Player Name: Mike Demarest
School: East Islip
Position: 3b
Mike is a 5’11” strong, middle-of-the-order hitter for East Islip. He is a two-way player.Mike is a 2015 graduate that is committed to playing at Adelphi University in the fall.
Pitching: Mike had a phenomenal season for the Red Men. He went 9-1 and was named League IV MVP. In the All Star Game, he threw one shutout inning. He threw only 6 pitches. He worked mainly in the 84-86 MPH range with the fastball and 73-75 MPH with the curveball. He induced a weak infield fly on the first pitch, which was a 75 MPh curve that was over the middle of the plate, The following batter took two strikes (86 MPH, 74 MPH) before getting a ground out to second on 73 MPH curve. The following batter smacked a first-pitch fastball for a single off the second base bag. The following batter hit into a 6-4 force out to end the inning. Demarest has terrific command of the curve and is very poised. He pitches a complete game nearly every outing.
Offensively: He bats with a slightly crouched and slightly open stance. He keeps his back elbow up and he employs a bat wag with his bat on a 45 degree angle. He has basically no leg kick, he just taps with the front foot and point it in as a timing mechanism. He has solid bat speed, keeps his head down at the point of contact and he finishes with both hands on the bat.
In the April 15 game, he smoked a double on a line drive that went over the second baseman’s head into the right center alley on a fastball up and out over the plate. He showed an ability to take it the other way rather than yanking it. In his first at bat, he hit a sac fly to deep left field (albeit it to a 270 foot fence). He also walked in the game. He showed a pretty good understanding of what he wanted to do. The opposing starter was topping at 77 MPH and had little feel for a breaking ball so he looked for a fastball. On the walk, he took a very close 2-2 breaking ball that was nearly a strike but he didn’t bite. On the flip side, when he did swing at a breaking ball, it was not a good-looking hack and the pitch bounced on home plate.
Defensively: He had two chances in this game. The first one was an extremely hard-hit ground ball while he was playing in. He reacted incredibly quick, scooped it off the ground and fired an accurate throw to first to get the runner by about 50 feet. On the second chance, however, he made a poor throw in the dirt that scooted past the first baseman for a two-base error. Everyone makes errors, and this one didn’t hurt the team. He definitely has good instincts in the field.
Base Running: He is not a base stealer. He is a clean up hitter and he just needs to be a station-to-station guy in order to keep the machine–that is East Islip’s offense–running.
Overall, he fits the bill as a ‘competitor’, he seemed very intense and had an impact in this game.
