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Prep Baseball Update 2015: Maryland State Champs, Northern VA District Champs crowned

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When we last checked in with Prep Baseball in Mid May,  Maryland was through its regionals, the private schools were mostly done, DC was still finishing the regular season, and Virginia was just starting up its District (aka “Conference”) tournaments.  Lets see where we stand now after the Memorial Day weekend and a slew of tournament results.

Text in Red are pending results, mostly from the southern Virginia districts and regionals, which don’t have to start as soon as Northern Virginia tourneys.

Virginia

Here are the Virginia Conference champions, regular season and tournament.  All these playoff brackets, if they exist, are at this link at VHSL.  I won’t re-link all the playoff brackets per district/region below.

6-A North Region

  • 6-A Conference 5/Concorde: Chantilly regular season champ.  Seeds held to form in the district tourney and Chantilly met Oakton in the district final.  Chantilly beat Oakton 2-1 to take the district title.
  • 6-A Conference 6/Liberty: McLean regular season champ.  #5 seed Fairfax upset McLean to make the District final, where they met Madison.  In the district final, Madison avenged an earlier loss to Fairfax to win 2-0 at home to take the title.
  • 6-A Conference 7/Potomac: Lake Braddock regular season champ.  #2 and #3 seeds Annandale and West Potomac were both upset and knocked out of Regional competition.  Lake Braddock met #6 seed South County in the district final and beat them easily 12-4 to win the title.
  • 6-A Conference 8/Cedar Run: Patriot regular season champ.  Battlefield had to forfeit its semi-final win over pitcher innings/pitch count limits, so Osbourn Park made the district final, where it subsequently beat Patriot in extras to win an unlikely district title.  Battlefield’s forfeit was absurd; their starter Jake Agnos struck out 21 *straight batters* in the 6-1 victory … and then resulted in a forfeit loss.  Agnos gave up a lead-off homer … and then retired the next 21 guys he faced.  I’ve never heard of such a feat.

6-A North Regional Qualifiers (in seed order).  Here’s the 6-A North bracket.  Play begins 5/29/15.

  • 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

Quick predictions for 6-A North regional tourney: I like Madison, Oakton, Patriot and Battlefield, since they were basically the best 6-A teams all year.  But do not count out Chantilly or McLean.  Thanks to their district forfeit, Battlefield drops to a #3 regional seed and a headache for a higher seeded team.  And McLean’s upset loss dumps them to a #3 seed as well in the region, despite besting perhaps the best 6-A baseball district in the regular season.  With the draws out, Battlefield faces Oakton in the first round, which is tough.  If seeds hold it’ll be Lake Braddock-Madison and Patriot-Chantilly in the regional semis.

6-A South Region: which is mostly big-time schools in Richmond, Roanoke and Virginia Beach area.  But there are just enough schools in Woodbridge proper to form a 6-A conference closer to DC with teams that are typically considered for All-Met rankings.  Because 6-A’s regional is only 8 teams, their district tournaments are not yet complete as of the time of this posting.

  • 6-A Conference 1/Coastal: First Colonial (aka Mark Reynolds‘ alma mater) regular season champs.  They were upset in the districts but still qualify for the regionals.  In the district final, Cox claimed the second regional birth with a win over Ocean Lakes.
  • 6-A Conference 2/Monitor Merrimac: Western Branch regular season champ.  However #2 Grassfield got them in the district tourney final.
  • 6-A Conference 3: Franklin County (Rocky Mount, south of Roanoke) regular season champ.  In the district tourney #5 seed Cosby scored three straight upsets to claim the district title, beating Thomas Dale in the final.  Cosby made the State semis last year and is looking to get back after an up-and-down regular season.
  • 6-A Conference 4: Forest Park (Woodbridge) regular season champ.  Forest Park also won the district tournament, beating Colonial Forge 10-2 in the final.  Colonial Forge had upset #2 seed and perennial powerhouse Hylton in the district tourney semis to claim the 2nd regional berth.

6-A South Regional Qualifiers (district finals 5/29/15)

  • 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

Quick predictions for 6-A South regional tourney: Western Branch is the only team in the state getting national attention, and they’re ranked #1 in the Hampton paper’s local rankings.  So I look for them to claw their way to the state tournament.

5-A North Region

  • 5-A Conference 13/Capitol: Marshall regular season champ.  Seeds held to form (with Marshall beating Lee by the astounding score of 21-0 in the district semis), and Marshall met Edison in the final.  In that final Marshall beat Edison 4-1 for its 10th straight win.
  • 5-A Conference 14: Stone Bridge (Ashburn) regular season champ.  In the playoffs, 1/2 met in the final and Stone Bridge beat Broad Run for the district title.  In the 3rd place game, Briar Woods grabbed the 3rd regional bid.
  • 5-A Conference 15: Mountain View (Stafford) regular season champ.  In the playoffs Mountain View and Potomac (Dumfries) met in the finals, where Mountain View pulverized them 10-0.  In the 3rd place game, North Stafford easily grabbed the 3rd regional bid.
  • 5-A Conference 16: Halifax County regular season champ.  They met #2 seed Patrick Henry in the final and Patrick Henry upset Halifax for the district title.

5-A North Regional Qualifiers (in seed order): 5-A North regional bracket here.  Play begins on 5/29/15.

  • 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

Quick predictions for 5-A North regional tourney: I like Stone Bridge to repeat, Marshall could be a challenger.  They are on opposite sides of the draw and could both make the regional final.  But non-DC area teams like Patrick Henry and Mountain View could be challengers.

5-A South Region

  • 5-A Conference 9/Atlantic: Kellam (in Virginia Beach, aka Ryan Zimmerman‘s alma mater) regular season champ.  Kellam was upset in the district tournament, with Princess Anne claiming the 2nd regional berth by winning the tourney.
  • 5-A Conference 10/PenSouth: Hickory (Chesapeake) regular season champ (also defending 5-A state champ).  Hickory advanced to the district final along with Menchville, who upset 2nd seeded Great Bridge along the way, before Hickory claimed the district tourney as well.
  • 5-A Conference 11: Deep Run (Glen Allen/Northern Richmond suburb) regular season champ (Freeman, last year’s 5-A state finalist, was 2nd in the district).  The two teams met in the final with Deep Run getting the double.
  • 5-A Conference 12: Manchester (Midlothian/Southern Richmond suburb) regular season champ.  Clover Hill took the district title and the #1 seed in the regionals.

5-A South Regional Qualifiers (in seed order): (district finals 5/29/15)

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

 

Quick thoughts: hard not to believe in the pedigree of Hickory and Freeman; I fully expect them to meet in the regional final.

Smaller Virginia Classifications with Northern Virginia ties.

4-A North:

  • 4-A conference 21: Woodgrove regular season champ.   Woodgrove also won the tourney, beating Sherando in the district final (both teams move to the 4-A North Regional). 
  • 4-A Conference 22: Fauquier regular season champ and tourney champ, beating Eastern View in the final.

3-A East Region

  • 3-A Conference 27: Kettle Run regular season champ, Culpepper #2.  They met in the tourney final as well, with Kettle Run taking both regular and post-season district titles.
  • 3-A Conference 28: Loudoun Valley (regularly in the AllMet top 10 rankings) regular season champ.  They also took the post-season tourney, beating #2 seed John Champe in the final.

2-A East Region

  • 2-A Conference 35: Strasburg continues its local dominance, winning the district again.  Falls Church’s George Mason (easily the smallest public high school in the Northern Virginia suburbs) was the #3 district seed but advanced to the district finals to face Strasburg.  Strasburg took the tourney final, but George Mason advances to the regional tournament.

 

Maryland

Here’s the state finals results in Maryland, played the week of 5/18/15  Brackets here at the MPSAA website.

  • 4-A States: State Semis were Perry Hall v Severna Park, Gaithersburg-Wise.  Severna Park and Gaithersburg each dominated their state semi to force a high-powered showdown of good teams in the 4-A final.  In that final, Gaithersburg beat Severna Park 5-3 at Ripken Stadium in Aberdeen for its first ever state baseball title.
  • 3-A States: State semi finalists were North Harford (Plyville in North Maryland), Mt. Hebron in Ellicott City, Chopticon (way down in St. Mary’s county) and Urbana (just south of Frederick).  In the state-semis, Mt. Hebron and Chopticon won close games to make the final.  In the final, Chopticon’s ace Ljay Newsome threw a complete game 1-hitter with 17 strikeouts to win the title 1-0.
  • 2-A States: State semi finalists: Eastern Tech, Patterson Mill, South Carroll and last  year’s champ Southern.  Eastern Tech and Southern each won 1-run games to make the 2-A final.  In the final, Southern beat Eastern Tech 6-1 to repeat as 2-A champs.
  • 1-A States: State semi finalists: McDonough, Colonel Richardson, Douglass and Brunswick make up this year’s 1-A state semis (mostly smaller schools outside the DC area).  In the state semis, McDonough will face off against the tough-looking Brunswick team.  Brunswick won the title 4-0.

A quick list of past Maryland State champions by division:

The Maryland public high school seasons are now complete.

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 DC-based.  St. Albans upset Wilson in the semis to face Gonzaga in the final.

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

Most private schools’ seasons are now complete.

Speaking of Liberty Christian … apparently the school had an open lawsuit against the Virginia High School League (VHSL) regarding membership, and the VHSL settled on 5/20/15.  The implication?  Quoting the link, “all non-boarding private schools in Virginia will be permitted to apply for membership in the VHSL.”   Liberty Christian Academy will now join the 4-A conference 23 (which covers the Lynchburg and Charlottesville area) and can compete for state titles in all sports.

I wonder if this ruling will lead to the various private schools in the Northern Virginia Area (including typical sports powerhouses such as Paul VI, O’Connell, Flint Hill, Bishop Ireton, etc) leaving the WCAC and joining the public schools.  I doubt it frankly; even the largest of these schools would be dwarfed by the 5-A and 6-A enrollment public high schools, and the WCAC is a fantastic league.  InsideNova had a piece on the topic quoting several area ADs of private schools (including Paul VI’s Billy Emerson, a class-mate and longtime teammate of mine), who think perhaps this ruling makes it easier for teams to schedule public opponents … but doubts any league changes will occur with DC-area teams thanks to the strength of the private school leagues here.

Local and National High School Baseball Ranking Lists:

  • Washington Post All Met Sports latest Baseball top 10: ?? date: Spalding, Gaithersburg 1-2, then Oakton, Madison, and Battlefield.  Stone Bridge 8th despite a win over Madison in Vienna.
  • 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 5/5/15): 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.
  • 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.

 

Written by Todd Boss

May 28th, 2015 at 9:04 am

Posted in Local Baseball

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College Baseball Regular Season wrap-up; local team season summaries

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Our first 2015 College Baseball post.  All the Division 1 conference tournaments wrapped up over the memorial day weekend, so lets wrap up how our local teams did.  We’re writing this post ahead of the regional seedings and the CWS field of 64 announcement.

We depend on d1baseball.com primarily for coverage of Division 1 Baseball.  Other useful sites include Warren Nolan’s college baseball RPIs and BaseballAmerica’s college coverage.

ACC (local interests: UVA, Virginia Tech).

UVA had a tough season; it started the season ranked in the top 3 by most charts after finishing as national runner-up last year.  Then they lost their best hitter (Joe McCarthy) for half the season, and then lost their ace (Nathan Kirby) for the second half.  They swept UVA in their final series of the season to salvage a .500 league record, good enough for 2nd place in their division but not enough to avoid the play-in game.  They won the play-in to make the ACC tournament, but went 0-3 in pool play.  They are on the outskirts of the top 25 and will make the CWS field, but will not host a regional.    Lots of well-known names to this blog and the Virginia area contributed for UVA this season: here’s a link to their season stats.  UVA finishes with a 34-22 (15-15) record.

Virginia Tech finished just a couple of games behind UVA in the standings, but were no where near the quality.  They were eliminated by UNC in the play-in game.  Final record: 27-27 (13-16).

Of note in the ACC this year to local fans: Stone Bridge alum J.B. Bukauskas was 5-3 with a 4.09 ERA for UNC this year.  He was a weekend starter as a freshman, led the team in starts, got their only win in the ACC tournament, and was named to the All-ACC freshman team.  Duke Ace, Georgetown Prep alum and Great Falls resident Mike Matuella went from being talked as a 1-1 pick to undergoing Tommy John surgery.  Draft pundits still give him a shot of going in the back end of the first round in the draft.  Nats 2014 2nd round pick Andrew Suarez went back to Miami and served as Miami’s saturday starter, going 6-1 with a 3.09 ERA for the nation’s top ranked team by RPI.  Suarez likely hasn’t improved his draft stock that much, still projected as a 2nd rounder.

Atlantic-10 (Local interests George Mason, George Washington, Richmond and VCU)

The A-10 tournament, unbeknownst to me until I looked it up for this post, was at Barcroft field in Arlington.  Grr.  GW’s home field.  I certainly would have made an effort to go had I known.  Anyway; GWU hung on as the #6 seed until the semis.   Richmond was the #3 seed and was eliminated early by GW.  VCU as the #5 seed eventually won the A-10, battering their way through conference rivals.  GMU finished just outside the qualification rankings to make the post-season conference tournament.

Big South (Local interests: VA schools Liberty, Radford, and Longwood)

Longwood was the #8 seed, losing early in the post-season tournament.  Liberty was the #4 seed and was eliminated by Longwood.    However Radford entered the tourney as the #1 seed and outlasted several very good baseball programs to win the tournament and clinch their first ever CWS appearance.

Big-10: (Local interest: Maryland)

Does it sound weird to talk about how Maryland makes the Big-10 conference tournament a “local” tournament?   Maryland made the final as the #3 seed before falling to the upset-minded Michigan team.

Big East (local interest: Georgetown)

Georgetown went 2 and out as the #4 seed in the Big East tourney.

Colonial Athletic Association (local interests: JMU, William & Mary and Towson)

Towson and JMU both had down years and didn’t qualify for the post-season tournament.  W&M did, but were 2- and out as the #6 seed.  The CAA came down to 1-2, with 2nd seeded UNC-Wilmington beating #1 seed College of Charleston.

Of note, College of Charleston was ranked most of the year and was led on the hill by friday ace starter Taylor Clarke.  Clarke was 13-1 with a 1.34ERA on the season.  Clarke hails from Ashburn and went to Broad Run and then Towson before transferring to CofC and becoming a star.

Conference USA: Local team Old Dominion

ODU was the #7 seed in the C-USA tourney and went 2-and out.

MEAC:  (Local teams UMES and Norfolk State):

Both teams made the post-season but did not factor in the final.

Patriot: (local interest: Navy)

Navy entered the post-season tourney as the #1 seed but lost in the final to #2 seed Lehigh.

The big news for Navy this year is the matriculation of a Navy grad to the majors for the first time in nearly a century.  RHP Mitch Harris also has some very personal ties: he played for the Fairfax Nationals in the (now defunct) Clark Griffith summer wood-bat league and was housed by none other than my father for the summer.

SoCon (local interest: VMI)

VMI fought hard as the #4 seed, losing in the tourney semis.

Other local players of interest: Madison alum Andy McGuire and his Texas team had to win the Big-12 tournament to get into the CWS, and they did.  McGuire went to Texas as a SS/3B but now is in the bullpen for the Longhorns.

The College World Series field of 64 will be announced just after the Memorial day weekend, upon the completion of all the college tournaments.  We’ll post again with the matchups and some quickie predictions.

 

Written by Todd Boss

May 25th, 2015 at 8:00 pm

Posted in College/CWS,Local Baseball

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DC/MD/VA District High School Tournament Report: 2015 post-season

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Here’s my first cut through tracking the various local high school baseball tournaments.  As we learned in 2014, Maryland and Virginia’s schedules are quite off from each other, with Maryland’s state tournament starting before Virginia’s public high schools even finish their regular seasons, but we’ll keep track the best we can.  Here’s 2014’s final prep wrap-up post, with all the various winners noted.

As the Maryland playoffs kicked in, there was an interesting WashPost article about how to setup your pitching for the playoffs.  Ironically, one of the main teams mentioned (Reservoir) was upset in the Maryland playoffs, perhaps due to their rotation choices.  Personal connection useless tidbit; the Chantilly coach (Kevin Ford) was a long-time local Vienna player and we played with him and his brother (Jeff Ford) all growing up.

Lets get to it.

Northern Virginia

Virginal district tournaments get started last weekend and most are scheduled to finish this week.  The VHSL site has some district brackets already published.  Here’s a preview of the district tournaments for local conferences with the leading contenders.

The top four teams from each district tourney form the 16-team regional brackets, to be published later on once all the divisions are finalized.

  • 6-A Conference 5/Concorde: Oakton and Chantilly are the 1/2 seeds, and Oakton has to be a favorite for the 6-A North regional title.
  • 6-A Conference 6/Liberty: McLean and Madison are 1/2 seeds, playing semis on 5/19/15.  Madison lost out to McLean for the district title but may be a co-regional favorite with Oakton.
  • 6-A Conference 7/Potomac: South County & Lake Braddock perennial favorites.
  • 6-A Conference 8/ Cedar Run: Rivals Patriot and Battlefield are 1/2 seeds and have already played three times this year.  Both should challenge for the regional title, but I suspect they’re slightly behind the Oaktons and Madisons this year.

I’d love to see an all-Vienna regional final, but teams like Chantilly, Battlfield and McLean could be pesky.

In the 5-A division:

  • 5-A Conference 13/Capitol: Marshall and Edison are the 1/2 seeds, as they were last year.
  • 5-A Conference 14: Stone Bridge repeats as conference champ, with Broad Run the 2 seed in this small group.
  • 5-A Conference 15: Mountain View and Potomac are 1/2 seeds.
  • 5-A Conference 16: Halifax, Patrick Henry-Ashland are perennial favorites.

I’d guess Marshall and Stone Bridge are early 5-A regional favorites, but we have no idea how good some of these non-DC area teams are.

There are some DC-local teams in the 4th and smaller divisions (mostly in Loudoun County).  We’ll go through them once their brackets are made available on VHSL.  The best 4-A team out there is probably Loudoun Valley, currently in the WP top 10.

Maryland

At this point, the Maryland State tournament is well underway, with all four “regional” champions crowned and the State semis set for 5/19/15.  Brackets here at the MPSAA website.  The Washington Post/AllMetSports.com reviewed all the Regional finals in this online post here.  We’ll run-down the regional results with some surprises:

  • 4-A Regionals: both of last year’s finalists (Chesapeake and Sherwood) lost early as new blood takes over Maryland states.  Perry Hall out of Baltimore took out both number 1 seeds in its regional to take the 4-A north.   Wise from Upper Marlboro also took out two PG-county #1 seeds to win the 4-A south.  Severna Park beat last year’s 4-A champ Chesapeake en route to the 4-A East championship, and the 4-A West regional final came down to perhaps the two best local Maryland teams, with current #2 All-Met ranked Gaithersburg taking out Montgomery Blair to reach the state semis.  State Semis: Perry Hall v Severna Park, Gaithersburg-Wise at U-Maryland on 5/19/15.  State final is scheduled for 5/22/15 at Ripken Stadium in Aberdeen.
  • 3-A Regionals: Last year’s state finalist North Harford (Plyville in North Maryland) repeated as 3-A north champ.  Mt. Hebron in Ellicott City pulled the big upset and beat last year’s champion Reservoir in the 3-A East regional final (perhaps because Reservoir lost their ace Cody Morris to TJ surgery).  Chopticon (way down in St. Mary’s county) and Urbana (just south of Frederick) filled out the 3-A state semis, beating last year’s regional winner Thomas Johnson en route.  State semis set for Joe Cannon stadium in Hanover on 5/19/15.
  • 2-A Regionals: Eastern Tech, Patterson Mill, South Carroll and last  year’s champ Southern make up the 2-A state semis (mostly smaller schools outside the DC area).
  • 1-A Regionals: McDonough, Colonel Richardson, Douglass and Brunswick make up this year’s 1-A state semis (mostly smaller schools outside the DC area).

 

DC

  • DCIAA: the regular season runs through 5/20/15 and the DCIAA tournament runs through 6/3/15.
  • DCSAA: the 2015 tournament has yet to be scheduled.

Remember, there’s not usually much suspense in who is winning the DCIAA; Wilson has not lost to a DCIAA opponent in more than 20  years.

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

  • MIAA: Powerhouse Spalding beat Calvert Hill to repeat as MIAA Class A champs.  St. Mary’s-Annapolis won the MIAA-B championship, also for the 2nd year in a row, and is 52-3 over the past two seasons.  ?? won the MIAA-C.
  • VISAA: Liberty Christian repeated as the VISAA Division 1 champ.  Local teams O’Connell, Flint Hill and Paul VI entered but lost (the entry to this tourney seems to be done via rankings, as opposed to results in the respective league’s post-season tourneys, since Flint Hill was upset but still got invited to VISAA).  Greenbriar Christian took the Division 2 title and the Southampton Academy took the Division 3 title among smaller Virginia private schools.
  • WCAC: St. Johns topped DeMatha in a 3-game series to win the WCAC for the 2nd year in a row.
  • 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.

My master list of links used to cover HS Baseball:

Local and National High School Baseball Ranking Lists:

  • Washington Post All Met Sports Baseball top 10: Spalding, Gaithersburg 1-2, then Oakton, Madison, and Battlefield.  Stone Bridge 8th despite a win over Madison in Vienna.
  • Baltimore Sun Rankings page: They also have Spalding #1, then Calvert Hall and Reservoir.
  • Hampton Roads Baseball top 10 page: Western Branch #1
  • Baseball America’s High School top 25 (most recent ranking 5/5/15): no DC/MD/VA teams listed.
  • USA Today High School top 25 (most recent ranking 5/6/15): Western Branch closest to top-25, ranked 30th.  Spalding (Washington Post’s #1 team) ranked 50th 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.  5/18/15 rankings.  No DC/MD/VA teams in MaxPrep’s “Excellent 50.”

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.
  • 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.

Written by Todd Boss

May 18th, 2015 at 1:37 pm

Posted in Local Baseball

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Local draft-prospects to keep an eye in for the 2015 draft

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Duke RHP and Great Falls resident Mike Matuella has rocketed up the draft boards for 2015. Photo via dukechronicle.com

Duke RHP and Great Falls resident Mike Matuella has rocketed up the draft boards for 2015. Photo via dukechronicle.com

For the third year running (here’s 2013’s wrap-up and here’s 2014’s wrap-up of drafted local players) we’re going to keep an eye on “local” draft prospects leading up to the 2015 amateur draft.  By “local” I essentially mean anyone who hails from the DC/MD/VA areas plus anyone who is playing their college ball here.

To compile this list, I looked at rising college juniors and rising prep seniors who made impacts in 2014 or who  have made a name for themselves with summer league performances in 2014.  Here’s a link to the WP’s 2014 all-Met team, which had more than a few juniors, all of whom are mentioned here.  Here’s the roster for Perfect Game’s big summer 2014 showcase, which is the first place a lot of rising prep seniors get scouted.  Here’s a link to Louisville’s 2014 All-American selections, looking for junior all-american nominees.  Here’s a link to the EvoShield Canes 17U Roster, the leading travel team in the area and where a number of these upper-end prospects played this past summer.  Here’s the BaseballDraftReport blog that has been doing some tracking of prep players ahead of the 2015 draft.  Here’s Fangraphs’ Kiley McDaniel “way too early” draft rankings from Oct 2014.  Here’s BaseballAmerica’s first 2015 draft ranking from Mid Oct 2014.  Here’s minorleagueball.com’s “early 2015 draft” prospect list.  Here’s USAToday’s pre-season HS all-american list (though there are no local first teamers).

Local Prep Names to keep an eye on for 2015’s draft:

  • Cody Morris, RHP for 2014 3-A state champion Reservoir HS (Fulton, just south of Columbia).  2014 All-Met, 2014 Louisville All-American, Maryland Gatorade player of the year.  He’s committed to South Carolina but a repeat of his 2014 season could have him rising up draft boards.  Played for EvoShield this summer and was at the PG National showcase event.
  • A.J. Lee, a SS/RHP for 2014 WCAC/DCSAA champion and Washington Post final 2014 #1 team St. Johns (DC) who hails from Millersville.  He was also named to the 2014 all-Met team and was a 2nd team Louisville All-American.  Lastly he was the DC Gatorade player of the year in 2014.  He’s committed to Maryland.
  • Connor Eason, LHP for 2014 Virginia 5-A state champs Hickory (Chesapeake).   Also played for for EvoShield this summer and is a UVA commit.
  • John DeFazio, OF/RHP for Madison HS (Vienna).  2014 All-Met, committed to Virginia Tech.
  • Brody Cook, INF for Riverdale Baptist.  2014 All-Met, committed to VCU.  Played for Demarini Stars this summer.  On BaseballDraftReport’s pre-2015 season watch list.
  • Nathan Eikhoff, who plays for Patriot and was a 2014 All-Met after hitting an astounding .541 in the spring season.  UVA commit.  Played for Demarini Stars this past summer.
  • Harvey Logan, C for 5-A state runner up Douglas Freeman (Richmond).  He was at the PG showcase, played for EvoShield and is an early commit to Wake Forest.
  • Jordan Carr, P for Archbishop Spalding (Severn, between Annapolis and Baltimore).  2nd team all-met in 2014.
  • Ljay Newsome, P for Chopticon (south of Waldorf), 2nd team all-Met in 2014.
  • Stevie Mangrum, 3B for Western Albermarle HS (Charlottesville), was at the PG Showcase.  Committed to Va Tech and played for EvoShield this summer.
  • Kaleb Bowman, RHP for Woodgrove (Purcellville), honorable mention All Met for 2014, played for EvoShield this summer and verbally committed to South Carolina.
  • Danny Blair, CF for Gilman (Baltimore), committed to South Carolina, played for EvoShield and was at the PG National showcase.
  • Evan Sperling, RHP for Grafton (Yorktown/Newport News), committed to UVA and played for EvoShield.
  • Nathan Trevillian, RHP for Amherst County HS (near Lynchburg), committed to Liberty and was at the PG National showcase.
  • Grant Donahue, RHP for Decatur HS in Berlin (outside Ocean City).  At the PG National showcase, played for EvoShield, committed to UVA.
  • Hunter Parsons, RHP for Parkside HS in Salisbury, committed to Maryland, at the PG National showcase and played for EvoShield.   Up to 93 on the gun at showcases.  Could show up on draft boards with a couple more ticks on the gun.
  • Paul Hall, LHP for Maury HS in Norfolk.  Committed to Virginia Tech, up to 90 on the gun, played for EvoShield.
  • James Monaghan, 1B for LaPlata HS.  Committed to Campbell, played for Evoshield’s regional 17U team.
  • Hunter Byrnes, 2B for GW-Danville.  Same HS as last year’s 4th round pick Blake Bivens.  Good athlete (also a star QB) who may not get drafted but could be a good Div-1 player for someone.

I give a lot of weight to playing on the Evoshield Canes, as you can see.  If a guy is on that team, odds are he’s playing Div 1 somewhere.

Local College draft-eligible players to keep an eye on for 2015:  (2014 pre-season Baseball America all-american team link here, 2014 Baseball America post-season All American team here, 2014 Golden Spikes semifinalist announcement here, 2014 Rawlings/ABCA All-American list link here.  2014 All-ACC College Baseball team.  2014 All-CAA College Baseball team.  2014 All Atlantic-10 College Baseball team. All Big South, All Conference USA teams.

  • Mike Matuella, RHP from Duke (via Georgetown Prep HS and Great Falls, VA).  Burst onto the scene in 2014 and is in the mix for 1-1 overall already.  Huge guy (6’6″) with a huge arm (sits mid-90s).  Upper 1st round projection ahead of 2015 season.  Baseball America had this feature on him ahead of the season in mid January.  Here’s a scout.com report from 2/19/15.  He missed a start with a minor injury early on (thanks to persistent 30-degree weather in the area), but has come back and as of the time of this posting has a 0.44 ERA through 20 innings/5 starts for Duke.
  • Nathan Kirby, LHP from UVA (via James River HS in Midlothian) who was a first team all-ACC, 2014 Golden Spikes semi-finalist, a BA All-American, ABCA All-American.  Projected top 10 first round pick pre-2015 season.  So far into the college season, Kirby has lived up to his billing, holding a 3-1 record with a 1.16 ERA as UVA’s friday starter.
  • Joe McCarthy, OF from UVA who hit in the middle of UVA’s order in 2014 and was named All-ACC.  Projected mid 2nd round pick by BA ahead of 2015 season.  McCarthy suffered a back injury prior to the season’s beginning and will miss the first 12 weeks of the season; he’ll have precious few looks to get his draft stock up prior to the Rule 4 draft.
  • Brandon Waddell, LHP from  UVA.  UVA’s #2/Saturday starter was 9-3 with a 2.57 ERA on the year in 2014.  2nd-team All-ACC.  So far in 2015 he’s gotten hit though, holding just a 3.48 ERA through 6 starts.
  • Taylor Clarke, College of Charleston’s Friday starter and breakout 2014 player, hailing from Ashburn and featured previously in the Washington Post.   So far in 2015, he’s only improving his stock, holding a 55/8 K/BB ratio through his first 39 2/3 innings.
  • Josh Sborz, RHP from UVA (by way of McLean HS).  UVA’s #3/Sunday starter in 2014 but has been re-assigned as UVA’s closer in 2015 in favor of former Virginia prep standout Connor Jones entering the rotation.  Thus far at the time of this posting, Sborz has 5 saves but just a 3.00 ERA through 18 innings across 11 appearances.
  • John La Prise, inf from UVA who hit .358 in 2014, but who has only played in 4 games thus far in 2015.  He is on Minorleagueball’s preliminary 2015 draft list, but he was fighting injuries prior to the season and may still be doing so.
  • 3 sophomore All-CAA players from William & Mary: Catcher Ryan Hissey, DH Charlie Gould and RHP Joseph Gaouette.  Thus far in 2015, Hissey and Gould have picked up right where they left off, but Gaouette has yet to appear for the Tribe.
  • Some draft eligible players from U-Maryland: Alex Robinson, LHP, Jake Drossner LHP, Lamonte Wade LHP/OF.  With Maryland’s rising national ranking (#11 in the 3/23/15 d1baseball.com rankings), these guys will continue to see their stock rise.
  • Smaller college guys like Kyri Washington, OF at Longwood and Dylan Nelson, RHP from Radford.

Did I miss anyone?  I’m all ears.

Written by Todd Boss

March 25th, 2015 at 10:18 am

Posted in Draft,Local Baseball

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High School Baseball starting up…

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logo via vhsl.org, the Virginia High School League.

logo via vhsl.org, the Virginia High School League.

There may have been nearly a foot of snow on the ground a week ago, and it may be scheduled to snow yet again tomorrow (Friday 3/20/15), but prep baseball kicks off this week in the DC metro area.

Baseball America posted their pre-season top 50 High School rankings in mid February, since the southern/warm states can start playing a ton earlier than us northern states (there are schools in Texas who have already played 10-12 games).  The only DC-area school noted is my alma mater James Madison HS in Vienna, ranked 27th to start by BA.  Which I can’t quite believe, even as a homer fan, based on who they have returning and who they have being recruited for Div 1 schools right now (they do have the returning all-Met John DeFazio, one of just a handful of returning Junior all-Mets from last year).  But hey, that’s why they play the games, right?

(post publishing note: the WP’s first top 10 on 3/26/15 has Madison #1 with the expected local powerhouses populating the top 10).

Other National HS team ranking sites for reference:

  • Baseball America: 2/24/15 pre-season rankings and their 3/10/15 rankings early into the National seasons.
  • USA today; too early yet for rankings but home page at http://usatodayhss.com/
  • Maxpreps.com: at this link, constantly updating.  Per their pre-season top-100 list, local teams getting recognition early include both 5-A finalists from last year Freeman and Hickory, 6-A Richmond power Cosby, Madison at #51, and defending Maryland 3-A champ Reservoir at #77.
  • PerfectGame.org: top 50 ranks: unclear if they have updated this for the new season yet, but this is the permalink.  They mention only Hickory and Battlefield.
  • (if you are aware of other ranking sites, please let me know).

Madison’s season (and a lot of other local HS teams) kicks off on Friday March 20th against defending 5-A north champion Stone Bridge.  A juicy match-up; basically the two best regular season teams from the area last year face off to start the new season.  Too bad its likely to get snowed out and maybe not even rescheduled.  Battlefield looks like it could be quite good this year as chronicled in this InsideNova.com article.  Otherwise it is hard to predict how the 2015 season may run.

Madison finished 21-3 last year and surprisingly lost in the regional semi finals, while Stone Bridge finished the year 22-2 and made it to the state semi finals despite losing ace Jacob (J.B.) Bukauskas prior to the playoffs (Bukauskas passed up on being a possible 1st round pick and is now in UNC’s rotation as a freshman, already seemingly moving from being their Sunday to their Saturday starter).  Lets hope if they don’t play tomorrow that they at least get to re-schedule the game.

Can’t wait for another season of prep baseball to track.  Local draft/marquee player post coming soon.

Local Baseball Resources that I use constantly: this is my typical list of resources that I’ll tag onto all HS posts

National High School Baseball Ranking Lists: once they start publishing, i’ll include direct links here.  See above links for what’s available this early in the season.

Local Prep Resources:

 

Written by Todd Boss

March 19th, 2015 at 12:26 pm

Posted in Local Baseball

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UVA’s 2015 baseball recruiting class ranked top-10

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The publication Collegiate Baseball Newspaper recently announced its Top 40 college baseball recruiting classes, and 2014 CWS runner-up UVA was ranked 9th.  LSU, Wichita State, Florida, San Diego and Oklahoma State comprise the surprising top 5, though the rest of the top 10 contains some of the expected collegiate powerhouse programs.  In late October, Baseball America ranked UVA’s class even higher, at #2 in the country behind only LSU.

(Also: UVA announced their 2015 schedule on 9/25/14, schedule here).

UVA published their own press release, which detailed the names in their recruiting class.  A good friend (UVA alumni who has taken a big interest in the squad with their recent success) asked me to react to the class with what I knew.  Here’s what I wrote:

(Here’s what I wrote about UVA-committed players after the 2014 draft, and some of these guys were covered in my “pre-2014 season draft prospects” piece).

– Derek Casey: he’s the player I’d be most happy about coming to school, were I a UVA fan.  He was a 3rd round talent, undefeated in his HS pitching career, 93-94 on the gun.  He should go far towards replacing the arms UVA stands to lose after next season to the draft (basically, all three of their projected weekend starters are Juniors in 2015).
– Pavin Smith probably replaces Mike Papi like-for-like in the lineup; big lefty 1B/OF type.  Well regarded nationally.
– Charlie Cody was more highly ranked on prospect boards before his Senior year; he’s a good bat addition.  At one point early in 2014 he was ranked as high as #34 for all HS prospects nation-wide by one ranking service.
– Bennett Sousa is another guy who got a lot of national recognition even if he wasn’t drafted.  93mph from the left hand side, another future starter.
– Tommy Doyle: its hard to say just how good he is: yes he got drafted (by the Nats in the 34th round) but his drafting seemed to be one of those “draft a local kid to appease a part-owner’s buddy” kind of things.  He pitched at a small high school (Flint Hill Prep in Oakton) with almost no competition, making it really tough to gauge how good he is.  He also played for a no-name travel team instead of someone like the Evoshield Canes.  What he does have going for him is his size: he’s 6’6″ and hitting 91, which probably comes out of his hand about a foot closer to the plate than a guy who is 6′ even, making it look that much faster.  If he can add a few mph, he’ll be a beast.
– Jack Gerstenmaier, like Cody, had his stock drop in 2014 for whatever reason.  He was a 1st team PerfectGame All-American for the region at one point.  But Gerstenmaier-Cody could be UVA’s double play combo for years.

Of the rest of UVA’s announced class, I don’t know anything about them, even the local guys.  I’d guess that a couple of them are good talents … but most of them might be on minimal-to-no scholarship.

UVA lost a big-time recruit last minute in Devon Fisher (no relation to 2014 supp-1st round pick Derek Fisher); he was a catcher from Portsmouth who got drafted and then signed with Boston.  20th rounder so probably not for a lot of cash, which makes it that much more of a surprise.  He would have pushed this class up the rankings for sure.

With the new draft rules in place, its likely that guys like Cody, Casey and Gerstenmaier let it be known they had strong college commitments and thus that hampered their draft status.  Same thing happened to Conner Jones last year.  Good for UVA that they draw so well.

It seems UVA is quite setup for the future in terms of arms:

  • 2015 rotation: Kirby, Waddel, Sborz on weekends, one of the freshman/sophomores (Jones?) mid-week.
  • 2016 rotation: Choosing from Jones, Bettinger, Sousa, Doyle and Casey.  not bad.

Written by Todd Boss

September 26th, 2014 at 4:44 pm

Posted in College/CWS,Draft,Local Baseball

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Blogging goodbyes and hellos

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When I first started blogging here (4+ years and 750+ posts ago), the sole local coverage of the Nats farm systems was thanks to Brian Oliver‘s Nationals Farm Authority blog.  Oliver covered the farm systems with daily recaps of each minor league affiliate’s game, some quick stat lines for stars and duds, and generally made it quite easy to follow the minor league affiliates.

Following the minor leagues was important in 2010, because the team had just bottomed out with two straight 100+ loss seasons, had jettisoned a GM that seemed out of his depth to turn the team around, and had just drafted two of the biggest draft-day names in a generation in Stephen Strasburg and Bryce  Harper.  I was personally convinced that the pathway to success at the MLB level, and the most undervalued resource in the game, was developing quality pre-arbitration starters out of your system.  I began tracking the rotations of the minor league teams closely, looking for the next Jordan Zimmermann (arguably the best starter this team has developed not named Strasburg in the Washington era of baseball).

Eventually, Oliver “took a real job” and had to step down from daily posting.  When Oliver hung ’em up, a new blogger stepped up to take his place.  Initially going by a pseudonym (literally, “Sue Dinem”), but eventually “coming out” and revealing his name, Luke Erickson‘s Nationals Prospects blog picked up where Oliver left off and has served as the go-to place for tracking Nats affiliates for the past several years.  I would not be able to track the minor league rotations like I do without his work.  And, as was probably an inevitability, Erickson too has announced he’s hanging them up (clarification per Luke: “dialing it back”) and heading back into the workforce himself.

Back in the 2009 time-frame, I covered for Oliver for a week of doing his weekly recaps on NFA.  He was going on vacation and would not have any time to do the coverage.  I quickly discovered the time involved; it took 2+  hours a day to run through the links and drill down into the recaps done at various local papers to do this daily coverage.  In fact, I created a links page at my own personal website just to assist with the linking (a links page that I maintain and use to this day in fact; scroll to the bottom for all the minor league affiliate links).  At the end of the week I questioned how Oliver found the time … and always marveled at how Erickson kept it up for years on end.

Nowadays, there’s more people covering the farm system (just off the top of my head, Ryan Sullivan‘s NatsGM does a great job, especially in draft coverage, and the likes of Byron Kerr at MASN and some of the MLB guys are doing more farm coverage than ever before), which is great, but the stuff that Erickson provided was invaluable.  I sincerely hope that someone steps up to continue the daily farm coverage like we’ve seen (I know that Erickson had some help writing the dailies this season; if you’re reading this Jason Crocker, Julie Goldberg, Souldrummer and whoever is “the two SDs” I hope you consider taking over).  In fact, if someone doesn’t take over perhaps we could propose a daily summary by community to spread around the work, where volunteers would take certain days to keep the summaries alive.  I’d certainly be up for this arrangement, committing to one day a week instead of seven.

In the meantime, as discussed in the comments, long time commenter “bdrube” (real name Karl Kolchak) has announced his own blog and I’d like to welcome him to the fold.  Nats EXPOsed has started with a strong set of prospect-centric posts and I encourage everyone to give him a RSS subscribe and join the party.

Thanks again to Luke’s years of efforts.

 

Written by Todd Boss

September 22nd, 2014 at 9:58 am

Posted in Local Baseball,Minor League Pitching

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DC/MD/VA Little League Regional Results

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We covered the 3 local area’s district tournaments and then the state tournaments.  Lets finish it off with quick coverage of the 3 state titlists regional campaigns.

Three local programs (Tuckahoe, West Salisbury and NW Washington) headed off to compete in Little League Regional tournaments earlier this month.  Maryland and DC’s champions moved on to compete in the Mid-Atlantic Little League Regional, comprised of DC,MD,PA,NJ,NY and DE, and this year held in Bristol, Connecticut.  Virginia’s champion moved on to compete in the Southeast Little League Regional, comprised of VA,WV,NC,SC,TN,GA,FL and AL, and this year held in Warner Roberts, Georgia (outside of Macon).  The Mid-Atlantic regional ran from 8/1/14-8/10/14 and the Southeast regional ran from 8/2/14 to 8/8/14.

Lets see how our local teams fared:

  • Virginia’s champ Tuckahoe American (outside of Richmond): they dropped their first game to South Carolina 11-5, but dominated Tennessee 13-0 in their second game.  In the pool final, they got a come-back win over Alabama 10-5 to finish 1st in the pool and advance to the Regional Semis.  In the regional semi (which I just happened to catch on ESPN2) they had a pretty amazing 6-run come-back in the final inning to get a walk-off win (Georgia just flat ran out of pitchers and their guys were just lobbing in the ball in the inning) to get a re-match with Tennessee in the regional final.  Despite beating them handily earlier in the tournament, Richmond couldn’t repeat the feat, fell apart in the 5th and lost 9-4 with a berth to Williamsport on the line.
  • Maryland’s champ West Salisbury got pummeled in its first two games in the mid-Atlantic regional, but then squeaked out a win over New York in the 3rd pool play game.  But they lost their last pool play game and finished 5th of 6 regional teams.
  • DC’s champ Northwest Washington had a similar experience to West Salisbury, losing its first three regional games (one by slaughter rule) and leaving them eliminated before pool play was completed.  They went winless and finished last in pool play.

The mid-Atlantic regional got some national press thanks to the presence of Kayla Roncin on the New Jersey champs Toms River, and then even more press when 13-yr old Mo’Ne Davis threw a shutout in the regional final for the Mid-Atlantic champs from Philadelphia.

The US representatives for the 2014 LLWS will be:

  • Mid-Atlantic: Taney Youth Baseball Association (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)
  • Southeast: South Nashville (Tennessee)
  • Great Lakes: Jackie Robinson West (Illinois)
  • Midwest: Canyon Lake (South Dakota)
  • New England: Cumberland American (Rhode Island)
  • Northwest: Lynnwood Pacific (Seattle, Washington)
  • Southwest: Pearland East (Texas East) (who beat Lake Charles in the final, the hometown of my wife)
  • Western: Mountain Ridge (Nevada)

Here ends the 2014 coverage; unpage.org and llbws.org have all the coverage  you need.

Written by Todd Boss

August 13th, 2014 at 10:29 am

Posted in Local Baseball

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Babe Ruth, American Legion and other youth league Updates

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Continuing my coverage this year of youth baseball.  We covered the local High School tournaments and Little League tournaments so far.  We talked about all the local area draft prospects ahead of the draft.   I have a draft post covering the multitude of College Wood Bat leagues, but since those leagues are almost over I may just save it for next year.  Now lets try to bridge the gap between little league and high school.

The youth landscape in baseball has changed a ton since I was a kid in Northern Virginia.  It used to be simple:

  • you’d play Little League until  you were 12
  • then you’d play Babe Ruth til you were 15
  • then if you were good enough you’d play HS ball in the spring and you’d play American Legion in the summers.  But you could always play “Senior” Babe Ruth from the time you were 16-18.
  • and that was it.  If you weren’t playing some other sport there was always “fall ball” at each age level, but the above were the leagues that “counted.”

Now a days, I’m not even sure what is going on with youth baseball.  We all know about the wide growth of travel baseball, which has essentially destroyed Babe Ruth at its older levels (thanks to the siphoning off of any one talented enough to pitch).  But now apparently there’s a whole slew of leagues i’m not familiar with:

  • “Major60” and “Major70” distinctions for 11 and 12 year olds
  • Modifications to the classic “little league” rules to try to capture those kids they’re losing to travel teams
  • Pony League baseball (more prevalent in southern virginia; is there even a northern virginia league?)
  • Cal Ripken youth leagues, which I guess is a division of Babe Ruth for youngsters
  • Travel teams; do they even have “leagues?”  Or do they just go to tournaments?

Back in the day, when Babe Ruth had no competition for the youngest teens, winning the 13-year old and/or the 13-15 year old Babe Ruth tournaments still meant something.  Likewise, American Legion was essentially a hand-picked/all-star team of your hometown high schools.  Now, I’m not so sure.  How is American Legion faring, considering that big-time travel teams now have all the major prep prospects out there?   As far back as 2005, there were stories in the Washington Post about how Legion ball was badly suffering.  It seems to me now that Legion ball is struggling just like senior Babe Ruth ball.

That being said, I did go looking for district and state results for the leagues I grew up knowing.  We reveiwed Little League’s local and state tournaments, so here’s the subsequent state results for Babe Ruth and other amateur youth leagues:

American Legion’s district tournaments are complete; the state tournament kicks off on 7/28/14 from the great Fireman’s Field in Purcellville.  Your 8 teams in the Virginia American Legion state tournament are from Roanoke #3, hosts Leesburg #34, Stafford #290, Williamsburg #39, Albemarle #74, West End (Richmond) #361, Big Island (outside of Lynchburg) #217 and lastly my “home post” of 180, Vienna.  Editor Update: Here’s the tourney results: Vienna Post 180 went two and out, losing to Albemarle and then Williamsburg (by forfeit of all things) to end their involvement in the tournament.   Albemarle breezed through the state tournament, winning 4 straight to win the State title.  Big Island fought through the loser’s bracket to

Cal Ripken Leagues (not to be confused with the Cal Ripken Collegiate league, nor “Ripken Baseball,” a for-profit academy run by the Ripken brothers) have all finished their state tourneys as well, and most of those state champs are already deep into their regional tournaments.

I have no information on Pony League baseball, other than what’s on their incredibly confusing website.  Pony baseball has more divisions than … well something with a lot of divisions.  My pun-making ability failed me here.

I have no idea if there’s even organized leagues for these multitude of travel teams.  I know there’s an official Northern Virginia Travel League, but nowhere on this site can i find something like a “schedule” or “standings.”  Do these teams just exist to go play weekend tournaments?   The locally based EvoShield Canes “schedule” is just a list of tournaments they’re playing in.   So what do these teams do the rest of the time?  Don’t they play regular games?

I dunno.  My kid is too young to force me to know all these things yet.  Hell, he may not even play baseball.  Are there readers out there who can fill me in?  Is it even worth tracking these all-star results anymore, thanks to the complete dilution of talent?

Feedback welcome/encouraged.

Written by Todd Boss

July 29th, 2014 at 1:55 pm

Posted in Local Baseball

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Local Little League Results: DC/MD/VA States

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littleleaguelogo

We reviewed the local Little League All Star results for the District tournaments in Northern Virginia and Maryland in mid July.  Here’s a review of how the three local state tournaments went.

Maryland and DC’s champions move on to compete in the Mid-Atlantic Little League Regional, comprised of DC,MD,PA,NJ,NY and DE, and this year held in Bristol Connecticut.  Virginia’s champion moves on to compete in the Southeast Little League Regional, comprised of VA,WV,NC,SC,TN,GA,FL and AL, and this year is being held in Warner Roberts, Georgia (outside of Macon).

Virginia

Virginia State Little League is divided into 16 districts, four of which are local to the DC area.

Local representatives Great Falls, West Springfield American, SYA West (Centreville/Clifton) and Loudoun South headed to the Virginia State Little League tournament this year is in Bridgewater, which ran between 7/17/14 and 7/22/14.   Here’s how our local representatives fared (Pool play results here and the knockout rounds here).  The 16 district champions were divided into four “pools,” and the two best teams from each pool advance to a knockout round.

  • Great Falls: Came in 2nd in Pool A and was waxed by SYA West 11-1 en route, and indicator of just how strong SYA is this year.  Advanced to knockout round.
  • West Springfield American: Allowed just two runs in three pool games to win Pool B and advance to the knockout round.
  • SYA West: Allowed 4 runs in 3 pool games (including wins over Great Falls and Loudoun South) to win Pool A and advance to the knockout round.
  • Loudoun South: Unfortunate to be grouped in with powerhouses SYA and Great Falls; eliminated in Pool play.

In the State quarters, the three remaining Northern Virginia teams advanced along with defending state champs Tuckahoe.   In the state semis on 7/21/14, SYA handled West Springfield easly and Tuckahoe eased by Great Falls, likely pitting the two best teams in the state together in the final.  In the State final,Tuckahoe repeated as state champs with a 5-2 victory over SYA.

Virginia State Champion: Tuckahoe American (Richmond)

Links to past Virginia State little League champs: its only up to 2011.  Great Falls was your 2012 champ and Tuckahoe in Richmond was 2013.

Maryland

Maryland is divided into 8 districts (though only 7 of them compete in the State Tournament; read below for the DC “district 3”).   Links to the district results are here.

Maryland’s state tournament finished over the 7/19/14 weekend; West Salisbury came out of the loser’s bracket to sweep Sharpsburg in the state final.

Maryland State Champion: West Salisbury

DC

As a reminder, despite being just a “district” within Maryland, DC’s champion is treated like a state champ and heads directly into the regionals at the “major little league” level.

DC’s playoffs finished up on 7/22/14.   As expected, the two dominant programs in the city (Capitol City and Northwest Washington) met for the title (though they both had to work to get there), which was won on 7/22/14 by Northwest 5-2.

DC “State” Champ: Northwest Washington

 

Congrats to Tuckahoe, West Salisbury and NW Washington as our three local state champs, heading off to regional play.  Lets hope for a local representative in Williamsport this year.

Written by Todd Boss

July 24th, 2014 at 9:55 am

Posted in Local Baseball

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