by Vinny Messana
Every great player needs a defining moment. For Matt Hogan that came on April 29 against Smithtown West.
With his team, Half Hollow Hills East, trailing 7-6 in the bottom of the seventh, the sophomore stepped up to plate with his buddy, Mike Palazzolo, on second base.
He smacked a walk-off two-run shot to center field to give the Thunderbirds the 8-7 victory and hand Smithtown West one of their three losses this season.
“I just happened to be the guy to get up at the plate and swing the bat,” said the uber-polite sophomore.
While it’s true that he was the one with the bat in his hand, not many hitters in the northeast region–let alone League III in Suffolk County–can match what he can do at the plate.
On his April 20 home run against Smithtown East, he did something very few batters of any age can do. He smacked a HR with a recorded exit velocity of 104 MPH off the bat.
That is the type of skills that translate to the next level–and the next level after that.
It’s one of the reasons that Vanderbilt University, only one of the most respected baseball programs in the nation, thought highly enough of him to pinpoint him as a player they wanted. Fortunately, the feeling was mutual and Hogan committed to his dream school.
He was a freshman in high school.
Word spreads quick within the relatively small community of high school baseball on Long Island. Once the word got out about Hogan being a force of nature at the plate, teams stopped treating him like a 10th grader on varsity and began treating him more like Barry Bonds in 2004.
In one recent game, he was walked in three of his four plate appearances–two of which were intentionally.
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Regardless, he was still able to smack 5 home runs this year, which placed him third among all hitters in Suffolk County.
If coaches were really paying attention, they would’ve known that as an eighth grader he smacked a double off the wall against Aaron Glickstein and another off Jon Faraci of rival Half Hollow Hills West.
Both pitchers are three years his senior and are now pitching for Stony Brook and St. John’s University, respectively.
But that’s just the caliber of player he is.
“He is the best position player I’ve seen on Long Island in the past 20 years,” said a local MLB scout.
He also happens to run a sub 7.0 60-yard dash and throws 88-90 MPH on the mound.
His Head Coach, Tim Belz, spoke glowingly of the sophomore star.
“I’ve worked a camp at West the past couple of years, and his name has come up with the seventh graders and sixth grader, even in the fifth graders and down to the fourth graders. Matt Hogan is becoming a legend’s name in this community–everybody knows who he is. Baseball fans admire him and they love him. He’s that kind of personality,” he added.
His work ethic has become somewhat legendary as well. Matt is known for taking batting lessons after games and being maniacal about taking swings.
When I went down to L.I. Indoor Sports in Ronkonkoma to watch him take batting practice, the instructor stated he was the best at picking up baseballs after a round of swings.
I laughed thinking it was more hyperbole surrounding Hogan–but that was until I noticed after the bucket was empty he was not joking, as he actually runs to pick up the baseballs, which is something I had never seen before.
Little things like that is what has helped Hogan maximize his wealth of talent.
Teams will have an interesting decision to take, if he continues his growth as a player and is throwing 90+ off the mound and regularly hitting baseball with 95+ MPH off the bat.
Having to make that decision is not something Hogan is interesting in doing just yet.
“Honestly, I’m still a sophomore so it’s a little hard to decide,” he said.
It’s a decision that not many players will have the luxury of making–but if one thing is clear, Matt Hogan’s current ability and his youth makes him the best prospect on Long Island and has put him on the radar of all MLB area scouts.
