Archive
Recapping the 2016 Season
by Vinny Messana With Wantagh winning the Class A NYS title on Saturday, the 2016 season is officially complete. This was an especially busy season for us at Baseball on the Island, as we expanded our game coverage to Nassau CC, Suffolk CC, Nassau HS and the Catholic League in addition to our customary NCAA-affiliated colleges. To start the season, I was in College Station to cover Hofstra’s season opening series against Texas A&M. I also went with them to West Point on March 8 to cover their road-game against Army. We also had four episodes of Baseball on the Island Weekly and held an All-Star Game for the top college players from Nassau vs Suffolk. To recap the season, I’m going to give out a couple awards based on the performances we’ve covered. Between my team of ...
Complete List of Long Islanders Selected in MLB Draft
There has been no shortage of Long Island talent represented in the MLB Draft over the past few seasons. Ever since the now-famous 2009 draft featuring Steven Matz and Marcus Stroman, the level of top-tier talent has been vindicated by the players selected in the MLB Draft. This year was no different with two Long Islanders selected in the FIRST round and 14 players overall. If anything, I was a bit shocked that players like Straton Podaras, Nick Girardi, Thomas Roulis, Anthony Gatto, etc didn’t get selected. Here’s the complete list: Round 1: Pick 19: Justin Dunn, Boston College (Freeport) Round 1: Pick 31: Anthony Kay, UCONN (Ward Melville HS) Round 4: Pick 123: Thomas Hackimer, St. John’s (Floral Park) Round 8: Pick 245: Stephen Woods, Albany (Half Hollow Hills East HS...
Wantagh Wins the Class A NYS Championship
by Vinny Messana Being the No. 7 seed entering the postseason? No problem. Not having a two-time All-State pitcher available in the postseason? No problem. Facing an undefeated Queensbury team in the NYS title game? Psh. The Wantagh Warriors defeated Williamsville East to capture their first Class A NYS title since 1998. Starting pitcher Bobby Hegarty, who fired a one-hitter against Mount Sinai to capture the Long Island Championship went the distance, although he did struggle in the early going putting the Warriors in a 5-1 hole. They clawed back with a three-spot in the fourth inning and tied the ballgame in the fifth on a sacrifice fly by Anthony Fontana that scored Jimmy Joyce. The game was tied going to the ninth inning when Joyce smacked the go-ahead home run to left field that put ...
Thomas Hackimer’s Path from Walk-On to Fourth Round Pick is a “One in a Billion”
(Photo Credit: St. John’s University Athletics) by Vinny Messana, Editor-In-Chief Now in his 21st season as the Head Coach at St. John’s University, Ed Blankmeyer has seen a lot. Whatever he hasn’t seen there, he probably saw while coaching Team USA. He has coached more than 80 players who have gone on to play professional baseball–most notably Mo Vaughn and Craig Biggio while at Seton Hall. Still, he was almost at a loss for words when discussing the journey of his star reliever, Floral Park native Thomas Hackimer. “Thomas is quite a story,” he said. “To go from a walk-on to a fourth round pick is one-in-a-billion,” he added. Hackimer chose to attend St. John’s because of the academic scholarship he received. He chose to major in physi...
Deja Vu for Ward Melville HS
(Photo Credit: D1baseball.com) by Vinny Messana For the man who lives and breathes Ward Melville baseball, there’s not much sweeter than having two of your ace pitchers drafted by the New York Mets within seven years of each other. “This does not happen,” said Petrucci on the incredible distinction of having Steven Matz drafted No. 72 overall in 2009 and now Anthony Kay drafted No. 31 overall. “Today is the second best day in the history of Ward Melville baseball–behind Steven getting drafted. This would not have been possible without Steven Matz,” he added. Like Matz, he is a southpaw that dominated League I baseball like very few pitchers in Suffolk County history have. During his junior year, he won the Paul Gibson Award (given to the best pitcher in ...
Mets Select Freeport Native Justin Dunn No. 19 Overall
(Photo is courtesy of Boston College Athletics) Freeport native, Justin Dunn, was selected with the No. 19 overall pick in the 2016 MLB Draft by the New York Mets. He is in the midst of a tremendous junior season at Boston College, in which they will open up the super regionals against Miami on Friday. Dunn is a 6’2″ 180 lb RHP that is 4-1 with a 1.49 era over 60.1 IP. He has struck out 66 against only 16 walks while allowing 49 hits. His stock shot through the roof after fanning 11 against Tulane in the regionals while allowing two ER. It actually rose his ERA from 1.35 to 1.49. He was named to Baseball America’s All-America third team. Despite growing up in Freeport, N.Y., he attended Gunnery HS in Connecticut. While it may not be the same as Steven Matz being selected ...
West Islip Prepares for “Business Trip”
by Vinny Messana Some teams go decades between winning county championships. Some have never won at all. For West Islip, it’s been just two years. Still, they were fueled by the fire of losing in the first round of the playoffs last season and it propelled them to winning it all again. With the New York State Class AA tournament just three days away, they are in position to go where no baseball team in program history has gone before–winning the NYS title. “I think we all knew going in that this is the potential that we had,” said catcher Nick Valenti–who is hitting a cool .546 with 38 RBI this season. “I don’t think we’re going to waste our opportunity going up there. No matter what happens, it’s still a successful season but we’...
MLB Draft 2016: Which Long Islanders Will Get Selected?
by Vinny Messana, Editor-In-Chief After watching every local college team multiple times and every elite high school senior at least once–along with talking with people in the know– I feel comfortable making this list. It will be listed in alphabetical order because there are other factors that play into where a player is selected; signability, character and health being the three biggest ones that could drop a top-talent into Day 3 of the draft. Here’s my guess as to who are the pro-caliber players that are draft-eligible this year with Long Island roots. Joe Daru, NYIT The knocks against Daru are unfair in my opinion–he’s a fifth-year senior and he’s too short. He can simply play and he certainly used those critics as fuel for his 2016 season. He was u...
Suffolk Tops Nassau, 5-0, in the Inaugural Battle of the Border
by Vinny Messana After seven months of planning, the inaugural Battle of the Border finally went down. I’ll get to the timeline of how it came about and all the difficulty that went into planning it shortly–but first, here’s how the game went. Suffolk won 5-0 behind the stellar pitching of Matt Kostalos (ECC Pitcher of the Year from St. Thomas Aquinas), Nick Girardi (St. Joseph’s), Dylan Mouzakes (Pace), Kevin Martinez (Farmingdale), Matt Leach (St. Joseph’s) and Peter Vath (Molloy). They allowed only three hits as a staff. The game was scoreless until the fifth when Suffolk broke through with RBI hits by Nicholas Gargan (St. Thomas Aquinas) and Joe Calabrese (St. Joseph’s). They added a run on a wild pitch. T.J. Riccio (New Haven) added an RBI single in...
West Islip Cruises to Its Second Long Island Class AA Title in Three Years
By Nakeem Grant If there was any doubt that there would be a letdown after their tooth-and-nail series victory over Northport, that was put to rest right away. West Islip dominated in the Class AA Long Island Championship– defeating East Meadow 16-0 at Farmingdale State College. West Islip’s offense and pitching left the game in no doubt as they kept their foot on the pedal throughout the game. Twelve of West Islip’s 16 runs came in the first three innings of the ballgame with most of the damage coming from the core of their lineup. Jake Guercio, James Kory, and Jimmy Mattera each had multi-RBI games and as a team, they racked up 12 hits. According to today’s winning pitcher, Ray Weber, this is another typical game for their offense. “All year we’ve been great on offense putt...
Bobby Hegarty Throws a Gem in Class A Long Island Championship
by Vinny Messana Being a sophomore, Anthony Fontana hasn’t faced too many pro-caliber pitchers yet. It took him just one at bat to adjust to Sam Kessler‘s stuff and he laced an RBI single to right field in the third inning which extended Wantagh‘s lead to 2-0 at the time, and proved to be the game-winning run that delivered their first Long Island Championship since 2010. “OH MY GOD–An experience I’ll never forget,” said the sophomore first baseman. Both teams went quietly offensively through the first two innings. Sam Kessler, who entered with eight wins, and will be headed to West Virginia this summer–if he does not get drafted next week–got the start for the Mustangs. He pumped fastballs in the high 80s and mixed it with a hellacious...
