Here’s My Thoughts on The 2019 Season So Far

We are about two weeks into the regular season for most teams at this point in Suffolk County, and one week for Nassau and the Catholic League. It goes quick–way too quick. It seems we wait forever for baseball season and then it’s over 6 weeks later. That means early season story lines that should be chalked up to ‘small-sample size’ and ‘too early to tell’ actually become the story lines the entire season.

Here’s a stream of consciousness about what I’m seeing, what I’m hearing and what I am predicting…

Nassau County

Matt Yip. What more can the kid do? I remember watching him in the winter going into the 2018 season and thinking wow this kid has a nice swing I’m surprised he’s still under-the-radar. I knew of his brother who was named to our College All-Long Island team in 2015, but not him. He went out and hit .458 with 7 HR before committing to UNC-Wilmington. He now has five HR in six games for Herricks. A power hitting catcher is the rarest of commodities in baseball. Very impressive job by him.

Cameron Mayer is a beast. The Tufts-commit has been one of the most impressive pitchers on Long Island. He has a one-hitter with 15 strikeouts and a three-hitter with 10 strikeouts under his belt and only one run allowed. The 6’4 RHP has clean arm action and is a very cerebral pitcher. He is one of the kids who has ran with the opportunity he was given as staff ace of Syosset.

New Hyde Park has two young studs and I need to watch them next week. It’s a big reason they are off to a red-hot 6-0 start. Luke Orbon just committed to St. John’s and has two home runs already, freshman James Asmus is tied for the Long Island lead in wins with three and has a home run. I can tell you that kid is scary because in the summer of 2016 I worked at the NYBA Camp at Hofstra and I had to pitch to this kid and got to watch him pitch. I’m pretty sure he almost killed me with a line drive and he also struck out just about every kid he faced. He was in sixth grade so he certainly had some maturing to do but he is a weapon at the plate and on the mound. And he’s a lefty. He may be a special one. Perfect Game has him listed a 6’0 220 lbs with a 79 MPH max fastball. Oh, he’s 14-years-old.

Huge sweep by Oceanside of Farmingdale this week. They proved they are a resilient team and they also proved they can win either a pitcher’s duel or a shootout. In the first game, Jake Reyer fired a one-hit shutout and Noah Eisel one-upped him with a no-hitter in a 10-0 win. Yesterday, they trailed 6-3 and 8-5 but never gave up and won on a walk-off single by Austin Vlahakis off Anthony Quatromani. Frankly, I think if Quatromani starts the inning then Farmingdale holds on. He is a sophomore that has great arm action and was touching 80 MPH. He came in with the bases loaded and was asked to put out a fire with the top of the order up. Probably the best top of the order in Nassau County with Eisel, Lazzaro, Vlahakis, Chris Siklas and Leo Alvarez. Tough task.

Cold Spring Harbor has allowed six runs through five games. Sometimes people forget about the smaller schools in Nassau County but with Theo Farynick leading the rotation, who fired a no-hitter this week, they are a dangerous team.

Next week will be interesting between Farmingdale and Massapequa. On one hand, you have the reigning State Champs who are fresh off one of the easiest sweeps in history–a 71-1 onslaught of Hempstead. It was enough to cause a serious debate about whether Hempstead needs to be playing in a different conference despite the enrollment number. Every superhero has its weakness, for Superman it was kryptonite and for Massapequa it is Justin Rosner. We will see what their game plan is against the Daler’s ace. Farmingdale will likely throw Dante Interlandi and Kyle Stamm against the reigning champs. They will hope that the offense led by Phil Krpata, Jacob Taormina and Robbie Manetta can get the job done against a team that is stacked up-and-down the lineup with players like Johnny Castagnozzi, Nick Schwartz, Travis Honeyman, etc.

Is it just me or does Tommy Reifler have two hits in every game? He may be the peskiest hitter on Long Island.

There are some undefeated & one-loss teams in Nassau County that we have not yet covered but we will have to; this includes Island Trees, Carey, Division, Clarke, South Side and Seaford.

Suffolk County

Connetquot got one scare so far; trailing 1-0 in the fourth inning against Bay Shore this week but then they woke up and won 7-3. They are 7-0 and they have one of the most balanced teams we’ve seen in a long time. The first seven games were the appetizer. They have their biggest challenge of the season on Monday against Boston College-commit Jake Krzemienski on Monday who has handled them well in the past. They will counter with their ace, Joey Savino. It promises to be an outstanding match up. Also, will Savino pitch to Tim McHugh or try his luck against the rest of the lineup? Either way I’m excited to find out. Commack is 4-0-1.

To nobody’s surprise, Smithtown East is right behind them at 7-1. They swept Copiague this week and Smithtown West last week. They have pitching on pitching. Imagine having six lefties on one staff? There were teams I played on where I was the only one. Nice problem to have. They have Newfield this week and Hills East the following week.

Center Moriches, the reigning New York State Class B Champs have a legitimate chance to repeat as champs. Yes they graduated Liam Pulsipher, but they apparently haven’t missed a beat because they have allowed just four runs over six games. Matt Alifano pitched a no-hitter last week, the offense has been relentless. A few scouts are very high on Robert Copozzi as a power-hitting 1st baseman and hard-throwing pitcher. Alec Maag and Brad Sakellarides are impact bats, Andres Auffant is a reliable arm in the rotation. They also have two youngsters, Leyton Pulsipher and Jordan Falco that look like the next wave for the program. If they get past Babylon this week, they may just run the table.

If you read my article the other day on Aidan Crowley, you know the situation. Shoreham-Wading River, who hasn’t missed the playoffs in more than 3 decades has another power pitcher that came out of nowhere. He threw back-to-back no-hitters. They have a very impressive top of the order with Mason Kelly, DJ Brown, Peter Minneci and Nick Bettenhauser and when Tyler Widercrantz comes back next week it is about to get even more intimidating.

Hills East has three walk-offs of their five wins. They clearly have stepped on a rabbit’s foot. They have had all sorts of magic. At 5-2, they have put themselves in a good position for a postseason berth. With Reis Henderson, they have one of the underrated pitchers in the county.

I’m not sure what to make of Pat-Med yet but they are 5-1. You can say some of that is beating up on Central Islip but they did just beat Floyd two of three and that’s a good team. Randall Alejo is 2-0, he is definitely on track for the breakout season I predicted. They can build up a nice cushion for themselves now because their last six games are Longwood and Ward Melville.

Sachem East is having a nice season, it looks like they have a budding star in Ty Acker who had the walk-off hit on Opening Day. We know about Roman Dorosh‘s brilliance, Don Wille and Ryan Micheli–two Division-I players that are their heart & soul in the lineup and then the X-Factor is Rafe Schlesinger who struck out 12 in a gem on Monday. If they have a reliable No. 3 starter, they have a very solid team.

Catholic League:

Today is Game 3 of their season so it’s way too early to draw any conclusions but I will say it’s been a terrific start to the week for the reigning Champs. Obviously, I was guilty of underselling them this off-season with the graduation of their top players from last season, but as we see all the time, if you have a great coaching staff the players tend to overachieve. This week we saw them knock off Jason Diaz on Opening Day with a brilliant effort from Giancarlo Giacometti who wiggled in-and-out of trouble for 6.1 IP. They play great defense, they take advantage of miscues and they also have a budding supertstar in Kyle Chase who got two hits off Diaz and then proceeded to strike out 11 in a complete game victory on Wednesday. He has a chance to be great.

Chaminade is another team I may have under estimated. With Logan Koester on the mound, they obviously can beat anyone, he’s one of the best pitchers in the conference and has a bright future. They have some great position players like Aidan Larkin (4 steals the other day) and Paul Orbon who is back to full health and one of the best defensive center fielders on the island.

Tough start for St. Anthony’s who are now 0-5 counting non-league games. They will turn it around. The bright spot has been Cameron Leary, who everyone can not stop raving about. He is a tremendous bat. He already has two home runs. I think players like him, Cameron Dunn and Steven Rizzo won’t allow this season to get away from them.

I still think St. Dominic is the class of the conference, we will see how it plays out but I think the have the most firepower and the two experienced arms.