FREEPORT - It's the bottom of the seventh inning, two outs, no one on and the score is 6-0.

It's not looking good for Brooklyn.

But the players are not pouting on the bench. They are not gazing sullenly out at Swartz Field during the Freeport International Baseball Invitational.

To a man they are at the fence, chanting, smiling, yelling words of encouragement in Spanish toward their teammate at bat.

A weak ground ball ends the game. But that isn't the point. For the Brooklyn team, just being off the streets of the tough neighborhoods of like Stuyvesant, Bedford, Bushwick and Williamsburg and on the wide-open field at Freeport is enough to smile and cheer about.

"We have a lot of bad attitudes on this team," said Brooklyn coach Tony Majors, who is a lawyer in New York in his day job and a crusader to find inner city kids better lives the rest of the time. "All these kids have it rough. They all come from broken homes. Several boys live with their mother and they tell me, 'My mom beats me up.'"

But for a week each year, they leave the turmoil and danger of their inner-city lives to come to the open expanses of Western Pennsylvania.

At the Freeport Invitational, they find a week's worth of reprieve from gang fights and trouble at home.

"The Lord has been good to us," Majors said. "There haven't been any fights or outbreaks of violence since we've come here. Those are the types of things we get with them back home. The atmosphere here quells their angry spirits."

Majors said 45 players tried out for nine spots on the team this year, all clamoring to join the team with the hope of coming to Freeport.

They are mostly 17- and 18-year-olds who are cocky and sure of their skills. But when they get to the fields of the invitational, they are often humbled by the younger teams they face.

"They get their heads handed to them," Majors said.

But that might be a good thing, he added.

"These guys climb over one another to get here," Majors said. "They come here full of themselves, thinking that they are great, then they get beat by teams much younger than they are. It humbles them in a good way. It lets them know they have to work hard to be good."

They also have a role model to look up to. For three years, Eric McGough has played with the team.

McGough, son of former major leaguer Tom McGough, is an example many of the Brooklyn players try to follow.

For McGough, the experience is rich with rewards, too.

"These guys deserve the credit," McGough said. "They are a real tight group. They all grew up together in their neighborhoods. It would be real easy for them to shut me out, but they don't. I feel like I am from Brooklyn when I play on their team."

The players from Brooklyn use McGough as an example of how to play the game.

That fact is not lost on Majors, who often seeks out local talent to fill out his team when he arrives for the invitational.

That cultural exchange is necessary, Majors said.

"They see Eric McGough go up to the plate and strike out, then go out into the field and make a great play. For these kids, when they strike out, they lose all their focus and concentration. When they see Eric play, they get an idea of the discipline they need to play the game," he said.

Playing on the team is an escape for the Brooklyn players, a way to flee their neighborhoods. Many come back to Freeport as spectators and speak to the team about how they turned their lives.

Majors has seen such turnarounds from his former players over the seven years he has brought the team to Pennsylvania.

"For most of them, their attitudes do change when they go back," Majors said. "They want to play so much, and they get an idea of what changes they have to make in their lives to do that."

For McGough, who recently graduated from Plum High School, making an impact is worth more than a hit at the Freeport Invitational.

Much more.

The Brooklyn players have also rubbed off on him.

"These guys would go to the wall for me," McGough said. "That is a special feeling. And I'm happy to be able to help them in any way I can. I try to bring their enthusiasm to my teams at Plum.

"There's nothing like their love for the game. You have to have that. If you don't, you might as well quit. That's one thing these guys have - a love for baseball. You can't beat that. We could learn from them, too."