In the program since seven years old, Rovatsos fascinated most people who saw her play, although she never called attention to herself.
Even before she joined Coach Mike Miselis' team when she turned eight, she had shown her qualities as a baseball player, winning the Tom Mack Award in T-Ball, which is the most valuable player in the instructional league.
Miselis said Rovatsos has performed better than most of the boys in the league, and stands out partly because she is such a team player, taking whatever position her coaches ask her to play, doing what she needs to help make the team competitive.
"Most girls play softball," he said. "She is only one of three girls in the major league division which has more than 200 kids playing. Even at that, she stood out as a player."
This year as a 12-year-old on the Mayor Joe Doria team, Rovatsos had the fifth highest total of hits in the league with 11 and had the 12th highest batting average in the league at .324
"She is a blazing fast runner and showed it on the bases as she was fifth in the league in runs scored with 11 runs," he said.
In 30 years of coaching, Miselis thought he had seen everything, and yet, of the many hundreds of kids he'd coached, he'd never seen the likes of Rovatsos.
"She is one of the special players," he said, somewhat said that at age 12 she will be moving on to another level of competition.
Rovatsos is proficient in several sports, including basketball and soccer. Miselis said he had heard she is even better in those sports than in baseball and she dominates the soccer field when she plays.
Rovatsos' mother, Liz Rovatsos was an all-county baseball player in high school, though she does not take credit for her daughter's ability.
"My husband was also a good athlete," she said.
Miselis said Rovatsos was part of a championship team the first year he coached her at eight. A year later, she became an all-star player for the first time and repeated the feat each year after that.
While Rovatsos routinely plays centerfield and pitches, Miselis said, she will play whatever position she is asked.
"Other towns are stunned when they see her play," he said.
At first, fans of competing teams may think she is on the team for show; just to have a girl.
"And then they see her play," he said.
In 2003, he recalled a magical moment in which she helped the team win.
They were playing an all-star game against the Greenville Americans in Jersey City's Pershing Field.
It was a packed house. Miselis' team was losing by eight runs going into the last inning.
Game organizers were already bringing out the trophies to award the other team. Miselis brought Rovatsos in as the relief pitcher.
"This was the first time she had pitched relief, and it was against some of the top players in the county," he said.
She struck out the first and held the other team while her own team came back to go ahead. Later, she struck out two out of three in the bottom of the inning to hold the lead.
While the team lost the next game, denying them the championship, that one game and Rovatsos' role helped bring the team together, so that over the next three years, the team became champions.
In 2004, his team returned to Pershing Field and with the score tied 2-2, she hit in the winning run with a clutch double, and the team went on to win the championship that year.
He remembered the shock on the faces of the fans when his team went to play in Edison for a tournament. Teams there had no girls, and parents stared at Rovatsos, shocked perhaps when Miselis put her in as the starting pitcher and she pitched five strong innings leading to a win.
"As she came out of the game fans - their fans - cheered her even though she had beaten their team," he said.
A student of Henry Harris School in Bayonne, Rovatsos is known as a humble kid and a team player, someone who doesn't sing her own praises but works towards the good of the team.
That doesn't mean she isn't without inspirational moments such as the three-run homeruns she hit a few weeks ago to win the district title against Weehawken.
"She was the first girl ever to hit a homerun from our teams," Miselis said, calling the home run "a story book ending" to a Cal Ripken League career.
Liz Rovatsos said she was very proud of what her daughter has accomplished.
"But when she got that homerun I jumped up," she said, proud also of the fact that her daughter could compete against boys at their own level. "Half the boys on her team act as if they are her brothers. None of them are really jealous. They seem to have great respect for her. Some have even urged her to go onto the Babe Ruth League."
"I got hits when I needed to get them," Lisa Rovatsos said. "I would feel okay if I got one clutch hit."
While she was very honored and worked hard while playing in the Cal Ripken League, Lisa Rovatsos she won't be going onto the next level of play with the boys. She said she will likely move onto to softball instead when she gets to high school.
"I figure if I play softball in high school I might get somewhere," she said.
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