FORT MYERS, Fla. – Sometimes, the only thing fans can do when they see excellence and dominance personified at the underclass level of amateur baseball is nod their heads in acknowledgement, allow a smile to cross their faces and sit back and appreciate what has unfolded before their eyes.
After only three pool-play games at this weekend’s Perfect Game WWBA Underclass World Championship, the Winter Park, Fla.-based Scorpions 2020 Founders Club has already proven itself worthy of such admiration.
Boasting a roster stocked with future NCAA Division I and professional-level talent, the Scorps 2020 FC overwhelmed their three pool-play opponents by a combined score of 26-0 to earn the playoffs’ No. 1-seed and a bye into Sunday’s second round of the 49-team bracket-play.
This is the 17th annual PG WWBA Under World and the Scorpions Baseball organization previously won championships here in 2009 and 2013; it looks poised to add to that total.
“We’ve got our whole team together for this tournament and we’re looking forward to making a run at the championship,” Scorpions standout 2020 infielder Lucas Costello told PG on Saturday. “We have a really talented group and we’ve all been playing with each other for a while. We’re coming in here as the top (2020) team in the organization and we want to make the Scorpions proud.”
So far, so good on that front. Nothing comes easy at a PG national championship event – especially one as prominent as this – but this Scorpions 2020 Founders Club squad looks built for the long haul.
The majority of the players on this roster – they’re all from the class of 2020 – played with the Scorps 2020 Founders Club this summer, a team that finished No. 10 in PG’s final summer 16u National Travel Team Rankings. Elite talents Dylan Crews and Michael Brooks played up on the Scorps 2019 Founders Club, which finished No. 6 in the final summer 17u National Travel Team Rankings.
“This is a really good group and, obviously, they’re still young,” Scorpions Baseball Director of Teams & Tournaments and head coach Matt Gerber said on Saturday. “This is coach (Jerry) Kennedy and I’s first-time kind of taking them over this fall and taking them into next summer.
“A lot of them are very talented but our job is to teach them how to play the game and to be focused every single pitch, every single game.”
Gerber used 14 players in the Scorpions 2020 FC’s first two pool-play wins on Friday: 8-0 over the Langan Bandits (New Jersey) and 6-0 over Gamers 17 Blue (Missouri). They included the very high-profile Crews, an outfielder/third baseman and a Louisiana State commit from Longwood, Fla.
He’s been a two-time participant at the PG Junior National Showcase and is an alumnus of the 2016 PG 14u Select Baseball Festival; he’s risen to No. 2 in the national prospect rankings.
Gerber called Crews, an athletic 6-foot, 175-pound, 16½-year-old, an “extremely hard-worker,” a top prospect who takes the time to hit and get into the weight room on a daily basis. He said that in his experiences over the years, the one thing that really separates the elite players from the rest of the pack is that they simply love to play baseball.
Crews is certainly in that group, and Gerber mentioned him in the same sentence as Brendan Rodgers, a former Scorpion who was selected by the Colorado Rockies with the No. 3 overall pick in the first-round of the 2015 MLB June Amateur Draft. They both love to play the game, Gerber said, and if there’s a place to play at any given point in time, they’ll be there with bats and gloves in hand.
“Once you get to college ball, and if you’re lucky enough to play pro ball with that long season, if you don’t love to play baseball you’re going to be in trouble,” Gerber said. “Obviously, Dylan is extremely gifted but he loves to play and he doesn’t want any days off.
“He’s going to DH (Saturday) and he’s going to be (peeved) at me. That’s just his mentality and I think that’s what’s going to make him successful in the long run.”
Fourteen of the Scorps 2020 FC prospects that are on the official event roster have already committed to Division-I schools, and it’s quite a collection of talent.
The infielder Costello (No. 200, Wake Forest), outfielder/third baseman Colin Apgar (No. 294, Florida State), top utility players Zac Veen (No. 475, Central Florida) and Richie Morales (No. 486, Tulane), right-hander Zachary Bennett (No. 493, Central Florida), infielder Tripp McKinlay (top-500, Washington) and left-hander/outfielder Billy Underwood (t-500, Coastal Carolina) all saw action in the first two games on Friday.
Right-handers Josh Mallitz (No. 322, Ole Miss) and Cade Udell (No. 202, Duke) pitched for the Scorpions on Saturday (Udell is a classmate of Crews’ at Lake Mary High School), and shortstop Michael Brooks (No. 51, Arkansas) and right fielder CJ Kayfus (No. 73, Miami) were also in the starting lineup. The Scorpions 2020 FC won that game, a 12-0, four-inning victory over Georgia-based Team Elite 17u Premier.
Those early college commitments are all fantastic, of course; the stated mission of travel ball programs from across the country is to get their players committed to the schools of their choice. But the PG WWBA Underclass World Championship, with the hundreds of college coaches/recruiters it draws, is more for players along the lines of the Scorps’ Richey Lakes, Henry Politz and Lucas Ismaili.
They are all ranked – Lakes is at No. 468, Politz is a top-500 and Ismaili a top-1,000 in the 2020 class – and each of the three is uncommitted. They are still only high school juniors, so there is plenty of time for something to happen. The recruiting process, if done the right way, should be more of a marathon than a sprint, with the prospects making sure their final choice is the right one.
Ismaili, who is 3-for-5 with a pair of doubles and three RBI after three games, isn’t necessarily concerning himself with the college recruiters:
“Most importantly, I just come out here and try to have fun and (whatever) happens, happens,” he said Saturday. “I don’t feel any pressure and I’ve been playing good, but baseball is a team game; it’s about the team. … We just all try to play as a team and try to win the tournament first, and (go from there).”
To Gerber’s way of thinking, this event continues to be equally important to the prospects who have already made their college choices. He knows that player development happens both on and off the field, and at this time of year it’s important for his guys to get their work-in in the weight room and for his pitchers to get back up and going after shutting things down for most of the last two months.
This is this team’s third event of the fall and he’s been increasing his pitchers’ pitch-counts at each tournament: 40 at the first event and 55 at the second, and he could even see extending a guy to 70 this weekend if need be. And that’s why it’s important to have all hands on-deck.
“In terms of being out here and you’re a committed guy, you’re committed but that doesn’t mean anything; it really doesn’t,” Gerber said. “You’ve got to continue to get better, continue to work and learn how to play the game; that’s why we’re here.”
Gerber used seven pitchers during pool-play and they were nothing short of lights-out, combining to throw 17 shutout innings while allowing only seven hits, striking out 24 and walking three. At the plate, McKinlay was 6-for-7 (.857) with two doubles and four RBI; Crews went 4-for-9 (.444) with a triple and an RBI and Underwood was 3-for-3 with a triple and two RBI; those numbers complemented Ismaili’s nicely.
“You always have something to prove so we’re always trying to win and trying to play our hardest,” Costello said. “We always learn from each other, and we teach each other things that sometimes the coaches can’t. We play and we can relate to each other; it’s always good.”
Bracket-play is an entirely different beast than pool-play at a PG tournament, and Gerber has a history of doing a great job of conveying that to his players. It’s all about being focused and doing the little things right, he explains, because at a tournament of this magnitude it’s important that the ball bounces their way.
But they also have to have their heads in the game, be passionate about what they’re doing and be mindful that they’re here to take care of business. There is, of course, even more to the message than that:
“We tell them to just play the game and have fun,” Gerber said. “You’re obviously talented (just) to be on this team. Whether you’re committed or not you’re a pretty talented guy so just playing your game and not being somebody that you’re not is important. If you’re good enough somebody going’s to take notice eventually, and it’s just about playing the game the right way every day.”