 8-7, in the championship game.
LaPiere and Antoine Marcotte both had a hit and drove in a run for the Expos. Boiteau, St-Cyr and Bussiere each had a base hit in the loss as the Expos closed out their first American tournament with a 1-1-1 record.
“We’re the first travel baseball team from Quebec City, so all that mattered was that we have fun and compete,” Fortin said. “As long as we compete in every game, that’s all that matters.
“Some people at home said, ‘You’re driving eight hours to get there. Are you crazy?’ But then we got here and it has been fantastic.”
Editor’s Note: Teams from British Columbia, on Canada’s west coast, have made the trip to Diamond Nation since 2015, a couple of which have won their age bracket in tournaments.