ANTHEM, Ariz. – A high school ball player’s senior season is always highly anticipated, and that was certainly the case for Quartz Hill (Calif.) class of 2015 right-hander Jonas Wyatt. After spending his junior season patiently waiting for his time in the sunshine, March and springtime arrived on their white horses and Wyatt's senior season finally got the green flag.
“I feel great and everything seems to be working out for me so far,” he said earlier this week while preparing to make a start for the Quartz Hill Rebels at the PG Coach Bob National Invitational Tournament, in a game played at Boulder Creek High School.
This was a fairly big stage for the 6-foot-2, 195-pound, hard-throwing Wyatt, with at least two dozen scouts on hand to watch him and equally hard-throwing Key West (Fla.) High School junior right-hander Gregory Veliz do battle. They showed splendid heat in the heat of an early spring day in the Valley of the Sun, with both touching 96 mph with their fastballs in the early innings.
But this start, his third of the season, meant more to Wyatt than showing the scouts he could throw hard; most already knew that. It was more about showing them he was ready and able to be regarded as one of top senior right-handed pitchers in the country. Right now, and this could certainly change, Perfect Game ranks Wyatt – who has signed with San Diego State – No. 139 in that category.
“I’m still working with my mechanics a little bit, trying to get my balance point,” he said. “I’m trying to stay over my body a little bit more instead of falling off, and I’m still working with my off-speed (pitches) a little bit, trying to get a little better command on that. The fastball is there for the most part – that’s probably my best pitch – but my off-speed I’m still working on a little bit.”
This marks the seventh straight year 10th-year Quartz Hill head coach Aaron Kavanagh has brought the Rebels to the desert for the Coach Bob Invite, and each year he finds the experience more and more rewarding for his players.
The players drive or fly out separately with their families but once here they get to experience some time on the road together, attend a couple of Cactus League spring training games and also get to see up close some high-end competition from other parts of the country.
“We try to spend a lot of time together as a team but we also get to play teams from other areas that we’ve never played before; we’re playing a team from Florida today,” Kavanagh told PG this week. “It’s something different for the kids to do other than playing the same teams from the same area all the time.”
The Rebels have had a rocky start to their season. After dropping their first two games in National Division play at the Coach Bob Invite, their record stood at 3-8, not exactly what this program is used to. But the Rebels returned only two everyday players from last year’s lineup and graduated 83 percent of their innings pitched.
“We’re learning, but they compete and they don’t ever give up, so I’ll give them that,” Kavanagh said of this group. “Hopefully, being here in Arizona is where we’ll start to turn it around, because to get out and to have to travel and play different teams will help them.”
The two returning position players back for their senior seasons are outfielder Gaston Bastanchury and second baseman Marcos Flores. Bastanchury hit .281 with four home runs and 15 RBI and Flores was at .329 with six extra-base hits and 19 RBI as juniors. Junior right-hander Blake Borror is also back after finishing 1-1 with a 4.98 ERA in 19 2/3 innings, the most of any returning pitcher.
Wyatt pitched in only three games as a reliever last season and gave up two earned runs on one hit in 3 2/3 innings (3.82 ERA) while striking out six and walking seven. He did start 18 games in the outfield, however, and hit .270 (10-for-37) with a home run, triple, three doubles, eight RBI and 11 runs scored.
Most of last year’s innings were gobbled up by ace right-hander Jonathan Teaney, who is now a freshman at the University of San Diego, and another graduated right-hander, Clayton Rabiej. Teaney finished 10-2 with a 0.93 ERA in 2014, and allowed only 38 hits in 75 1/3 innings while striking out 137 and walking 36. Rabiej finished 8-3 with a 2.00 ERA, striking out 73 in 63 innings of work.
They were responsible for 68 percent of the innings pitched in 2014 and were the main reason the Rebels shared the Golden Baseball League championship with Knight High School with matching 13-1 records. Quartz Hill finished 21-10 overall after a loss in the CIF Southern Section Division 3 playoffs’ quarterfinals.
Kavanagh explained that he has always been blessed with a lot of depth in his pitching staff during his tenure at Quartz Hill and that has allowed him to bring his juniors and sophomores into the flow slowly, saving their best for their senior seasons.
So, as a junior, Wyatt was left waiting in the wings. He had also suffered a very minor elbow injury that caused him to miss a couple of games but it wasn’t nearly serious enough to require surgery. The injury healed on its own and he is back better and stronger than ever.
“We had those two seniors that started and finished games and I didn’t really get a chance to work myself up to the varsity last year,” he said. “I wasn’t known for my (pitching) ability yet and hadn’t been able to show it off, so I mostly just played outfield.”
Wyatt now enlists the services of a trainer and said he has been working as hard as ever to reach the point where he’s at now. The trainer has pushed him hard, he said, and he refuses to give up under any circumstances.
“He’s got such a live arm,” Kavanagh said. “He’s got three really good pitches and he’s got a fastball like I haven’t seen at Quartz Hill. He’s just got that million dollar arm, so it’s just a matter of him continuing to learn and compete as he continues to evolve as a pitcher.”
Perfect Game national scouting coordinator Jheremy Brown watched Wyatt’s Coach Bob outing intently, while scribbling notes and shooting video. He noted that Wyatt sat 94-95 mph with his fastball in his first inning of work and then took it up to 96 with his first pitch of the second inning before settling in at 93-95 – high heat in the desert heat, indeed. Brown later wrote:
“(Wyatt’s) fastball shows very nice run to his arm side, showing the ability to get in to left-handed hitters, something that helped make his changeup become that much more of an effective pitch. … Wyatt’s changeup is already an above average offering in the 83-86 mph with late fading and diving action. The pitch serves as his put-away offering, generating more empty swings with it than contact. He also flashed a solid 11-5 curveball in the mid-70s, though he went mostly fastball-changeup, generating consistent ground ball contact.”
Quartz Hill lost the game to Key West, 5-2, but Wyatt had no reason to be disappointed with his outing, as Brown’s report indicates. He is 1-1 with a 1.95 ERA this season, having allowed four earned runs on six hits over 14 1/3 innings, with 23 strikeouts and eight walks.
The Rebels’ two other primary starters are still trying to find their groove. Borror, now a junior, is 1-2 with a 3.27 ERA after three starts and 15 innings, and junior right-hander Andrew Garcia is 1-2 with a 4.20 ERA after two starts and 15 innings.
Offensively, Bastanchury (.375, HR, 3 2Bs, 6 RBI) and Flores (.320, 2 2Bs, 6 RBI) are picking it right back up and senior Nathan Croy is hitting .412 (7-for-17). Wyatt believes the Coach Bob experience will benefit the entire team.
“We play some really good teams out here, and t’s better for us because it pushes us more to try and better ourselves,” Wyatt said. “It’s better to play good competition then to play teams that aren’t as good. … It pushes us to do better and it makes us work harder. Being (at Coach Bob) is a good experience with a lot of people out here that get to see you, maybe for the first time.”
Wyatt always dreamed of getting a scholarship offer and would love to play professionally someday. If that opportunity presents itself after June’s MLB amateur draft that’s all for the better, but right now he’s content to be a San Diego State Aztec.
The city of Quartz Hill is in the Antelope Valley region of Los Angeles County in Southern California, and the fact Wyatt is a So Cal kid certainly played into his college choice.
“With San Diego State, I wanted to go somewhere by the beach and somewhere with nice weather because I just really enjoy that kind of environment,” he said. “San Diego State came along when I was playing summer ball and offered me a scholarship and I decided to take it.”
Where ever Wyatt lands after he graduates from Quartz Hill in May, it’s certain be a good spot. As hard as he’s worked and as long as he’s waited for his turn on center stage, it just can’t happen any other way.
“He’s a hard-worker and he wants to be successful,” the Rebels’ Kavanagh said. “He’s a good kid and he’s a good student, so if he decides to go to college, San Diego State will be lucky. If he gets drafted in a position where he would like to go and plays in the minors, then he’ll do a good job there, too.”