FORT MYERS, Fla. – The soggy Lee County Player Development Complex was at times rainy and cloudy but consistently cool and comfortable Thursday morning as players, coaches and their friends and family gathered for the opening games at this weekend’s Perfect Game WWBA Underclass World Championship.
The Downers Grove, Ill.-based Longshots Baseball 2019 Teal were among the teams on hand for a scheduled 9 a.m. first-pitch – wet field conditions delayed the start 3 hours – and dozens of scouts, college coaches and curious onlookers turned out to grab a glimpse of the Longshots’ starting pitcher, among others.
Michael Prosecky is a 6-foot-4, 186-pound left-hander from Westchester, Ill., who PG ranks as the No. 329 overall national prospect in the class of 2019. A junior at Nazareth Academy in La Grange, Ill., Prosecky has already committed to Louisville, but with the start of his college career still two high school seasons away, there are plenty of folks who want to take their measure of the young man.
And, not coincidentally, the PG WWBA Underclass World Championship and Prosecky’s commitment to Louisville are forever intertwined.
It was at last year’s WWBA Under World where Prosecky made his PG tournament debut while pitching for the Chicago Scouts Association. About three dozen college coaches and recruiters gathered at the Lee County Player Development Complex (formerly called the 5-Pex) to watch him work, including those from Louisville. An offer from the Atlantic Coast Conference and national powerhouse soon came his way, and he committed to the Cardinals’ program roughly two weeks later.
“It’s cool to be back here and kind of relive the whole situation,” Prosecky told PG before the start of play Friday. “This place kind of changed my life as I knew it and it’s just cool to be back here.”
Longshots Baseball president and coach Rob Rooney brought two teams to the PG WWBA Under World with the hope that maybe another young prospect’s life could be changed for the better over the next four or five days.
Ryan Ross, a top 2019 shortstop prospect from Elmhurst, Ill., has committed to Mississippi State, and joins Prosecky as the only two players on the Longshots 2019 Teal roster with D-I commitments coming into the weekend.
It’s a roster with its spots occupied exclusively by high school juniors (class of 2019), each one from the greater Chicago Metropolitan Area. The core of the group has been playing together under the Longshots Baseball banner for at least three years now.
While these guys consider the Longshots their primary team, Rooney also allows them to play in Perfect Game tournaments with the Chicago Scouts Association when the opportunity presents itself, much like Prosecky did a year ago.
In fact, Prosecky, Ross, Landon Arney, David Dillman and Mathew Dinkel played with the CSA at last weekend’s PG WWBA Kernels Foundation Championship in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Prosecky threw five one-hit innings, allowing one earned run while striking out four and walking two, and Ross hit .273 with a pair of triples, three RBI and three stolen bases at the tournament.
This is an athletic roster, as well. According to Rooney, he can put seven players in his lineup that can run the 60-yard dash in under 7 seconds – Arney, Ross, Michael Hoes, Pat Boyer, Jake Carlson, Aaron Staehley and Ian Steinorth– which can create all kinds of opportunities during the course of a typical ballgame.
“It changes the way you play because you get the opportunity to really push the game, first of all, and then, secondly, you’re able to take better advantage of your opponents’ mistakes,” he said. “Every dropped ball the guys are gone, and we’ve taught this group to really push the edge. We’re trying to develop not only their aggressiveness but their tenaciousness, and they’ve really bought into that.”
The Longshots organization does have a long record of turning out tenacious players. Rooney told PG on Thursday that 50 former Longshots Baseball have been selected in the MLB June Amateur Draft in the program’s 20-plus year history, including 20 in the last three years; more than 350 alumni have gone to play college baseball.
The Longshots Baseball 2019 Teal players don’t look upon their participation in the PG WWBA Underclass World Championship so much as a challenge but more as vehicle with which to generate a high level of excitement.
Staff members at Longshot Baseball spend most of the fall months working on player development. The program’s teams will play periodic games in the Chicago area but spend as many as four days a week working on the development side of the fence.
As a result, this tournament becomes focal point of the fall calendar for everyone involved. It’s a chance to harvest the fruits of their labor by playing meaningful baseball games against the best underclass teams from across the nation and Canada. This is a PG national championship event where the best of the best stand toe-to-toe and shoulder-to-shoulder.
“They know the top players in the country are here,” Rooney said. “We’ve really tried to focus on letting kids see the next step. … We very much want to push kids forward, and in some cases, it gives us the opportunity to let some of our younger guys play with the older guys.”
Of the two teams Longshot baseball has here this week, the 2019 Teal is its top unit and the 2019/2020 Navy is a younger group. The members of the second team are here to basically get their feet wet and hopefully come to realize what they have to do to reach an elite level. In many cases, it is also the young players’ first opportunity to perform in front of college recruiters, who are here in force. The older team is here with a different purpose.
“Our first team always come to compete, and over time we’ve had a lot of success winning pools and getting to the playoffs,” Rooney said. “This group here, just like our other top teams, they’re coming to win. I don’t know how that’s going to play itself out, but what I do feel good about is knowing they’re going to compete really, really well; that’s what our focus is on.”
Prosecky praised the chemistry and the camaraderie he shares with his Longshots teammates, and enjoys every minute of the tine they can spend playing together. He’s also onboard with Rooney when it comes to discussing the competitive nature of the group.
“We compete; that’s just what we do,” he said. “It’s awesome for me on days I’m not pitching to just watch everyone compete out on the field; it’s just cool to watch them.”
With Prosecky wheeling and dealing, the Longshots Baseball 2019 Teal topped the Chestnut Ridge, N.Y.-based North Atlantic Select, 6-2, in Thursday’s tournament-opener. The tall left-hander allowed the two runs on three hits and struck-out five and walked two in his five efficient (82 pitches) innings of work.
“Michael has terrific upside,” Rooney said. “His arm is incredibly loose – the ball comes out really easily – and he runs a lot; he’s really worked hard. … He’s a terrific student, he’s an A-plus character kid, and I don’t know where his ceiling is because there’s a long way to go.”
Two young Illinois prospects making their PG debuts shined at the plate for the Longshots on Thursday: Hoes doubled, walked, was hit by a pitch and scored three runs, and Blair Thibault singled twice and drove in a pair.
One again, a large contingent of recruiters were in attendance to watch the game, a happening Prosecky is used to and also one he’s glad his teammates get to experience.
“It’s something that’s just part of the game at this point in someone’s career,” he said. “It’s just about who gets down to business the best and that’s who (the scouts and recruiters) are looking for.
It definitely brings a little bit of pressure to the situation, but it’s just fun to play at that kind of level with those eyes on you. It proves that your hard work is paying off a little bit … so it’s cool to see all those guys watching and taking notes on your play.”
The PG WWBA Underclass World Championship is a tournament Prosecky has been looking forward to ever since his magical experience of a year ago. He called the Lee Country Player Development Complex (formerly referred to as the 5-Plex) “just a fun place to be.
He enjoys the competition, of course, but also loves seeing his teammates get the exposure he feels they richly deserve. It’s an environment that is conducive to making special things – sometimes life-changing things – happen with a regularity that might surprise outsiders.
“One of my teammates (Ross) is committed to Mississippi State and he just plays his heart out all the time,” Prosecky said. “It’s just cool to see all these guys come together and compete for the same goal. It’s not necessarily looking to see who wants it more but it’s looking to see who’s willing to work harder and get to that next level. It’s just awesome to see it all come together.”