Webster-Thomas wins again

Yesterday, Dan Fetes won the Hammer. Today, Matt Casilio took home the award. Both are Webster-Thomas grads. Matt has had a strong showing this fall, and put together another solid day. Nothing spectacular, just executes the routine very well. His team has not lost in recent memory.

Move over Dillon Lowe and Ian Gallagher -- there's some new State Champs in town!

Saturday promises to be fun. Larson v. Sturm -- bragging rights for the roommates. Following the intersquad, the alumni game will take place.

Execute the Routine

At the top of every practice schedule is the phrase "Execute the Routine". The great players have the ability to accomplish the routine aspects of the game every time. The focus of Frioday's intersquad was executing the routine plays -- a list of executions was provided to each team: bunts, pitchouts, hit and runs and pickoff plays were some of the required aspects of the intersquad.

We got off to a slow start. The Buslines team whiffed on it's first two attempts at bunts for a hit. Trying to be too quick instead of getting the ball down. We saw a couple of popups to the catcher on hit and runs. After a little conditioning to re-focus, execution improved. We executed three hit and runs and bunting improved.

In Fitz's first attempt at a hit and run, he popped up. His next attempt resulted in a ground ball. He also added a triple in the gap -- he made the adjustment. Great to see.

The Crushers downed the Buslines (I think it was a 7-2 final). Tommy Morris went seven strong for the Crushers and improved as the game went on. Kenny Johnston added three more hits and continues to be an Energy Giver. Newcomer Matt Casilio continues to play the game well. The Webster Thomas lefties can hit!

Fridays Hammer ended up with Dan Fetes. Four hits. It seemed Dan saw good pitches to hit all day. The key was he did not miss them. He also worked the count well and saw a lot of pitches and executed a hit and run. Dan's strength as a player is that he is determined to do what is asked of him. He gave a solid speech, but still not near what Jordan Hibbard used to deliver.

Run with the wise

Brian Sheehan talks about our progress with Fitz.

"Run with the wise"

For the first time we have introduced a Quote of the Week where we ask three players to answer what a specific quote means to them. This week, Ian Gallagher, Brian Sheehan and Steven Sturm were chosen to interpret "Run with the wise".

"This quote means that you should surround yourself with people whom will give you the best chance to succeed.  These people should be hard workers, should stay out of trouble, and should be able to help you with any questions you have."

"To me, run with the wise means associating your self with people who conduct themselves the right way on and off the field. Allowing their influence to effect you in a positive way can help spread that positive behavior throughout a team, which can benefit every player. Influence is a very powerful tool and can change the outcome of a season."

"Run with the wise means to follow those who are trying to make themselves better and are pushing themselves every day, not only in the game of baseball but in life as well."

You will take on the personality of the people you surround yourself with. Associate with positive people and avoid relationships with those that bring you down. Run with the wise.

Weekend highlights

We were able to intersquad on Friday. Brian Sheehan took home the Hammer with three doubles. Both junior Nate Lester and freshman Ryan Metz looked sharp on the hill with six solid innings.

Unfortunately, Saturday was a washout with the rain. Beautiful weather all week and rain on Saturday. All I can think about is Al Schoeneck quoting Rogers Hornsby: "People ask me what I do all winter when there's no baseball. I'll tell you what I do. I stare out the window and wait for spring."

It wasn't quite winter, but I spent Saturday staring out the window waiting to play.

In full swing

The Devils have shown the Need for Speed, swiping third base four times on Saturday.

We played our first intersquads this weekend. Friday saw us squeeze out three innings in the rain before conditions forced us to adjust.

Big Cat Lawrence took home the Hammer for a pair of RBI knocks. Coach Greco had the team work on hitting the other way during the week, and Lawrence drove a couple of balls to the right side. All but one our our hits was the other way on Friday. Lawrence spoke of his motivation being the Florida trip and SUNYAC play this year.

Saturday we looked sharp all the way around. Pitchers pounded the strike zone, we  ran the bases agressively and had many solid hitting performances. Some great D, too. Each pitcher threw around 50 pitches live, then went to the bullpen to simulate two more innings.

Evan Carmello took home the Hammer. He tossed 3 2/3 and threw under 40 pitches. He's back for his sophomore season, and made a nice improvement with his karate-chop curveball. Unfortunately, he was at the tennis courts covering our home match for me after his outing. Practice started late and ran long with Friday's shortened effort. We tried to have him make his speech via cellphone, but that did not pan out too well. We'll have him address the squad Wednesday.

Day 1: Completed

We just finished our first day of practice and a lot of the returnees showed some positive signs. We did some hitting, pre-grame, four line fungos and double plays to start the day off. Pitchers went over with head coach Matt Palisin to work on covering first base also known as PFP's in our program. They did some bands and worked on long tossing properly. We ended practice with speed camp while we recapped everything that happened today. It was a solid first day but many things need to be worked on like our hit and runs and double play timing. We talked with two of our players to get some insight on the first day and the above video is what they had to say. Ian Gallagher and Connor Lorenzo have some high hopes.

Alicia's newborn baby boy!

A special congratulations to Alicia our trainer who has recently given birth to a baby boy.  Alicia is always at our home games helping us out with ice for our arms, rehabs, stretching and taping whenever we need it. She even bakes us delicious brownies once in a while as well. Our program would like to send our congrats and best wishes to Alicia and her new family and hope to see her back in action sometime soon.