Nationals Arm Race

Welcome to the 2016 College Baseball Season!  Despite there still being snow on the ground here,  D1 programs all over the country played their first series this past weekend.

I know; I’m one of the few guys out there (at least in DC blogger-land) covering the College game.  So i’m ok if you keep moving on.  I probably got really turned onto the College game as I started to really look at the college arms the Nats were drafting, and the focus the Mike Rizzo establishment puts on college players.  Its a very “Billy Beane-esque” strategy; college players have more ABs, more consistent stats and more experience playing against “known quantities” of talent (especially those guys in the top baseball leagues like the SEC and ACC).  Now with two very good local programs (UVA and UMD) and a ton of local guys who i’ve been following long enough to track them from HS draft prospect to College draft prospect, I continue coverage of the College game.

Quick rundown of the top local prospects first weekend in action;

• UVA’s Connor Jones threw 7 shut-out innings in a UVA win over Kent State.
• Maryland’s Mike Shawaryn gave up 2 runs on 3 hits in a loss at Alabama
• UVA’s Matt Thaiss went 6-13 in the kickoff tournament down in Myrtle Beach.
• Ole Miss’ Error Robinson (a dc-native but quickly rising on the draft boards) went 2-for-7 with 3 walks and 4 runs in a their opening series sweep against FIU.
• UNC’s J.B. Bukauskas had 9 Ks in 4 2/3’s innings but got a hook after showing some wildness in an eventual UNC loss.

I have a comprehensive post about all DC-area prospects coming, headlined by these four guys but also including all the local prep and college players, which we’ll post once HS season starts up.

Meanwhile, here’s some pre-season top-X lists for the new year: you’re going to see the same 4 teams at the top of every list.  There’s only 5 or so main sites covering the game, so we’ll go back to these blogs and sites constantly.  D1baseball.com and BaseballAmerica.com are the leaders but the other Collegiate Baseball sites are good as well.

• D1Baseball’s pre-season top 25: Florida, Louisville, TAMU, Vandy, Oregon State.
• Baseball America’s pre-season top-25: Florida, Louisville, TAMU then surprisingly UVA #4.
• College Baseball Daily pre-season top 25 from 2/1/16: Louisville #1, TAMU #2, Vanderbilt #3 and Florida #4.  Virginia #8, Maryland #22.
• College Baseball Central’s pre-season top 25 January 2016: Florida #1, Louisville #2
• Collegiate Baseball News pre-season top-40 announced in Dec 2015.  Florida #1, Louisville #2, which isn’t surprising since both teams have multiple pre-season first team all-americans on their team.  Local teams mentioned: UVA #9, Maryland #28.
• NCBWA (National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association)’s pre-season top-30: Florida, Louisville, Vandy and TAMU.

And here’s some pre-season All-America lists.  You’ll recognize a lot of these names if you’ve followed any pre-2016 draft coverage, and this list will eventually comprise a huge percentage of the first round draft this coming June.

• Collegiate Baseball News announced in Dec 2015 their pre-season All Americans and it contains a whole slew of names in contention for 1-1 in 2016.  A.J. Puk, Alec Hanson, Corey Ray along with other big-time names such as Kyle Funkhouser, Nick Banks.  Maryland’s Mike Shawaryn is a 1st teamer, UVA’s Connor Jones and the Navy’s Luke Gillingham a 2nd-teamer, and Matt Thaiss (UVA), Charley Gould (W&M) and Michael Morman (Richmond) are 3rd teamers.
• D1Baseball.com’s pre-season all American list: the two aces for local college teams UVA and UMD are listed (Jones and Shawaryn).   UVA’s Thaiss is a 2nd teamer.  D1baseball also has a list of the Top 300 College draft prospects for 2016.
• BaseballAmerica’s pre-season All American team is here.  No local guys on 1st team, Shawaryn, Jones and Pavin Smith are on the 2nd and 3rd teams.
• USA Baseball pre-season Golden Spikes watch list: includes most major D1 prospects and local guys Shawaryn, Jones, Thaiss and Gillingham.

A full overview of D1Baseball’s coverage is here.  BaseballAmerica’s College index is here.

 

 

Back in the day, (no this isn’t a “get off my lawn” post), once you got to high school age as a baseball player, you had just two choices for summer ball once the high school season was done; you’d either play Legion ball (if they were the elite of the town) or Babe Ruth (which was still pretty good baseball), and scouts would generally depend on scouting high school and Legion games and to hang out with high school coaches to figure out who the draftable talents were.

No longer.

These days, every kid of note hoping for a Division 1 scholarship or pro interest out of high school plays on a travel team.  These same players also go to Showcase events throughout the  year, either by invitation (for the best of the best) or on their own dime, where scouts can see players in a “combine” like setting and gauge their skills in a relatively controlled environment.  More and more, the actual performance in HS is downgraded or ignored and performances in these elite events is highlighted, since the opponent skill levels are so elevated and consistent.  This move has badly hurt Legion ball and has decimated Babe Ruth (here locally leagues have had to combine with other towns just to field enough teams to compete, and they struggle to find enough pitching to make the games competitive), but its the way of the future.

When you try to track prep kids (as I’ve begun to do more and more), you constantly hear about these teams and these events.  So I’ve finally broken down and tried to summarize them for the local area as best as I can.

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This is my attempt to characterize the landscape of Travel Baseball in the DC/MD/VA area.  A ton of this is drawn from participation in the recent Perfect Game Wood Bat 17-U championships, so I likely am missing teams that did not participate.  If you come across this post and i’m missing your team, please comment as such.

Elite Talent Teams

• Evoshield Canes: Based in Fredericksburg, VA with “outposts” up and down the east-coast.  This franchise is huge, fielding multiple teams at the latest WWBA event.  One of the leading talent teams in the land, winner of recent national travel team championships.
• Stars Showcase Red (formerly Demarini Stars): Based in Oakton, Va.  Also large enough to field multiple teams in national events.
• Chandler World: based out of Norristown PA but with a couple local players of note for 2015.
• The Dirtbags All-Blacks: based just across the border in North Carolina, but draws players from southern and SW Virginia.

Mid-level Talent Teams

• Richmond Braves National: based in Richmond.
• Virginia Cardinals; based in Midlothian, VA.  The best of the Richmond area players.
• Diamond Elite 17U: Ashburn; was independent, now joined with Evoshield Canes as one of their off-spring.  Comprised mostly of Ashburn/Leesburg guys from leading high schools out there like Stone Bridge.
• Mid Atlantic Red Sox: Frederick MD

Lower-end Talent Teams

• RISE Baseball Midlothian VA: ; not at WWBA 17u.
• Arena STARZ 17U out of Bel Air, MD.   Lots of Battlefield players on this roster despite its geographic location.
• Diamond Skills Dodgers (Silver Spring): mostly St. Johns Prep players
• Maryland Monarchs: Gambrils, MD: Anne Arundel county players
• Rawlings MD Prospects: Millersville MD
• Rawlings Prospects of VA Sandlot Elite Sterling, VA
• Tidewater Orioles Virginia Beach, VA
• Virginia Baseball Network: Mostly guys from Lynchburg and Forest based  high schools. (not at WWBA 17u)
• CBA Rays: Chesapeake based, mostly from Chesapeake-based high schools Greenbrier Christian, Great Bridge and Grassfield.  Not at WWBA 17u.
• Hampton Road Hurricanes: not at WWBA 17u
• Baltimore Bandits 17u: travel team run out of Calvert Hall HS in Baltimore.  Not at WWBA 17u.
• Old Dominion Hitters: some D-I talent, not at WWBA 17u.

It should also be noted that the big programs (Evoshield, Stars, DirtBags, etc) fielded a number of “alternate” teams that were not as talented as their leading “varsity” team.  Those squads, as fielded at WWBA 2015 were:

• Evoshield Canes American: Fredericksburg
• Evoshield North (NC): Raleigh
• Evoshield South (SC): Columbia
• Evoshield Seminoles (Richmond)
• Evoshield Canes Mid-Atlantic
• Evoshield Canes North
• Richmond Braves American
• Dirtbags Select (NC)
• Stars Black
• Stars Blue

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Showcase Guide 2015

So, what events are these kids playing?  Spurred on by this excellent summer-kick off article from Jonathan Mayo, here’s a good guide for the 2015 summer/fall events that the upper end rising HS seniors will be participating in.  Some of these have already passed and are listed here for completion purposes:

• Perfect Game National Showcase player roster, Mid June 2015 Ft. Myers FL. Just a combine of sorts.
• USA Baseball Tournament of Stars roster, Mid June 2015 Cary NC.  Fake teams created for scouting purposes.
• Perfect Game WWBA 17U championships, July 3-10, Emerson GA.  (aka the “Marietta/Cobb” event).  Won by a very good team out of Southern California called “CBA Marucci.”
• 17U Perfect Game World Series, July 17-22 in AZ.  Evoshield only local team; they fell in pool play.  The team that won WWBA came in 3rd; won by a team from Orlando.
• Impact 17U World Series, North Carolina; July 21-26, 2015.  A good local tourney with lots of east coast teams, just won by the Richmond Braves 16U team (a bit of a statement, beating a bunch of 17u teams).
• East Coast Pro Showcase (End of July); Tampa, FL.  Rosters here, with a few local kids.
• Area Code Games, Aug 4th-9th, 2015 Long Beach, CA.
• Under Armour All-America Game, August 15th, Chicago
• Perfect Game All-American Classic, August 16th, San Diego
• USA Baseball Trials, August 16th-19th, Southern California (campus of Cal State-Fullerton)
• Metropolitan Baseball Classic (Aug 24th at Hofstra in New York): aka “Met Ball,” put on by the Mets and featuring showcase talent from the area plus a couple of travel teams.  Slowly becoming a must-visit.  Evoshield and Chandler World competed, along with local guys.
• WWBA World Championships in Jupiter, FL, Oct 22-26, 2015 (aka the “Jupiter” event).  Won by Evoshield Canes for the third straight year, powering through the field, beating the strong Marucci team in the semis and then facing their 17-U team in the final.  Quite a show of dominance for the Evoshield program at this event.
• Several “Breakthrough Series” events throughout the country (Cincinnati, Florida, Compton) throughout the summer; lesser showcases.

Perfectgame.org is *the* website for these kinds of things.  At PG’s events, all the teams, with their full rosters of players with home towns and college commits, are online and viewable.  Very good information if you’re interested in (say) one particular team’s roster of players.

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Prep tournament guide 2015

• American Legion: Regionals this year are in Leesburg (presumably at Fireman’s field in Purcellville).  Nationals are Shelby, NC Aug 13th-18th.
• Babe Ruth: Regionals in various spots by age group, World Series in various locations by age.
• Connie Mack World Series: 7/31-8/7 in Farmington, NM.  Sponsored by the AABC, its a national tournament for regional winners and seems to consist of travel teams.

 

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This is my first cut at this data.  I’m sure i’m missing local teams and showcases.  Please let me know if you disagree with my characterization of the talent level of these teams (mostly taken by eyeballing the college commits to gauge the strength of the roster), if you feel i’m missing any major teams, or if you think a show-case or tourney is missing.

 

Now that the June 2015 draft signing deadline has passed, here’s a quick review of all DC/MD/VA players who got drafted with their signing bonuses (if known), and if not signed where they’re presumably heading to school.

This post at MinorLeagueBall lists all the top 20 round draft picks who did NOT sign.  This list has a ton of 20th round+ guys who we’re depending on MiLB.com assignments.

Chelsea James just did a nice summary of the Nats draft class at NatsJournal.  I’ll do a separate post to that end later on.

Important Draft-related links for this post:

• MLB’s Awesome Draft Tracker; you can slice and dice the draft 10 different ways, search by schools and home states, etc.
• Official Draft Bonus Pool totals.  Astros have $17M (most).  Nats have 3rd least at $4.1M.
• MLB.com’s Draft Signing and Bonus tracker; note this only goes through the first 10 rounds; after that, the bonus figures are treated differently.

College Players with local ties

• Nathan Kirby LHP from UVA: went #40 (Supp 1st round) to Milwaukee.  Signed at the deadline for below slot value ($1.2M versus slot of $1.545M).
• Josh Sborz, RHP closer for UVA: went #74 (Supp 2nd round) to the Dodgers.  Signed at the deadline for below slot ($722k vs $827k).
• Taylor Clarke, who hails from Ashburn (Broad Run HS) went #76, first pick of the 3rd round to Arizona.  Signed for slot value of $801k.
• Mike Matuella, of Great Falls (Georgetown Prep) and Duke: #78, to Texas in the 3rd round.  Signed for huge overslot deal of $2M.
• Brandon Lowe: UMD infielder: 3rd round #87 overall to Tampa Bay.  Signed for $6k overslot ($697k); why $6,000 over slot?  weird figure.
• Alex Robinson: UMD’s ace Lefty went in the 5th round (#140 overall) to Minnesota.  Signed for $5k under-slot ($382k)
• Joe McCarthy, OF for UVA: 5th round, #148 overall to Tampa Bay.  Signed for slot value of $358k.
• Brandon Waddell UVA Saturday/Sunday starter: 5th round (#157) to Pittsburgh.  Signed for slightly underslot bonus of $315k.
• Jack Wynkoop of Virginia Beach (Cape Henry Collegiate HS), LHP starter for South Carolina: went in the 6th round to Colorado.  Signed for slot value of $298k.
• Michael Boyle: Radford Ace.  13th rounder to the Dodgers.  Signed for unknown figure, currently in Rookie/Pioneer League Ogden.
• Kevin Mooney: UMD closer: 15th rounder by the Nats.  Signed for unknown figure, currently in short-A Auburn.
• Kenny Towns; 3B from UVA and the 2011 All-Met player of the year from Lake Braddock, went in the 20th to the Angels.  Signed for unknown figure, currently in Rookie/Pioneer League Orem.
• Luke Willis, OF from George Mason and Oakton HS, in the 30th round to Kansas City.  Signed for unknown figure, currently in Rookie/Appalachian League Burlington.
• Josh Swirchak, a MIF from Division II Wilmington University via Osbourne Park HS in Manassas, Signed with St. Louis as an undrafted free agent after the 2015 draft.   Currently at short-A State College.

There were no significant college draftee non-signings from the area.

There are quite a few other college players from the many baseball-playing colleges in the area drafted past the 10th round; search the MLB draft tracker and select the state of Virginia for many more local college players.

Local Prep players of note:

• Jimmy Barnes, Deep Creek HS in Chesapeake; 11th rounder to the Angels.   Signed for unknown figure, currently in the Arizona Rookie League.
• Nic Enright RHP from Steward HS in Richmond: 19th rounder to the Mets.  Did Not Sign, as noted on MinorLeagueBall.com.  Will presumably honor his committment to Virginia Tech.
• Ljay Newsome of Chopticon (south of Waldorf): 26th rounder by Seattle.  Per his summer team’s twitter page, Newsome Signed with Seattle for an undisclosed amount.  Currently in the Arizona Rookie League.
• Nathan Trevillian, RHP from small Amherst County HS; 22nd rounder to the Pirates.  Signed for  unknown figure, currently in GCL.
• Stevie Mangrum, 3B from Western Albemarle HS in Charlottesville, 28th round pick by Boston.  Did Not Sign, will presumably honor his commitment to Virginia Tech.
• Cody Morris, of Reservoir got picked up in 32nd round by Baltimore.   Did Not Sign, will honor his commitment to South Carolina.
• Hunter Parsons of Parkside HS, picked up in the 40th round by Cleveland.  Did not Sign, will presumably honor commitment to Maryland.

At the end of the signing period, here’s what some of these local schools’ recruiting classes seem to look like in terms of local guys:

• UVA: Connor Eason, Nathan Eikhoff, Evan Sperling, Grant Donahue
• U of Maryland: A.J. Lee, Hunter Parsons
• Virginia Tech: Nic Enright, Stevie Mangrum, John DeFazio, Paul Hall
• South Carolina: Cody Morris, Danny Blair
• Wake Forest: Harvey Logan
• Liberty: Jack DeGroat
  
• VCU: Brody Cook
• UNC-Asheville: Jordan Carr
• Campbell: James Monaghan
• Uncommitted thus far: Kaleb Bowman, Hunter Byrnes.  Update post-publishing: Bowman went to Spartansburg Methodist and Byrnes went to UVA … to play football.

This Baseball America link has a list of all the major prep players who didn’t sign, listed by college commitment.  It has a couple more big names for some of the local baseball schools.  PerfectGame.org also has a way to search by college commitment, but it doesn’t verify the results since its self-reported by the players (it has literally 20 names listed for UVA’s incoming 2016 class).

Nats re-draft/previously drafted Players (i’ve noted our previous draft position for each player)

• Andrew Suarez , (2nd round pick 2014) LHP from Miami went in the 2nd round again, #61 overall this time to San Francisco.  Signed for slot of slightly more than $1M.
• Skye Bolt, OF from UNC, went in the 4th round (#128 overall) to Oakland.  Signed over-slot deal of $610k.
• Cody Poteet, (27th rounder in 2012) went in the 4th round (#116 overall) to Miami.  Signed slot deal of $488k.
• Austin Byler, (9th rounder, 2014) OF from Nevada.  Was the first pick on day 3; 11th rounder by Arizona.  Signed for unknown amount.
• Daniel Salters (22nd rounder 2014) C from Dallas Baptist: 13th round pick to Cleveland in 2015.  Signed for unknown amount.
• Jake Jefferies (34th rounder in 2012): 2B from Cal State-Fullerton; Nats picked him up again, this time in the 39th round.  Signed for unknown amount with the Nats and is on the Auburn roster.

Previous local Draft posts:

• At the beginning of the season, we profiled a ton of local prep and college players.
• Then we talked about the higher-profile local players in our Pre-draft coverage
• Just after the rule-4 draft, we went over all the local players who got picked.

Here’s a recap of our CWS coverage so far for 2015:

• College Baseball 2015 Previews and pre-season Rankings
• Regular Season Wrap up for DC Local College teams
• Field of 64 announcement
• CWS Regional Results and Super Regional Pairings
• CWS Super-Regionals recap and CWS field
• CWS Group Winners and CWS Final preview

 

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Here’s how the Finals played out.

• In Game One on 6/22/15, UVA’s Connor Jones matched Vanderbilt’s ace Carson Fulmer zero for zero for the first five innings.  However, Vanderbilt got a well-timed opposite field double down the line to plate two and then scored three more, knocking Jones from the game in the 7th to win game one 5-1.  Fulmer was outstanding, holding UVA to just 2  hits through 7 2/3rds innings, leaving with a large lead in his final collegate appearance (he was drafted 8th overall by the White Sox).  Other players of note: #1 overall pick Dansby Swanson finally had a good game, going 2-4 with a run and an RBI.  Nats 3rd rounder Rhett Wiseman struggled; going 0-4 with the hat-track of three punch-outs.
• In Game Two on 6/23/15, UVA turned to their regular outfielder Adam Haseley in somewhat of a shock, and he threw 5 shut-out innings before handing the ball to the most dominant pitcher this post-season has seen in Josh Sborz, who threw another 4 shutout innings to shore up the win 3-0 and force a game 3.  UVA’s offense was also unexpected; they were powered by their #8 and #9 hitters, the latter of which was walk-on senior Thomas Woodruff, who had a grand total of 67 ABs in his collegiate career.  It was Woodruff’s 2-run bases loaded single that provided the game winning runs.  Amazing.
• In Game three on 6/24/15, UVA’s Brandon Waddell threw the game of his life, giving up 2 runs early but then shutting down Vanderbilt’s offense for the next six innings en route to a 4-2 win.  Vanderbilt’s Walker Buehler struggled with his control, giving up runs early and getting unceremoniously yanked in his last collegiate appearance.  Nathan Kirby came on to relieve Waddell, who threw 105 pitches on 3 days rest, and blew away Vanderbilt’s hitters in the 8th and 9th for his first (and last) career save.  3B Kenny Towns, a lowly 20th round pick by the Angels, was the game hero, with a very good diving stop to save a run early and a crucial go-ahead RBI late.   But it was freshman 1B Pavin Smith who was the offensive star of the game, clubbing a 2-run homer early to tie the game and deflate Vanderbilt.

UVA wins the first Baseball title for the ACC since 1955, an amazing stat considering the baseball-playing pedigree of the conference.  Super reliever Josh Sborz recieved the MVP award for his CWS work; final tally:  3IP on 6/13, 2IP on 6/15, and 4ip on 6/20, and 4IP on 6/23.  All Scoreless.

UVA completes a pretty amazing season all things considered; they suffered injuries to a number of their key guys, struggled in conference all season and likely only even made the field by virtue of a sweep of UNC in their final ACC season series.  But, for those who thought the final was a fluke based on the seedings of the two teams, consider this: Vanderbilt was the consensus pre-season #1 team by every poll out there, and UVA was either 2nd, 3rd or 4th in those same polls.  So these teams were expected to return to the CWS at the very least … they just to circuitous paths there.

Your 2015 College World Series Champion: The University of Virginia

This concludes the College Baseball season and our coverage of it for 2015.  I have some draft posts about summer leagues and summer travel teams of note for high schoolers that I may dig out again, for those interested.

 

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College CWS tournament references:

• d1baseball.com’s daily scoreboard is my go-to link
• Baseball America’s Regional Roundup
• d1baseball’s tournament Post season Index
• d1baseball.com’s Tournament Summary page
• d1baseball’s Regional participant information
• CollegeBaseballDaily.com has coverage as well.
• Ncaa.com’s interactive full 64-team bracket
• NCAA Individual player stats
• Warren Nolan.com’s College Baseball RPI

Here’s our final post on High School baseball for 2015 in the area.  We previously posted updates on:

• DC/MD/VA District High School Tournament Report: Start of the 2015 post-season, which covered MD regionals, VA district brackets, Private school tourney results.
• Maryland State Champs, Northern VA District Champs crowned, which covered, as the title suggests, MD state finals, VA district tourneys, VA regional brackets, DC regular season results
• Virginia Regional Results, DC Tourneys which mostly covered the Virginia Baseball Regional tournaments.

In this post, we will cover the various Player/Teams of the year that have been released, Virginia State tournaments and re-cap MD, DC and private schools.

All the Virginia state tourneys ran the weekend of 6/12/15 to 6/13/15.  All Virginia state brackets available from this link at VHSL.org.

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Player of the Year Awards

Before we get to the Virginia playoff results, some player of the year and all-area teams have been announced.

Gatorade announced their State player of the year awards:

• Maryland: Chopticon’s Ljay Newsome, who pitched the game of his life in the Maryland 3-A championship, won the award in Maryland.  He has yet to declare for a college but was drafted (26th round by Seattle).
• Washington DC: St. John’s A.J. Lee won the award for the 2nd consecutive year.  Committed to Maryland.
• Virginia: The Steward School (Richmond)’s Nic Enright won the award in Virginia.   He’s committed to Virginia Tech.

Louisville Slugger All-Americans announced; Ljay Newsome and A.J. Lee were named to the first team All-American.

Locally, some local player of the year awards:

• The Washington Post’s 2015 All-Met announcement, with mostly familiar names that we’ve discussed in this blog this spring.  A.J. Lee was your All-Met player of the year.  Cody Morris named to his third straight All-Met team despite his Tommy John surgery.
• The Baltimore Sun’s 2015 All-Metro Baseball Team.  Player of the year is Truman Thomas of Southern (2-time defending Maryland 2-A champ).  Ironically Morris was only Baltimore 2nd team.
• Richmond 2015 All-Metro team: pending
• Tidewater area
• All 2015 6-A North region teams via InsideNova.com.  6-A North player of the year was Oakton’s Joe Rizzo, a *junior* who hit over .600 for the season.  He’s an early commit to South Carolina.
• All 2015 6-A South Region team: co-players of the year Bodie Sheehan, First Colonial, a Lefty committed to William & Mary and Nathan Eaton, Thomas Dale, a SS/RHP committed to VMI.
• All 5-A North: Marshall HS C Mitch Blackstone (Cornell commit) named the 5-A player of the year (he was also all-Met).
• All 5-A South: pending
• All 4-A North and 4-A south teams: pending
• All 3-A East: Loudoun Valley’s Jack DeGroat (Liberty) the regional player of the year.
• VHSL All-State Teams: pending
• VISAA’s 2015 All-State teams, Division I, II and III
• Maryland MIAA All-State teams: pending.

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6-A State Finals: held at Robinson and Lake Braddock HS in Northern Virginia (which are odd-choices; Robinson and Lake Braddock’s fields aren’t exactly the nicest available fields in the area.  Nor do they have the largest stands.  But, those are the two biggest high schools around, so perhaps that’s why they were selected.  Of course, in previous years Fairfax HS was frequently used, with its ridiculously short LF porch, so maybe Robinson’s larger field is better.  Most people believe Madison has one of the nicest HS fields in the area … but it rarely gets selected as a host for some reason when the cycle for hosting comes back to NoVa).

• 6-A North: Winner Madison (Vienna) (22-5) , runner-up Chantilly (20-6)
• 6-A South: Winner Western Branch (Chesapeake) (22-3), runner-up First Colonial (Virginia Beach) (21-4)

6-A State Semis Results: Madison pecked away at First Colonial and ended up breezing to a 7-2 victory in the first semi.  Madison’s senior ace Brian Eckert (Radford commit) pitched 6+ innings of one run ball in his final appearance for the Warhawks.  In the nightcap, Chantilly got revenge from last year’s state final and pounded the defending 6-A champ Western Branch 8-3 to make the 6-A state final a rematch of the regional title game and an all-northern Virginia affair.

6-A State Final: In the state final, Madison’s junior lefty Matt Favero started the game … and he finished it.  Madison jumped ahead 3-0 but Favero got knocked out in the 4th after giving up 5 hits and 5 unearned runs.  Madison clawed their way back though, tying the game in the 6th and then loading the bases in the bottom of the 7th with no outs.  There, Favero came up and got the walk-off hit (twitter link to video of the hit) to clinch Madison’s 4th state title (2015, 2002, 1971 and 1968).  Kudos to Chantilly; two straight state finals; their coach (Kevin Ford) deserves his coach of the year accolades.

Madison’s feat is all the more impressive when looking at their lineup; outside of their ace lefty Eckert and one position player, the rest of their starting lineup in the state tournament are underclassmen.  They could be quite dominant in 2016.

6-A State champ: Madison (Vienna) with a 24-5 record on the season.

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5-A State Finals: held at Robinson and Lake Braddock HS in Northern Virginia

• 5-A North: Winner Stone Bridge (Ashburn) (21-5), runner-up Marshall (McLean) (21-5)
• 5-A South: Winner Hickory (Chesapeake) (22-3), runner-up Freeman (NW Richmond) (19-6)

Stone Bridge plays at 3pm at Lake Braddock, Marshall at 7pm.

5-A State Semis Results: As with the 6-A tournament, the 5-A final will be an all-Northern Virginia affair as both local teams won.  Stone Bridge’s Brett Kreyer threw a one-hitter as Stone Bridge beat Freeman 6-0 in one semi.  Marshall took advantage of an ill-timed error that would have ended an inning and a rally and eventually beat the defending champ’s Hickory 7-4.

5-A State Final: In the state final, Stone Bridge fulfilled its “ewing theory” credentials by getting further without J.B. Bukauskas than they ever did with him, handling Marshall 9-4 for its first state title.

5-A State champ: Stone Bridge with a 23-5 record on the season.

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4-A State Finals: held at Liberty University in Lynchburg.

• 4-A North: Winner Jefferson Forest (Forest/Lynchburg) (19-7), Fauquier (Warrenton) (19-6), runner-up (by fft after the fact)
• 4-A South: Winner Glen Allen (N. Richmond) (21-3), runner-up Hanover (N. Richmond)  (18-5)

4-A State Semis Results: Glen Allen took out Fauquier in the first state semi final 6-4, facing the Warrenton team after they had to forfeit their 4-A north final victory and settle for second place.  In the other semi, Jefferson Forest outlasted two-time defending state champion Hanover 4-3 in extra innings.

4-A State Final: In the final, Glen Allen scored four early and was never threatened, beating Jefferson Forest 9-3.

4-A State champ: Glen Allen (N. Richmond) with a 23-3 record on the season.

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3-A State Finals: held at Liberty University in Lynchburg.

• 3-A East: Winner Loudoun Valley (Purcelville) (22-2), Runner-up Lafayette (Williamsburg) (18-6-1) (note: these teams were declared co-champs; the positions must have been determined by a coin-flip).
• 3-A West: Winner Monticello (Charlottesville), runner-up Rustberg (outside of Lynchburg)

3-A State Semis Results: In the first semi, Loudoun Valley upended Rustberg 6-0 with Liberty commit Jack DeGroat throwing a complete game 2-hitter with 17 strikeouts.  On the other side, Lafayette destroyed Monticello 11-0 to setup the state final that should have been the regional final.

3-A State Final: In the state final, Lafayette hit a solo homer for the winning run in the top of the 7th before closing out Purcellville’s Loudoun Valley 5-4 for Lafayette’s first ever state baseball title.

3-A State champ: Lafayette (Williamsburg) with a 20-6-1 record on the season.

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Smaller Classifications: held in Salem and at Radford University.

• 2-A match-ups: Strasburg (corner of I-66 & I-81) (25-1) vs Lebanon (SW corner of Virginia), Virginia High (Bristow) (24-2) vs Maggie Walker (Downtown Richmond).  In the semis, Virginia High ended Maggie Walter’s season 8-3, and Lebanon ended Strasburg’s excellent season 8-2.  In the 2-A West rematch for the state title, Virginia High bashed their way to a 16-8 victory to repeat as Virginia 2-A champs..
• 1-A match-ups: Honaker (SW corner of Virginia) v Lancaster (King George peninsula), William Campbell (Gladys south of Lynchburg) vs Radford.  In the semis, the two 1-A east teams advanced for a rematch, wherein William Campbell turned the tables on Lancaster, winning the 1-A title 16-4.

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Recent Virginia HS champs:  Before 2014, we just covered AAA, which now is split between 4-A, 5-A and 6-A divisions.

2014: see this post for 2014’s state tournament wrap up for all 6 divisions.

• In 6-A, Western Branch d Chantilly 6-4.  McLean and Cosby were state semifinalists.
• In 5-A, Hickory d Freeman 6-4.  Stone Bridge and the surprising Freedom-South Riding semi finalists.
• In 4-A, Hanover d Millbrook 7-1.
• In the smaller classifications, Loudoun Valley (Purcellville) won 3-A, Virginia High (Bristol) won 2-A and Northumberland (Heathesville, on the King George peninsula) won 1-A.

2013 AAA: Hanover d Great Bridge. Hanover’s super-junior Derek Casey (now at UVA) outlasts Great Bridge and their 1st round talent Connor Jones (now UVA’s Friday starter after spurning a likely late 1st round draft position).  Lake Braddock and Oakton beaten in the semis.

2012 AAA: Lake Braddock d Kellam 4-0. Lake Braddock lost to West Springfield in the regional title game but then blitzed to a state championship.

2011 AAA: Great Bridge d South County in the state final, giving the powerful South County its first and only loss on the season after starting the season 28-0.  Lake Braddock was the regional finalist and lost to Great Bridge in the state quarters.

2010 AAA: West Springfield d Woodbridge in the final, giving Woodbridge its only loss on the year. WT Woodson regional finalist.

Complete history of Virginia HS Champions: from VHSL’s website.  Covers all sports and has results for a century.

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Maryland Recap

See previous post for MD state final wrap-ups.  Brackets here at the MPSAA website.

A quick list of past Maryland State champions by division:

• 4-A: 2015: Gaithersburg beat Severna Park 5-3.  2014: Chesapeake beat Sherwood 2-0.  2013: South River defeated Catonsville 6-0.  2012: Northwest.  2011: Westminster.  2010: Sherwood
• 3-A: 2015: Chopticon beat Mt. Hebron 1-0.  2014: Reservoir beat North Harford 2-0.  2013: Bel Air defeated La Plata 3-2.  2012: Bennett.  2011: Bennett.  2010: C. Milton Wright.
• 2-A: 2015: Southern beat Eastern Tech 6-1.  2014: Southern beat Parkside 3-2.  2013 : Catoctin defeated North Caroline, 4-2.  2012: Williamsport.  2011: North Caroline.  2010: North Hagerstown.
• 1-A: 2015: Brunswick beat McDonough 4-0.  2014: Smithsburg beat Sparrows Point 9-0.  2013: Cambridge/South Dorchester defeated Allegany, 15-0.  2012: Mountain Ridge.  2011:  St. Michaels.  2010: St. Michaels.

The Maryland public high school seasons are now complete.

 

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DC Public Schools/DCIAA/DCSAA Recaps

• DCIAA: Wilson won its 23rd consecutive DCIAA regular season title, extending its city league winning streak in the process.  DCIAA tournament supposedly ran through 6/3/15, though I cannot find any evidence that it occurred.  Perhaps it has been replaced in total by the DCSAA tourney.
  
• DCSAA:  In the DCSAA final, Gonzaga beat St. Albans 2-1 at Nats Park on a controversial interference call that turned a tag-out at the plate into the decisive run.

 

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Private Leagues: WCAC/MAC/IAC and VISAA/Maryland Private

• MIAA: Class A: Spalding beat Calvert Hill.  Class B: St. Mary’s-Annapolis.  Class C: St. John’s Catholic Prep repeated.
• VISAA: Liberty Christian repeated as the VISAA Division 1 champ.  Greenbriar Christian took the Division 2 title and the Southampton Academy took the Division 3 title among smaller Virginia private schools.
• WCAC: St. Johns (DC) topped DeMatha in a 3-game series to win the WCAC for the 2nd year in a row.  (Not the same St. Johns as who won MIAA).
• IAC: Georgetown Prep beat Landon to win the IAC, avenging their loss in the finals last year.
• PVAC: Sandy Spring Friends defeated Jewish Day school for the inaugural title in this fledgling league.
• MAC:  the Potomac school beat St. James (who upset #1 seed and defending champ Flint Hill) in the final.
• Maryland Private School Tournament: DeMatha beat Riverdale Baptist.

All local area Private schools’ seasons are now complete.

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Local and National High School Baseball Ranking Lists:

• Washington Post All Met Sports Final Baseball top 10: Updated/finalized 6/17/15 at the end of the spring prep season.  Madison 1, Gaithersburg 2.  If I had ranked them, I likely would have gone Madison 1, Gaithersburg 2, Spalding 3, Stone Bridge 4, Chopticon 5, Chantilly 6, Loudoun Valley 7, St. Johns 8, Oakton 9 and Marshall 10.  Battlefield HM.  I was pretty close.
• Baltimore Sun Final Rankings page : dated 5/25/15: They also have Spalding #1, then Calvert Hall, St. Marys, 4-A finalist Severna Park and then 3-A finalist Mt. Hebron.  Reservoir 6th.
• Hampton Roads Baseball top 10 page: dated 5/19/15: Western Branch #1, then Grassfield, Hickory and First Colonial.  Needs updating.
• Baseball America’s High School top 50 (Final ranking 6/17/15): Madison #24 in final poll, Stone Bridge #42.
• USA Today High School top 25 (most recent ranking 6/17/15): Madison at #36, Liberty Christian #43, Spalding #44 and Western Branch #49.
• MaxPreps top 25/top 50 lists, which has a hand-picked and a computer/power ranking list.  6/15/15 rankings.  No DC/MD/VA teams in MaxPrep’s “Excellent 50.”  Highest ranked teams in the extended rankings are Liberty Christian at #71, Chopticon at #95.  Madison is in the #400s, making one question these rankings slightly.

Resources:

• Washington Post’s AllMetSports section with standings and schedule results.
• InsideNova.com‘s coverage of high school sports, but has put limits on the number of stories you can read.
• Richmond Times-Dispatch has a HS scoreboard.
• Hampton Roads Pilot (Hampton Roads) has scores for teams in the Chesapeake/Norfolk/Va Beach area.
• The Baltimore Sun’s high school page has information on some of the programs outside the DC area mentioned in the Maryland section
• The Connection family of newspapers has a sports section that is rarely updated, but it does do some coverage.
• Nvdaily.com (Strasburg) has some results for some of the teams in the smaller conferences/outskirts of DC, generally in the Strasburg area.
• WinchesterStar (Winchester) has results for Winchester teams but its pay-only.
• The Daily Progress (Culpeper local paper) also has some scores for schools in its areas.
• Fauquier Times (Fauquier) has some local sports news.
• VivaLoudoun tracks the Loudoun/Ashburn/Leesburg teams.
• The Loudoun Times also covers Leesburg-area teams.
• LoCosports blog, with tons of Loudoun county Coverage
• Fredericksburg.com has some local coverage of Fredericksburg and Woodbridge teams.
• The Lynchburg News & Advance for Lynchburg-based sports.
• The Virginia Gazette for Williamsburg local stuff.
• I use perfectgame.org to look up high-end HS prospects.
• VHSL’s and MPSSAA home pages for playoff brackets and updates for VA and MD respectively.
• MaxPreps DC/VA specific coverage.

 

Here’s how some of the players of local interest fared in the 2015 draft.  Per section, i’ve ordered these guys by the order they were taken chronologically, not by any pre-draft rankings.

At the beginning of the season, we profiled a ton of local prep and college players.  And then we talked about the higher-profile local players in our Pre-draft coverage.  At the end of the day, almost none of the prep guys were drafted and those that were are almost certain to go to school.

College Players with local ties

• Nathan Kirby LHP from UVA: went #40 (Supp 1st round) to Seattle, a huge drop from where he was projected.  His injury and the drop in his stuff this year really hurt his draft status.
• Josh Sborz, RHP closer for UVA: went #74 (Supp 2nd round) to the Dodgers, who had a fantastic draft picking big-name college arms who fell due to performance.  Sborz can start (and did start both this year and last).
• Taylor Clarke, who hails from Ashburn (Broad Run HS) went #76, first pick of the 3rd round to Arizona.
• Mike Matuella, of Great Falls (Georgetown Prep) and Duke: went two picks later, #78, to Texas in the 3rd round.  An amazing drop for Matuella, who was rumored as a top 5 pick earlier in the season but who dropped probably 3 full rounds thanks to the surgery and questions about his medicals.  And there’s no reason for him to head back to school; thanks to the timing he isn’t even back on a mound until midway through his senior year.  Maybe he does go back to school (he’s going to Duke after all; he may want to finish his degree) and try to get himself back into the 1st round.  We’ll see.
• Brandon Lowe: UMD infielder: 3rd round #87 overall to Tampa Bay.
• Alex Robinson: UMD’s ace Lefty went in the 5th round (#140 overall) to Minnesota.
• Joe McCarthy, OF for UVA: 5th round, #148 overall to Tampa Bay.  Man, Joe had a rough junior year.  He went from a back-0f-the-first rounder to a 5th rounder.  Will he hold out for above slot money as a result, possibly going back to school for his Senior year to regain value?  I would.
• Brandon Waddell UVA Saturday/Sunday starter: 5th round (#157) to Pittsburgh.  Another guy who was supposed to be higher but who dropped.
• Jack Wynkoop of Virginia Beach (Cape Henry Collegiate HS), LHP starter for South Carolina: went in the 6th round to Colorado.
• Michael Boyle: Radford Ace.  13th rounder to the Dodgers, who just *cleaned up* on high-profile college arms in this draft.
• Kevin Mooney: UMD closer: 15th rounder by the Nats!
• Kenny Towns; 3B from UVA and the 2011 All-Met player of the year from Lake Braddock, went in the 20th to the Angels.
• Luke Willis, OF from George Mason and Oakton HS, in the 30th round to Kansas City.

There are quite a few other college players from the many baseball-playing colleges in the area drafted past the 10th round; search the MLB draft tracker and select the state of Virginia for many more local college players.

Local Prep players of note: nobody got drafted high enough to seriously consider changing their college frankly.

Fyi: Washington Post announced their All Met teams last night.  Nearly every local kid we’ve talked about this year is mentioned, including a number of these guys below:

• Jimmy Barnes, Deep Creek HS in Chesapeake; 11th rounder to the Angels.  Interesting selection; the 11th round is the first round where you can “get away” from the bonus structure of the first 10; Barnes hasn’t committed to a college and is a SS from the baseball hotbed of Chesapeake VA.  Signable?
• Nic Enright of Steward HS in Richmond: 19th rounder to the Mets.  Looks like he’s going to Virginia Tech.
• Ljay Newsome of Chopticon (south of Waldorf): 26th rounder by Seattle.  Wonder what happens here: Newsome has not declared for a college yet.  Is he signable as a 26th rounder?  Post Publishing update: per his summer team’s twitter page, Newsome signed.
• Nathan Trevillian, RHP from small Amherst County HS; committed to Liberty.  22nd rounder to the Mets.
• Stevie Mangrum, 3B from Western Albemarle HS in Charlottesville.  Va Tech commit, 28th round pick by Boston.
• Cody Morris, of Reservoir with a South Carolina commit and a TJ surgery: got picked up in 32nd round by Baltimore, probably the team sending a message to a local kid.
• Hunter Parsons of Parkside HS, picked up in the 40th round by Cleveland.  Maryland commit.

I only see one of these prep kids going signing (Barnes in the 11th).  That means, reaching back to my pre-season coverage, the following colleges are going to see their early commits come to school.  Here’s a list of all the Prep players profiled early on with verbal commits (link to allmetsports.com’s Recruit Watch) Not all of these commits are set in stone, but here’s what some local schools signing classes could look like:

• UVA: Connor Eason, Nathan Eikhoff, Evan Sperling, Grant Donahue
• U of Maryland: A.J. Lee, Hunter Parsons
• Virginia Tech: Nic Enright, Stevie Mangrum, John DeFazio, Paul Hall
• South Carolina: Cody Morris, Danny Blair
• Wake Forest: Harvey Logan
• Liberty: Nathan Trevillian, Jack DeGroat
  
• VCU: Brody Cook
• UNC-Asheville: Jordan Carr
• Campbell: James Monaghan
• Uncommitted thus far: Ljay Newsome, Jimmy Barnes, Kaleb Bowman, Hunter Byrnes

 

Nats re-draft/previously drafted Players (i’ve noted our previous draft position for each player)

• Andrew Suarez , (2nd round pick 2014) LHP from Miami went in the 2nd round again, #61 overall this time to San Francisco.  A few picks after he went last year; did he make a mistake spurning the Nats offer?  (disclaimer: who knows what the Nats offered).
• Skye Bolt, OF from UNC, went in the 4th round (#128 overall) to Oakland.
• Cody Poteet, (27th rounder in 2012) went in the 4th round (#116 overall) to Miami.
• Austin Byler, (9th rounder, 2014) OF from Nevada.  Was the first pick on day 3; 11th rounder by Arizona.  His decision to head back to school may have cost him (though, to be fair, we have no idea what he turned down from the Nats).
• Daniel Salters (22nd rounder 2014) C from Dallas Baptist: 13th round pick to Cleveland in 2015.
• Jake Jefferies (34th rounder in 2012): 2B from Cal State-Fullerton; Nats picked him up again, this time in the 39th round.  He’s a junior now, clearly the Nats like him and probably just wanted to send a message, setting him up for next year.

There’s a couple more guys who were HS draftees in 2012 who should be draft eligible juniors now but who were not drafted.  They may not even still be playing for all we know.

 

Here’s the next big update on the state of High School baseball in the area.  We previously posted updates on:

• DC/MD/VA District High School Tournament Report: 2015 post-season, which covered MD regionals, VA district brackets, Private school tourney results.
• Prep Baseball Update 2015: Maryland State Champs, Northern VA District Champs crowned, which covered, as the title suggests, MD state finals, VA district tourneys, VA regional brackets, DC regular season results

In this post, we will cover the Virginia Regional results, preview the VA State brackets, finish up the DC tourney results, and have summaries to the Maryland and Private school results.

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Virginia Regionals:

All regional brackets are available at this link; we won’t keep reposting links below.

6-A North Regionals: Here were your qualifiers:

• Conference 5/Concorde: Chantilly, Oakton, Herndon, Centreville
• Conference 6/Liberty: Madison, Fairfax, McLean, South Lakes
• Conference 7/Potomac: Lake Braddock, South County, West Springfield, TC Williams
• Conference 8/Cedar Run: Patriot, Osborne Park, Battlefield, Stonewall Jackson

My predictions: Oakton and Madison on one side, Patriot and Chantilly on the other.  Most of the expected Northern Region heavyweights are here and it should be a good tourney.

Regional games run from 5/29/15 to 6/5/15.  Here’s a rundown of the results:

In the 6-A North Regional first round on 5/29/15, there were plenty of upsets.  South Lakes shut out Potomac champ Lake Braddock and Centreville easily handled Cedar Run champion Patriot 11-5, eliminating two district champions.  The other two district champs (Madison and Chantilly) each advanced easily in the first round, with Madison throwing their ace lefty Brian Eckert (Radford commit).  Battlefield blanked Oakton 7-0 as Jake Agnos (East Carolina commit) picked right back up where he left off in his 21-K start, whiffing 13 through 6 innings and eliminating the team I thought might very well win the Region.  Liberty regular season champ McLean was trounced by South County 9-1, completing the penalty for their early-district tournament defeat.

In the 6-A North Regional Quarter finals on 6/1/15, Battlefield eased by South Lakes 8-2 and Chantilly handled South County 7-5.  Rain wreaked havoc in the area the evening of 6/1/15 so some of these teams may have to play back to back games this week.  Indeed, the other two games got pushed to 6/2/15; Centreville continued its upset ways by beating West Springfield 10-5 and Madison blasted Herndon 21-3.  This sets up two interesting Regional semi finals: Centreville and Chantilly are local rivals, while Battlefield & Madison met in the semis of a tournament in Myrtle Beach earlier this year and Madison won handily 11-1.

In the 6-A North Regional semis on 6/3/15, Madison and Battlefield faced off for the 2nd time this year, but this time with both team’s throwing their aces.  Battlefield’s Agnos threw 8 innings, struck out 14 and gave up 1 unearned run to finish an amazing post-season, but he was matched by Madison’s Eckert.  The game went to the 9th.  After having struck out the side in the top half of the inning with runners on 2nd and 3rd, Madison’s Pete Nielsen hit a walk-off single to win it for Madison and send them to the Regional final and state 6-A tournament.  On the other side, Chantilly beat Centreville 8-4 to return to both the Regional final and the 6-A state tournament for the 2nd year in a row.

Just a note on Agnos before moving on: in his final three starts (in the district final and his two regional starts) he threw 21 innings and struck out FOURTY-EIGHT batters.  I’ve never heard of such a feat; its amazing to me that he’s “only” just going to ECU and isn’t more prominently mentioned in the draft.

In the 6-A North Regional final on 6/5/15, coach Mark “Pudge” Gjormand’s Madison jumped out to a 5-0 lead early behind a 3-run homer from starting pitcher Matt Favero (who took a no-hitter into the 6th) and cruised to a 9-0 laugher in the regional final over Chantilly.  Next up for both teams is the 6-A state semi-finals.

 

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6-A South Regional: Here were your qualifiers:

• 6-A Conference 1/Coastal:  First Colonial, Cox
  
• 6-A Conference 2/Monitor Merrimac: Western Branch, Grassfield
• 6-A Conference 3: Cosby, Thomas Dale
  
• 6-A Conference 4: Forest Park, Colonial Forge
  

Regional games run from 6/1/15 to 6/5/15.  Here’s a rundown of the results:

In the 6-A South Regional quarters, all four District champions advanced, mostly with ease.  Cosby beat Colonial Forge in a 2-1 squeaker, Western Branch pounded Cox, First Colonial eased by Grassfield (in what might have been an upset in reality), and Forest Park beat Thomas Dale.

In the 6-A South Regional semis, First Colonial ended Forest Park’s season 4-3.  Rain wreaked havoc on the 6-A south playoffs, with the Cosby/Western Branch semi rained out two nights in a row, forcing a push of the regional final.  When they finally played, Western Branch handled the Richmond power easily 8-2 to advance to the state tournament.

In the 6-A South Regional final, Western Branch beat First Colonial 2-1 in a tidewater battle.

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5-A North Regional: Here were your qualifiers (not all conference contributed equal numbers of teams)

• Conference 13/Capitol: Marshall, Edison, Stuart, Lee
• Conference 14: Stone Bridge, Broad Run, Briar Woods
• Conference 15: Mountain View, Potomac, North Stafford
• Conference 16: Patrick Henry, Halifax County

Regional games run from 5/29/15 to 6/5/15.  Here’s a rundown of the results:

In the 5-A North Regional first round on 5/29/15, all three conference 13 teams playing lost (Edison, Stuart and Lee), indicating just how weak that conference was this year.  Conference 15’s #2 seed Potomac handled Briar Woods.

In the 5-A North Regional Quarter finals on 6/1/15 and 6/2/15, #1 seeds prevailed as Marshall, Stone Bridge, Mountain View and Patrick Henry-Ashland all advanced.

In the 5-A North Regional semis on 6/3/15, Stone Bridge beat Mountain View (Stafford) 4-1 to return to the regional final/state tourney for the second year.  Their opponent will  have to have played back-to-back games, as the Patrick Henry-Broad Run quarter was postponed two days in a row, backing up that part of the draw.  Stone Bridge outlasted Patrick Henry 3-2, setting up a final of Northern Virginia’s two best 5-A teams this year on Marshall’s home field.

In the 5-A North Regional final on 6/6/15, Stone Bridge won their second straight 5-A north title by beating Marshall on their home turf 10-7.

 

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5-A South Regional: Here were your qualifiers:

• Conference 9/Atlantic: Kellam, Princess Anne
• Conference 10/PenSouth: Hickory, Menchville
• Conference 11: Deep Run, Freeman
• Conference 12: Clover Hill, Manchester
  

Lots of new faces in this regional … and two familiar ones.  Hickory beat Freeman in last year’s 5-A state final and could meet again in the regional final.  But Hickory would have to go through Kellam, a traditional powerhouse.

Regional games run from 6/2/15 to 6/5/15.  Here’s a rundown of the results:

In the 5-A South Regional quarters, rain forced the whole slate to 6/3 or 6/4, backing up the tournament badly.  Menchville (Newport News) upset Kellam 4-2 (though by their records it wasn’t much of an upset), Hickory advanced over Princess Anne easily 12-1.  The other two quarters were rained out *three days in a row* unbelievably, forcing the whole slate of the 5-A south tournament to shift.

In the 5-A South Regional semis, Hickory topped Menchville 7-4.  Clover Hill defeated Freeman in 10 innings … but was then forced to forfeit the game due to their using an ineligible pitcher.

In the 5-A South Regional final, Hickory took advantage of a tired Freeman team (a rematch of last year’s 5-A title game) and won the regional title.

 

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Virginia Smaller Classifications: we’ll just summarize the regional finalists who are moving on to the state tournament.

• 4-A North: All four district champs advanced the semis.  Jefferson Forest (Lynchburg) and Fauquier HS advanced to the final, and Fauquier won it.
• 4-A South: Upsets abounded as Powhattan and Hanover upset district champs in the quarters.  North Richmond suburb rivals Glen Allen and Hanover (both from District 20) advanced to the regional finals, where Glen Allen beat the 2-time defending state champs again 15-4 for the regional title.
• 3-A East; Loudoun Valley’s Jack DeGroat (committed to Liberty) threw a no-hitter in the 3-A East regional quarters over Culpepper.  Loudoun Valley advanced to the final, facing Lafayette from Williamsburg.  I guess they got rained out so many days in a row that they declared co-champions.
• 3-A West: All four district champs advanced the semis.  There, Rustberg and Monticello advanced to the finals, won by Monticello.
• 2-A East: Both local teams (Strasburg and George Mason) advanced to the Region semis.  George Mason’s season came to an end at the hands of Va Beach-based Maggie Walker, but Strasburg continued their recent dominance by winning the regional.
• 2-A West: Virginia High and Lebanon advanced to the regional finals; Virginia High wins it.
• 1-A: No DC-local schools are in the smallest 1-A classification.

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State tourney matchups and tourney locations

All the state tourneys run from June 12th – 13th at the various sites.  Semis are at 3pm and 7pm on 6/12/15 and the finals are the next day (though it seems that some of these teams have graduation ceremonies this coming weekend, so the dates/times are in flux).  All state brackets available from this link at VHSL.

• 6A- Robinson High school, in Fairfax for both semis and final
• 5A – Lake Braddock HS for semis, Robinson for the final.
• 4A – Liberty University, Lynchburg for both semis and final.
• 3A – Liberty University, Lynchburg for both semis and final.
• 2A – Radford University semis and final.
• 1A – Salem for the semis, Radford for the final

Here’s the state matchups (? means the regional final results were still pending upon publish; we’ll update as we get them).

• 6-A match-ups: Madison (22-5) vs First Colonial and Western Branch versus Chantilly (20-6)
• 5-A match-ups: Stone Bridge (21-5) vs Freeman (19-6), and Hickory versus Marshall (21-5)
• 4-A match-ups: Faquier (20-5) versus Hanover (18-5) and Glenn Allen (21-3) vs Jefferson Forest (18-8)
• 3-A match-ups: Monticello vs ?, ? versus Rustberg
• 2-A match-ups: Strasburg vs Lebanon, Virginia High vs Maggie Walker
• 1-A match-ups: Honaker v ?, ? vs Radford

 

 

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Recent Virginia HS champs:  Before 2014, we just covered AAA, which now is split between 4-A, 5-A and 6-A divisions.

2014: see this post for 2014’s state tournament wrap up for all 6 divisions.

• In 6-A, Western Branch d Chantilly 6-4.  McLean and Cosby were state semifinalists.
• In 5-A, Hickory d Freeman 6-4.  Stone bridge and the surprising Freedom-South Riding semi finalists.
• In 4-A, Hanover d Millbrook 7-1.
• In the smaller classifications, Loudoun Valley won 3-A, Virginia High won 2-A and Northumberland won 1-A.

2013: Hanover d Great Bridge. Hanover’s super-junior Derek Casey (committed to UVA) outlasts Great Bridge and their 1st round talent Connor Jones (now attending UVA after spurning a likely late 1st round draft position).  Lake Braddock and Oakton beaten in the semis.

2012: Lake Braddock d Kellam 4-0. Lake Braddock lost to West Springfield in the regional title game but then blitzed to a state championship.

2011: Great Bridge d South County in the state final, giving the powerful South County its first and only loss on the season after starting the season 28-0.  Lake Braddock was the regional finalist and lost to Great Bridge in the state quarters.

2010: West Springfield d Woodbridge in the final, giving Woodbridge its only loss on the year. WT Woodson regional finalist.

Complete history of Virginia HS Champions: from VHSL’s website.  Covers all sports and has results for a century.

 

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Maryland

See previous post for MD state final wrap-ups.  Brackets here at the MPSAA website.

A quick list of past Maryland State champions by division:

• 4-A: 2015: Gaithersburg beat Severna Park 5-3.  2014: Chesapeake beat Sherwood 2-0.  2013: South River defeated Catonsville 6-0.  2012: Northwest.  2011: Westminster.  2010: Sherwood
• 3-A: 2015: Chopticon beat Mt. Hebron 1-0.  2014: Reservoir beat North Harford 2-0.  2013: Bel Air defeated La Plata 3-2.  2012: Bennett.  2011: Bennett.  2010: C. Milton Wright.
• 2-A: 2015: Southern beat Eastern Tech 6-1.  2014: Southern beat Parkside 3-2.  2013 : Catoctin defeated North Caroline, 4-2.  2012: Williamsport.  2011: North Caroline.  2010: North Hagerstown.
• 1-A: 2015: Brunswick beat McDonough 4-0.  2014: Smithsburg beat Sparrows Point 9-0.  2013: Cambridge/South Dorchester defeated Allegany, 15-0.  2012: Mountain Ridge.  2011:  St. Michaels.  2010: St. Michaels.

The Maryland public high school seasons are now complete.

 

 

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DC Public Schools/DCIAA:

• DCIAA: Wilson won its 23rd consecutive DCIAA regular season title, extending its city league winning streak in the process.  DCIAA tournament runs through 6/3/15.
• DCSAA: the 2015 tournament is underway, with the final scheduled for Nats park on 5/31/15.  Gonzaga is the #1 seed and Wilson the #2.  Curiously missing is St. Johns, who won the WCAC and is the defending DCSAA champ.  In the semis St. Albans upset Wilson to setup a final against Gonzaga.  In that final, Gonzaga beat St. Albans 2-1 at Nats Park on a controversial interference call that turned a tag-out at the plate into the decisive run.

 

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Private Leagues: WCAC/MAC/IAC and VISAA/Maryland Private

• MIAA: Class A: Spalding beat Calvert Hill.  Class B: St. Mary’s-Annapolis.  Class C: St. John’s Catholic Prep repeated.
• VISAA: Liberty Christian repeated as the VISAA Division 1 champ.  Greenbriar Christian took the Division 2 title and the Southampton Academy took the Division 3 title among smaller Virginia private schools.
• WCAC: St. Johns (DC) topped DeMatha in a 3-game series to win the WCAC for the 2nd year in a row.  (Not the same St. Johns as who won MIAA).
• IAC: Georgetown Prep beat Landon to win the IAC, avenging their loss in the finals last year.
• PVAC: Sandy Spring Friends defeated Jewish Day school for the inaugural title in this fledgling league.
• MAC:  the Potomac school beat St. James (who upset #1 seed and defending champ Flint Hill) in the final.
• Maryland Private School Tournament: DeMatha beat Riverdale Baptist.

All local area Private schools’ seasons are now complete.

 

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Player of the Year Awards

Gatorade announced their player of the year awards:

• Maryland: Chopticon’s Ljay Newsome, who pitched the game of his life in the Maryland 3-A championship, won the award in Maryland.  He has yet to declare for a college.
• Washington DC: St. John’s A.J. Lee won the award for the 2nd consecutive year.  Committed to Maryland.
• Virginia: The Steward School (Richmond)’s Nic Enright won the award in Virginia.   He’s committed to Virginia Tech.

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Local and National High School Baseball Ranking Lists:

• Washington Post All Met Sports latest Baseball top 10:: Spalding, Gaithersburg 1-2, then Oakton, Madison, and Battlefield.  Stone Bridge 8th despite a win over Madison in Vienna.  This hasn’t been updated for regional and state tournaments; i’d guess we’d see Madison and Stone Bridge rise slightly but likely not overtake Maryland’s two best teams unless they win states.
• Baltimore Sun Rankings page : dated 5/25/15: They also have Spalding #1, then Calvert Hall, St. Marys, 4-A finalist Severna Park and then 3-A finalist Mt. Hebron.  Reservoir 6th.
• Hampton Roads Baseball top 10 page: dated 5/19/15: Western Branch #1, then Grassfield & Hickory.
• Baseball America’s High School top 25 (most recent ranking 6/2/15): no DC/MD/VA teams listed.
• USA Today High School top 25 (most recent ranking 5/20/15): Western Branch closest to top-25, ranked 26th.  Spalding (both Washington Post’s and Baltimore Sun’s #1 team) ranked 42nd nationally.
• USA Today’s Virginia-only rankings: no longer seem to be in existence.
• MaxPreps top 25/top 50 lists, which has a hand-picked and a computer/power ranking list.  5/24/15 rankings.  No DC/MD/VA teams in MaxPrep’s “Excellent 50.”  Highest ranked teams in the area are Liberty Christina (#55), Western Branch (#67), Turner Ashby (#72).  Chopticon and Spalding are in the 75-100 range.

Resources:

• Washington Post’s AllMetSports section with standings and schedule results.
• InsideNova.com‘s coverage of high school sports, but has put limits on the number of stories you can read.
• The Connection family of newspapers has a sports section that is rarely updated, but it does do some coverage.
• MaxPreps.com also has some non-paywall HS information that comes in handy too.
• Nvdaily.com (Strasburg) has some results for some of the teams in the smaller conferences/outskirts of DC, generally in the Strasburg area.
• WinchesterStar (Winchester) has results for Winchester teams but its pay-only.
• The Daily Progress (Culpeper local paper) also has some scores for schools in its areas.
• Faquier Times (Fauquier) has some local sports news.
• VivaLoudoun tracks the Loudoun/Ashburn/Leesburg teams.
• Fredericksburg.com has some local coverage of Fredericksburg and Woodbridge teams.
• Richmond Times-Dispatch has a HS scoreboard.
• Hampton Roads Pilot (Hampton Roads) has scores for teams in the Chesapeake/Norfolk/Va Beach area.
• The Baltimore Sun’s high school page has information on some of the programs outside the DC area mentioned in the Maryland section
• I use perfectgame.org to look up high-end HS prospects.
• VHSL’s and MPSSAA home pages for playoff brackets and updates for VA and MD respectively.

 

 

The MLB rule-4 (Amateur) draft starts on Monday 6/8/15 at 7pm.  See MLB Network for the best coverage.  Since we’re also going to be talking about prep regional results and CWS results early next week, I thought i’d get this draft coverage post out there.  This post has good links to use to see draft prospect rankings, then links to help cover the draft starting monday, then some blurbs on local players of interest, and then links to a bunch of mock drafts.

Draft Coverage so far at NAR for 2015:

• here was our 2015 pre-season local player link.
• the shake-up at the top of draft boards with the news of Aiken and locally-tied Matuella‘s TJ surgeries in March.

Here’s a slew of Draft Prospect rankings : these are NOT the same as mock drafts; see further down for those.

• D1baseball HS top 100 players with commitments (most of it behind a pay-wall)
• Keith Law‘s Early top 50 draft prospects
• MLB’s initial top 50 draft prospects
• Jon Sickels early draft thoughts.
• Kiley McDaniels early draft rankings.
• MLB’s Late may top 200 draft prospect rankings.
• Baseball America’s top 500 draft prospects
• MinorLeagueBall’s top 400 draft prospects
• Chris Crawford (now Baseballprospectus.com) top 100 draft prospects
• Scout.com’s Jeff Ellis 1-35 draft prospect rankings and 36-75 rankings (some scout.com stuff is behind the pay-wall)
• D1Baseball.com’s Top 150 Draft Prospects (mostly behind a paywall)
• MLBDraftReport’s top 500 with write-ups…

Draft Links of importance

• MLB.com Official 2015 Draft Central home page.
• MLB’s Awesome Draft Tracker; you can slice and dice the draft 10 different ways, search by schools and home states, etc.
• Official MLB 2015 Draft Order (Nats first pick is #58 well into the 2nd round, next #69, then #103, then #134 in the 4th round, and then 134+30 picks there-after.
• Official Draft Bonus Pool totals.  Astros have $17M (most).  Nats have 3rd least at $4.1M.
• MLB Draft Database
• Fangraphs Sortable Draft Board; a great new tool Fangraphs has that lets you slice and dice their top draft board.
• Baseball-Reference Draft Tools: links to their draft database plus some custom reports.

Now, some news about College Players with local ties

• Nathan Kirby Lat strain Press Release: UVA’s ace Kirby, considered a mid-to-late 1st rounder, missed a huge chunk of the season with a Lat Strain.  If the cards fall right, he may be able to pitch UVA’s 3rd regional game.  MLB has him ranked #26, as does BA.
• Mike Matuella, of Great Falls (Georgetown Prep) and Duke, remains a back-end of the 1st round draft prospect but is also rehabbing his own TJ surgery.  He has far less of a track record than other college arms, and may be a crap shoot in the draft.  MLB has him ranked #28, BA #23.
• Taylor Clarke, who hails from Ashburn (Broad Run HS), was named the CAA pitcher of the year while putting up stellar numbers for the College of Charleston, a trendy underdog pick to reach the CWS.  MLB has him ranked #144, so that’s perhaps a 4th-5th rounder, while BA has him higher at #118.  Here’s a draft profile of him from scout.com.
• Joe McCarthy, OF for UVA, missed most of the season with a back injury and then hit horribly after wards.  His draft stock has dropped from a supp-1st to probably the back end of the 2nd round.  MLB has him ranked #68, BA #46.
• Josh Sborz got dumped out of UVA’s rotation but still is ranked #115 in MLB’s pre-draft rankings (projecting to a 3rd-4th rounder).
• Brandon Waddell had a good season as UVA’s #2 starter … and MLB projects him as a 5th rounder at #163.  BA has him at #153.
• University of Maryland’s two best draft prospects are Alex Robinson (MLB ranked #124) and Brandon Lowe (MLB ranked #148).  Robinson is #74 on BA’s top 500 list and Lowe is #98 on BA’s list.
• Radford’s Michael Boyle has pushed his draft stock up with his team’s post-season performance; BA has him ranked #132, which puts him in the 4th-5th round.

Local Prep players of note:

• Cody Morris, probably the best local player matriculating this year, had to undergo TJ surgery and likely scuttling his draft plans.  Luckily he had already taken a scholarship offer to South Carolina, where he will now presumably attend and rehab to get ready for the 2016 season.  BA still has him ranked #265 but the odds of a team taking him in the 8th round seem slim.
• A.J. Lee of St. Johns earned his 2nd straight Gatorade DC player of the year award and remains committed to Maryland; I do not sense he is a significant draft prospect and will go to College.  He is not in BA’s top 500 prospects.
• Ljay Newsome of Chopticon (south of Waldorf) made some noise with his stellar 3-A state final game; he has not picked a college and I wonder if he’s headed for the draft.  He is not in BA’s top 500 prospects.
• Nic Enright of Steward HS in Richmond (2015 Gatorade player of the year) is signed to Va Tech but ranked #132 by MLB.  Will he sign if he gets 3rd round money?  BA’s got him ranked far lower; #230, in the range of draft rankings where it makes more sense for him to go to school.

Other players of interest to Nats fans:

• Andrew Suarez, the Nats’ 2nd round pick of last year, had a decent if not spectacular senior season at Miami and may end up getting picked right in the same spot.  MLB has him #75, BA #73.
• Austin Byler, the Nats’ 9th round pick of last year, is ranked #199 by MLB (but much higher at #115 by BA) putting him in the 7th round or so.  Not too much of an improvement over last year; his senior season was more of the same for him; lots of power, perhaps stuck at 1B so will really have to hit his way moving forward.
• Skye Bolt, the Nats’ 26th round pick in 2012, had a great UNC career and is ranked #67 by MLB ahead of the draft.  BA has him a bit lower at #106.  Maybe the Nats can draft him again since this is right around where their first 2015 draft pick falls.

Mock Draft Guesses

Sometimes you just can’t help yourself.  I like mock drafts from writers I like.  Since the Nats don’t pick until midway through the 2nd round, there’s no point (like in years’ past) in trying to project the Nats pick.  So here’s some popular pundits and their mocks, with their top 5 predictions (Law = Espn, McDaniel = Fangraphs, Callis & Mayo = Mlb.com, Manual = Baseball America and Crawford = Baseball Prospectus)

• Keith Law Mock #1: Dansby Swanson, Alex Bregman, Dillon Tate, Brendan Rodgers, Kyle Tucker
• Keith Law Mock #2: Swanson, Rodgers, Tyler Jay, Tate, Tucker
• Keith Law Mock #3 (on ESPN podcast): Swanson, Bregman, Rodgers, Tate, Tucker
• Keith Law final Mock: Swanson, Bregman, Rodgers, Trenton Clark, Andrew Benintendi
• Kiley McDaniel Mock #1: Swanson, Rodgers, Tate, Kyle Funkhouser, Daz Cameron
• Kiley McDaniel Mock #2: Swanson, Rodgers, Jay, Bregman, Tucker
• Kiley McDaniel Mock #3: Swanson, Bregman, Rodgers, Tate, Tucker
• Jim Callis Mock #1: Swanson, Rodgers, Jay, Cameron, Carson Fulmer
• Jim Callis Mock #2: Swanson, Bregman, Rodgers, Cameron, Tucker
• Jim Callis: Final Mock: Swanson, Bregman, Rodgers, Tate, Benintendi
• Jonathan Mayo Mock #1: Tate, Rodgers, Swanson, Cameron, Fulmer
• Jonathan Mayo Mock #2: Swanson, Rodgers, Jay, Cameron, Tate
• Jonathan Mayo Final Mock: Swanson, Bregman, Rodgers, Cameron, Tate
• John Manual Mock #1: Tate, Swanson, Rodgers, Jon Harris, Tucker
• John Manual Mock #2: Fulmer, Swanson, Rodgers, Tate, Tucker
• John Manual Mock #3: Jay, Swanson, Rodgers, Tate, Tucker
• John Manual Mock #4: Swanson, Bregman, Jay, Rodgers, Cameron
• Jeff Ellis/Scout.com Final Mock: Swanson, Bregman, Rodgers, Tate, Tucker
• David Rawnsley/si.com final mock: Swanson, Bregman, Rodgers, Tate, Cameron
• Chris Crawford Mock #1: Garrett Whitley, Swanson, Rodgers, … the rest behind a pay-wall.
• Ryan Sullivan/NatsGM final mock: Swanson, Bregman, Rodgers, Tate, Tucker
• D1baseball.com Mock #1: Swanson … and the rest behind a pay-wall.
• Jon Sickels/MinorLeagueBall Mock #1: Swanson, Bregman, Jay, Rodgers, Tucker
• PerfectGame.org’s mock drafts and coverage now behind a pay-wall.

Todd Boss’ Mock draft?  Based on my vast level of expertise (sarcasm) and the thousands of man hours i’ve put in scouting players in person and cultivating industry sources (also sarcasm), I’ll take this as my guess for the top 5:

1. Swanson: I think Swanson’s post-season hitting combined with his positional flexibility and the decline of all the upper-end college arms that have been mentioned in the conversation for 1-1 (First Aiken & Matuella, then Tate, then Funkhouser and Fulmer) has cemented Swanson’s spot at 1-1.  In other years, he’d be lucky to go in the top 10.  Not this year.  Arizona goes with the least risk; proven college hitter.
2. Bregman: practically every connected pundit now has Bregman going 2nd.  Houston gets a sure thing and goes prep with #5.
3. Rodgers: Houston hasn’t backed away from HS players before and get the best one, a SS with power, at #2.
4. Tate: Tate’s regional performance pushed him back into this lofty level and he’s a better bet than Jay thanks to his reliever status all year.  Colorado likes college arms this high.  He makes the most sense.  If this pick isn’t Tate, its Jay.
5. Tucker: practically everyone has Houston’s 2nd pick on Tucker, meaning they’re taking two upper-end prep talents.  Plus the Astros know the family; Kyle’s older brother Preston was a 7th round pick by Houston in 2012 and made his debut this year.  Makes too much sense.

So, just so you know, this guess matches the final mocks of Law, McDaniel and Ellis, and is nearly identical to the final mocks of a couple others.

This top 5 means some big time names are available 6-10.  Cameron, Jay, Fulmer, Clark and Harris could very well be in the next 4-5 guys picked.  Funkhouser seems to be slipping.  Also throw the likes of Andrew Benintendi, Tyler Stephenson, and Walker Buehler into the top 10 possible mix.

ACTUAL DRAFT Results added on 6/7/15: Swanson, Bregman, Rodgers, Tate, Tucker.  A number of the experts above had the top 5 pegged.  Yours truly … changed his prediction last minute to match the consensus and “got it right” too 🙂

Here’s a recap of our CWS coverage so far for 2015:

• College Baseball 2015 Previews and pre-season Rankings
• Regular Season Wrap up for DC Local College teams
• Field of 64 announcement

Now we’re through the Regionals and the field has been winnowed from 64 to just 16.

College CWS tournament references:

• Baseball America’s Regional Roundup
• d1baseball’s tournament Post season Index
• d1baseball.com’s Tournament Summary page
• d1baseball’s Regional participant information
• d1baseball.com’s daily scoreboard
• CollegeBaseballDaily.com has coverage as well.
• Ncaa.com’s interactive full 64-team bracket

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We’ll review the 16 regionals in order of the national seeds.  Bold is the host city, Blue is the host team and Red is the winner.  We’ll also highlight significant players and/or guys who are big names in the upcoming draft as we get to them (MLBpipeline.com summarizes their top 200 ranked players here: i’ll just talk about the 1st round talents and players w/ local ties).

1. In the Los Angeles regional (host: #1 seed UCLA), the big story wasn’t the tourney’s #1 overall seed, but lowly #3 seed Maryland, who upset SEC power Ole Miss and then handled the #1 team in the land 4-1 to advance to the regional final.  UCLA made its way through the loser’s bracket and beat Maryland on 5/31/15, setting up a winner-take-all game to advance on 6/1, but Maryland prevailed in a 2-1 nailbiter.  This sets up a most amazing super-regional matchup; read on.
2. In the Baton Rouge regional (host: #2 seed LSU), #2 overall seed LSU breezed into the region final, where they beat UNC-Wilmington 2-0 to advance.  Players of note: likely upper 1st round pick Alex Bregman had a relatively quiet regional at the plate.
3. In the Louisville regional (host: #3 seed Louisville), Louisville made quick work of this regional, winning 3 straight games to become one of the first teams to advance.  Ace Kyle Funkhouser was thrown, oddly, in the opener against tiny Morehead State and was good but not great (2ER in 7ip), another sign that his draft stock is falling.  Nonetheless, Louisville did not look stretched in this regional, beating Michigan 13-4 to advance.
   
4. In the Gainesville regional (host: #4 seed Florida), Florida (who I thought could have been the #1 overall seed) made quick work of its regional, defeating each of the other 3 participants en route to a 2-1 victory over Florida Atlantic in the final.
5. In the Coral Gables regional (host: #5 seed Miami), Miami seemed to be in control of the regional, but was stunned by Ivy league champ Columbia, who forced a winner-take-all game on 6/1.  In that final game, Columbia finally ran out of gas and Miami embarrassed the Ivy Leaguers 21-3.  Players of note: Miami’s ace (and Nats 2014 2nd round pick) Andrew Suarez threw 7innings of 2-run ball to get the win in the opener.
6. In the Champaign regional (host: #6 seed Illinois), the host team cruised to the region final, where they face upstart Wright State on 6/1/15.  In the final, Illinois handled Wright State to advance.  Players of note: Illinois closer Tyler Jay,whose usage this season has been deplored by scouts, did not even appear in his team’s first two wins, each a complete game by the starter.  In the region final, he closed out the game and showed off his arm, giving up 1 hit and a walk in four innings of work.  Jay is projected as an upper 1st round pick and a future starter … why he’s not being used as such in college is beyond me.
7. In the Fort Worth regional (host: #7 seed TCU), NC State upset the host team to make the region final, but TCU fought their way out of the losers brack and forced a deciding 6/1/15 game.  After forcing the winner-take-all game, TCU rallied from an 8-1 deficit in the 8th inning to force extra innings and win on a walk-off to advance to the super-regional in perhaps the tourney’s best game.
8. In the Springfield regional (host: #8 seed Missouri State), Missouri State lived up to its national seeding by cruising through the regional without a loss.  Players of note: Missouri State Ace Jon Harris threw 8 innings of 1-run ball to get the win over Canisius in the opener.  Harris has quietly put together a strong year and looks to be a back-of-the first round pick.
9. In the Stillwater regional, (host: #9 seed Oklahoma State), 2nd seeded Arkansas made quick work of the regional, with host Oklahoma State not even making the regional final.  The 4th seeded St. Johns team pushed Arkansas but ultimately lost 4-3.  Players of note: Arkansas projected 1st rounder Andrew Benintendi went 4-11 for the regional but took an o-fer in the regional final.
10. In the College Station regional (host: #10 seed Texas A&M), California (whose baseball program was one step from the grave a few years ago) upset the host to make the regional final, but TAMU forced a deciding 6/1 game.  In that game, TAMU won a well played 3-1 game that had both sides wishing these two teams played more often. 
11. In the Nashville regional (host: #11 seed Vanderbilt), Vanderbilt awaits local team Radford, who lost to Indiana early but got revenge to make the regional final.  In the final though, Radford ran out of gas and Vanderbilt advanced by the amazing score of 21-0.  Players of note: Carson Fulmer pitched 7 innings of 1-run ball in the opener for the victory, potential first overall pick Dansby Swanson connected for his 14th homer in the 2nd game, and Walker Buehler was removed after 5 innings thanks to his team’s 10-run 5th inning.  Note: most of Radford’s squad is VA-based; I’ve never covered players heading there since it isn’t a destination baseball program.  But tourneys like this can lift up a program’s credentials, so we’ll take note of Radford commits more closely going forward.
12. In the Dallas regional (host: #12 seed Dallas Baptist), local entry VCU made some waves early by reaching the winners bracket final, taking out host Dallas Baptist and Oregon State easily.  The host team made its way back to the regional final and has to sweep a 6/1/15 double-header to advance.  DBU forced the winner-take-all game, but VCU outlasted them in the final to be the only #4 seed to advance t his year, and perhaps one of the most unlikely #4 seeds to win a regional in the tournament’s history.  Note:  VCU’s squad is a lot more national than I would have guessed, but do have some players with local ties.
13. In the Tallahassee regional (host: #13 seed Florida State), College of Charleston had to sweep a 6/1 DH from the host to advance, but they couldn’t get going an Florida State advanced easily.  Player of note Taylor Clarke (Ashburn native and Broad Run HS grad) got hit hard in the opener against Auburn but did not factor in the decision.
14. In the Fullerton regional (host: #14 seed Cal State-Fullerton), host Cal State-Fullerton pounded upstart Pepperdine 10-1 to win the regional in three straight games.
15. In the Houston regional (host: #15 seed Houston), host Houston lost a 20-inning heartbreaker to city rival Rice to be eliminated; this was one of those games you see and cringe, because both teams had guys come out of the bullpen to throw 9 innings (as far as I can tell, both teams used mid-week starters, and did not have middle relievers suddenly throwing 110 of the highest leverage pitches of their lives).  Rice has to sweep Louisiana-Lafayette twice on 6/1 on about 6 hours of sleep in order to advance, but couldn’t even win the first, losing 5-2 to send the Rajun’ Cajuns to the super-regional.
16. In the Lake Elsinore regional (host: #16 seed UC Santa Barbara), UVA showed how badly it was under-seeded by advancing to the final by taking two close games.   Connor Jones (Great Bridge HS in Chesapeake) gave up just 1 run in nearly 8 innings to win the opener and Brandon Waddell pitched even better to beat San Diego State.  The regional final was wild, with UVA scoring 3 in the 8th to tie it and then 5 in the 11th to win 14-10 over USC to advance.  In the 3rd game, UVA threw out all kinds of names familiar to readers here: Alec Bettinger (Hylton grad from Woodbridge) got the start but failed to record an out.  He was relieved by Tommy Doyle (Vienna VA, Flint Hill) and got the game to UVA’s middle relievers.  Josh Sborz finished all three wins off.  Joe McCarthy struggled on the weekend, going just 1-6 in the final.  Nathan Kirby remains sidelined but could return for the Super-Regionals, bad news for whoever they face.  Other players of note in the regional: Upper-1st round draft talent Dillon Tate had 11 strikeouts in 8 innings, but gave up 4 runs and was out-dueled by San Diego State’s Bubba Derby in what was likely his last amateur appearance.  UCSB was badly exposed, getting crushed in its loser’s bracket game and becoming the only seed to go 2-and-out.

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Summary of Regionals statistically:

• 11 of 16 hosts advanced, including 7 of 8 National seeds.  This is a far cry from 2014, which lost most of its national seeds early.  This tournament is setup to be much more “chalk” than in years’ past.
• 5 = number of regionals forced into the “extra” deciding game.  Most of them were good; a couple were laughers.
• 10 of the 16 regionals were extended to Monday games, some thanks to weather, some thanks to the regional getting extended to the “extra” deciding game.
• 11 number one seeds, 1 number two seeds, 3 number three seeds and 1 unlikely number four seed (VCU) advanced to the supers.
• 6 number of #4 seeds who didn’t finish 4th in their regional: lots of overseeded 2/3 seeds ended up going two-and-out.  In fact, three #4 seeds pushed their way to the regional final: VCU (who won), St. Johns and Pepperdine (clearly under-seeded).
• 1 host that went 2-and-out: the clearly undeserving host UC Santa Barbara.  Now, they were the 16 seed, but college pundits howled at their selection as host over a team like College of Charleston.
• 9 = the number of extra inning games, including the epic 20-inning Houston-Rice game and the NC State-TCU winner-take-all extra innings affair.
• 6 of the regionals went pure chalk, a good indication of the job the seeding committee did this year.
• Biggest upsets: Maryland over #1 overall seed UCLA is the clear big-time upset.   Arkansas beating #9 Oklahoma State (who some thought should have been a national seed) probably was the 2nd biggest upset.
• Most surprising regional winner:  VCU, who becomes just the 5th #4 seed to advance out of a regional since the field expanded to 64 in 1999.  But VCU is the most surprising team; the other #4 teams who advanced at least had prospects.
• My Predictions: I was wrong about Illinois and Missouri State but was right about TCU struggling to get by NC State.  I was right in saying the rest of the national seeds should win but wrong on UCLA; nobody saw that coming.  In the 9-16s, I was right about UC Santa Barbara, wrong on Fullerton and right about Dallas Baptist … just wrong on which team was going to win.

Conference Breakdowns of the teams in the Super Regionals:

• 4 ACC teams (out of 7 that made full field).
• 5 SEC teams (out of 7 that made full field).
• 2 Big-10 teams (out of 6 that made the full field).
• 0 Pac-12 teams (out of 5 that made full field).  Per the d1baseball post above, this is the first time since the 64-team expansion that a Pac-12 team failed to make the super-regional field.  In fact, there’s just one team west of Texas in the super-regional (Cal State-Fullerton), who will be a big underdog at Louisville.  For me, this confirms what I’ve often thought; Pac12 baseball tends to get overrated.
• The remaining 5 super-regional teams are from one-bid conferences: TCU, Missouri State, Fullerton, Louisiana-Lafayette and VCU.

Its clearly an ACC/SEC kind of year.

 

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Super Regional Matchups:  The super-regional hosts were announced just after the last regional ended.

• Maryland at UVA (guaranteeing at least one non-top 16 seed makes the CWS this year)
• #2 LSU vs Louisiana-Lafayette
• #3 Louisville vs #14 Cal State-Fullerton
• #4 Florida vs #13 Florida State
• #5 Miami vs VCU
• #6 Illinois vs #11 Vanderbilt
• #7 TCU vs #10 Texas A&M
• #8 Missouri State at Arkansas

Super Regional Thoughts:

What an amazing set of circumstances: our two local teams (UVA and UMD) both fly 3,000 across the country to … setup a repeat of last year’s UVA-held super regional.  Who would have thought.  I’m not quite sure why Arkansas gets to host over national seed Missouri State; that’s got to be a point of contention for that deserving program.  Three great intra-state matchups featuring great teams from Florida, Louisiana and Texas.   The super-regionals could be pretty fun.

Predictions:

UVA gets Kirby back and holds off Maryland.  LSU and Louisville cruise.  Florida outclasses the over-achieving Florida State rival.  Miami pounds the “just happy to be here” VCU team.  Vanderbilt “upsets” by seed Illinois, who can’t handle the talent level Vandy puts out.  Texas A&M beats TCU and Missouri State blasts Arkansas after being insulted by losing hosting rights as a national seed.