Although Great Bend is not fielding a Class AA American Legion baseball team for a full summer schedule, the Braves will be taking part in a pair of tournaments during the next two weekends.
“We have a unique situation with the Braves team,” said Great Bend head coach Michael Stettinger, whose younger group will be taking part in the Pratt Wood Bat Tournament on Saturday and Sunday.
The Braves take on Buhler  at 2 p.m. and Ulysses at 6 in the opening day of the Pratt tourney.
Stettinger coaches the Chiefs, whose record is 4-12 overall after splitting a Class AAA doubleheader with TMP (Hays) on Wednesday evening at Al Burns Memorial Field. They lost 5-3 in the first game before salvaging a split with a 3-1 win in the nightcap.
Prior to the start of the season, the Chiefs and Braves had to merge after there weren’t enough numbers to have a roster for the older group.
Nearly all of the older Chiefs players — namely Braden Jones, Bryce Beck, Johnny Allende and Dillon Reiser — will be taking this weekend and the next off.
Jones, a 2013 Great Bend High School graduate is not eligible to play for the younger group.
Only Chiefs right-hander Tristan Hall will be available for some pitching chores for the Braves, according to Stettinger.
On June 29-30, the Braves travel to McPherson.

• Chiefs snare Game 2
For the young and inexperienced AAA Chiefs, it was their seasoned players who came through against TMP (Hays).
Hall delivered a two-run single in the second inning and right-hander Bryce Beck pitched a complete game, lifting the Chiefs to their 3-1 win in game two of their twinbill.
It was a blast from the past for the Chiefs, playing at Al Burns Memorial Field, their old stomping grounds. The move from the Great Bend Sports Complex, in its second year of existence, was necessitated on Wednesday after Tuesday night’s rain storm left it too soggy to play.
“The big hit by Tristan Hall was the difference,”  Stettinger said. “Bryce Beck pitched a good game.
“Johnny Allende had a couple of line-drive outs, hit right at (TMP), during his first couple at-bats. With runners on first and third, Johnny’s infield single in the sixth scored Beck.”
That gave Great Bend its two-run cushion.
TMP won the first game, 5-3, despite a solid performance from Chiefs right-hander Jones, who threw a complete game.
“Braden Jones pitched really well throughout the game,” Stettinger said.
Beck had two hits and Allende added one.
Next Wednesday, the Chiefs travel to Salina for a doubleheader, set for 6 p.m.