by Andrew Giantasio
There was a unique opportunity today for young students of the game of baseball at the JMF sports center in Westbury hosted by Batting 1.000. The opportunity was to spend the afternoon learning hitting from former All-Star and current Brooklyn Cyclones manager, Edgardo Alfonzo, and pitching from Brent Strom, the pitching coach for arguably the most successful staff in the major leagues, the Houston Astros. The event was put together with batting 1.000 baseball academy. Coach Mike Ferriggi, the co-owner and head instructor of the Batting 1.000 academy was very excited for his players to learn from the pair.
“Every once in a while, we want to bring to our players and families the opportunity to learn from some of the best and both of these guys track records speak for themselves.” He spoke very highly of Strom saying, “Brent Strom, what he’s doing with the Houston Astros pitching staff. Obviously, he has great talent but to maximize that great talent speaks volumes to his work and watching him work a session here with our younger guys makes him definitely worth a trip up here and a great opportunity.”
Coach Mike was also very excited to welcome in Mets legend and current Cyclones manager Edgardo Alfonzo, “Edgardo Alfonzo worked with our older guys in the morning session. Its amazing. I’ve always loved his swing, I compare to Daniel Murphy, short, compact, stay inside and through the ball it’s the same thing we teach our guys at the academy. It’s always nice to bring in guys, big names, who teach the same stuff we teach so it’s not conflicting to what we teach the boys here.”
For his part, Alfonzo was also happy to be there and happy to share his knowledge with the next generation, “I like it, I like it, because I was young once and I went through this before. The opportunity for these young guys to be told about what’s going on in Major League Baseball today is amazing. I feel so happy to talk to the kids because they like to listen, they want to be somebody. If I could help them out, I would like to do it.”
Alfonzo taught multiple camps over the course of the day, both for younger and more advanced players. He wasn’t the only holding camps for players however, as Brent Strom also taught multiple camps on pitching as well. Strom Is the pitching coach for the Houston Astros, who boast one of if not the best pitching staffs in the majors. Many of the Astros’ pitchers credit Strom with their success. Like Alfonzo, Strom was happy to help out.
“I thought today was pretty good for these young guys. For them to come on a day where they didn’t have to come this is the ideal age to get started. The parents were very good with helping and they have a homework assignment to write down the different ideas they got from this and hopefully they build upon this, it’s the ideal time to do it between the ages of eight and fourteen.”
It’s not every day that you can get hitting tips from a former all-star or pitching tips from the coach of baseball’s best staff. For the attendees of today’s camp, it was almost certainly a worthwhile experience.
