Carl Yastrzemski Award
Where Are They Now Powered by The BK7 Brand: Rob Rizzo
(Editor’s Note: This is second installment of the “Where Are They Now” series in which we highlight standout players from previous generations. Last week, we highlighted Kyle Gelling of West Islip.) Getting to play baseball professionally is a dream for just about every kid that ever steps foot on a field. Half Hollow Hills West alum Rob Rizzo had finished up his collegiate career at Lynn University in Boca Raton when his head coach called him asking if he wanted to play overseas in Italy. Rizzo did not hesitate to say yes. He hopped on a flight and played baseball in the Serie A1 League for 3 months until the season ended. With that, his career ended with what he called a “three month vacation in Italy.” It was a soft landing to his career which had included ...
Recap of 2022 Suffolk All-County Award Banquet
The annual Suffolk County Awards Banquet returned for the first time since 2019 at Villa Lombardi’s in Holbrook after a two-year hiatus due to covid. It was attended by roughly 700 people and featured the best players and coaches in our region. The highest honor of the night went to Pat-Med junior Josh Knoth who was the 54th annual recipient of the Carl Yastrzemski Award. The award is given to the top player in Suffolk County and the previous winners are littered with players that enjoyed successful professional – and in some cases big league – careers. Knoth was the runaway winner. He set a school record with 107 strikeouts and during the regular season and a ridiculous K/BB ratio of 93/4 with only 10 hits allowed and 0.86 ERA. If you watched him pitch, it’s more ...
Where Are They Now: Alec Sole
Trailing West Islip in the first round of their playoff game, things weren’t looking too promising for the Arrows of Sachem North. While they were one of the top teams in League 2 all 2011, all it takes is running into one hot team in the single-elimination postseason to end a season. That all changed with a late-inning rally that delivered a 3-2 victory that helped stave off elimination and propel them into the next round of the playoffs. Once that happened, the team would never look back. “After that victory, we said to ourselves ‘alright we’re gonna win this thing’, said Alec Sole, as he reminisced on the best season of his life. The Arrows went on a hot-streak from that point on, rattling off consecutive wins against Northport, Pat-Med and Eastport-South M...
Mike O’Reilly Working Hard At Driveline To Return To Pro Ball
It’s hard to fathom exactly how clutch Mike O’Reilly was during the 2012 Suffolk County Class A postseason run. The Shoreham-Wading River RHP/3B was a force of nature. He hit walk-off home runs against Rocky Point and Sayville, with the latter HR coming with the team trailing 1-0 in extra innings. He had another game in which he crushed a bases-clearing double to stave off elimination. On the mound, he was just as dominant. The hard-throwing righty fired 22 consecutive shutout innings including a 10 inning shutout in the Class A Long Island Championship against Tyler Manez and Plainedge. Their magic would finally run out in the 11th inning when Plainedge put up a three-spot to win 3-1 and head to the New York State tournament. He captured the 45th Carl Yastrzemski Award, becomi...
Mike Ciminiello Sr. Hoping His Son’s Team Experiences Same Success As He Did in 1990
Smithtown has always had a rich tradition of baseball. In fact, there is a chance this season only adds to that prestige with their talented roster that features arguably the deepest pitching staff on Long Island and a number of impact bats such as Will Kennedy, the Harvey twins, Ryan Pennisi and others. Despite all the success in recent years, the 1990 team remains their last New York State Championship, although they did win the Suffolk County titles in 1999 & 2000. That 1990 team defeated Farmingdale to win the Long Island Championship and kept their momentum rolling right through the NYS tournament. The star of that team has a direct connection to this Smithtown East team. Mike Ciminiello, a very talented southpaw that was the winning pitcher on April 3 against rival Smithtown West...
Where Are They Now: Rick Vichroski, 1983 Recipient of the Yaz Award
It’s been 36 years since Northport has won a Suffolk County Championship. They came awfully close in 2016, when they were defeated in three games by West Islip, but they came away just short. In 1983, when John DeMartini was still the JV coach, they not only won Suffolk County, but defeated Bethpage in the Long Island Championship. The winning pitcher in that game? Rick Vichroski. Rick improved his record to 12-0 that season, his third year on varsity. The Tigers leaned on his arm heavily that season, as he accounted for 46 percent of his team’s wins on the way to an appearance in the New York State semifinals. Vichroski, 53, is now the owner/operator of Human Healthy Vending and lives in Rhode Island, but his memories of his playing days are still cherished. And they did not e...
Brian Morrell Caps Outstanding Career With Second Carl Yastrzemski Award
The bar was already set pretty high for Shoreham-Wading River athletes when Brian Morrell stepped foot on the high school field for the first time. They already had Keith Osik (1987) and Mike O’Reilly (2012) win the coveted Carl Yastrzemski Award. Even with that, Morrell re-wrote the school’s record books during his remarkable five-year career. He graduates as the program-leader in career games played (123), at bats (476), hits (164), doubles (34), triples (8), home runs (26), RBI (124), runs scored (134) and total bases 292). He won 23 games on the mound with 295 K over 213 IP and a 1.15 ERA. Head Coach Kevin Willi stated that while he was “clearly the best player the program has ever had”, you would never know it by how he carried himself. “For a five-year v...
