GLENDALE, Ariz. – The members of the Warriors Baseball Academy (WBA) 2018 squad came into this holiday weekend’s 16u PG WWBA West Memorial Day Classic older, wiser and more physically mature then they were when they arrived at last year’s 14u PG WWBA West Memorial Day Classic.
The hope, at least in the minds of the young players and head coach John Navarro, is an extra year of seasoning will translate into WBA 2018 taking one more step in the tournament playoff bracket as 15-year-olds then they were able to take a year ago as 14-year-olds.
Sunday morning, playing on its beautiful backyard fields at the Camelback Ranch Complex, Glendale-based WBA 2018 made its first move towards taking that next step.
Quarterfinal-round games of the playoffs at the 16u PG WWBA West Memorial Day Classic were played at Camelback Ranch Sunday, and Warriors Baseball Academy 2018 improved to 4-0 and advanced to Monday’s semifinals with a resounding 12-2 win over the Peoria-based Desert Cats (2-1-1). In its four games played over the last three days, WBA 2018 outscored its opponents by a combined 40-5.
“We’ve got a great bunch of kids, we’ve got a great team,” Navarro said after watching his squad thump the Desert Cats thanks to five runs in each of the sixth and seventh innings. “They all work well together; we’ve got great chemistry. Everybody picks each other up and we’re never negative with anybody. We just stay positive with each other.
“They’ve been showing great fundamentals and it’s been a great team effort,” he continued. “There’s never one guy that wins our games for us, it’s a team effort. We’re going to win as a team and we’re going to lose as a team, as long as we stick together.”
The core of this CBA 2018 roster is the same group that finished 5-1 after losing to Team Phenom from Moreno Valley, Calif., in the championship game at last year’s 14u PG WWBA WMDC.
Six players – outfielder/right-hander Griffin Hampton, right-hander/corner-infielder Antonio Brito, first baseman/right-hander Dominik Demarbiex, catcher/right-hander Jacob Robson, catcher/corner-infielder Jack Silverman and left-hander/outfielder Sasha Sneider, all 2018s – were named to last year’s 14u WMDC all-tournament team.
Each one of those players, along with a couple of others, has been instrumental in WBA 2018’s return to this year’s final four, albeit in a different age-group. The squad is hitting .340 as a team with 12 of its 34 hits going for extra bases, and the pitching staff has compiled a 0.86 ERA over 25 innings.
Hampton is 4-for-8 (.500) with a double, a triple, four RBI and six runs scored, and pitched five shutout innings allowing four hits. Demarbiex is 5-for-11 (.455) with two doubles, six RBI and three runs scored, and while he allowed an earned run on two hits in two innings of work, he got five of his six outs via punch-out.
“It’s weird coming off my high school season and not facing all that great of arms and facing all these pretty good arms out here makes a big difference,” Hampton said. “This has been a great experience.”
Silverman is 4-for-11 (.364) with a double, a long home run against the Desert Cats, six RBI and three runs. Sneider is 4-for-12 at the plate with a couple of doubles and has been dominant on the mound, throwing 4 2/3 no-hit, shutout innings in two appearances with 10 strikeouts and one walk.
2018 shortstop/right-hander Reid McLaughlin was not with WBA 2018 at last year’s 14u WMDC but he did play in three other tournaments with the team in 2014 and earned all-tournament recognition at the 14u PG MLK Championship. He has been big this weekend, going 5-for-10 (.500) with two doubles, six RBI and four runs.
“This has been great,” he said. “I’ve made lots of new friends and I’ve had a good time since I’ve been here, and I just really enjoy it. We’re all coming off of our high school seasons and we’ve kind of picked up right where we’ve left off. Our offense has been really good and we’re getting good swings on the ball.”
Navarro describes this team as a very “loose” group and that’s what the staff at Warriors Baseball Academy encourages with its players. They generally perform at a higher level when they’re loose and relaxed as opposed to playing tight, and it can be beneficial to have a short memory. If mistakes are made – and they inevitably will be – forget about it and move on to the next pitch.
“We’re just going to live one pitch at a time on defense and we’re going to compete one pitch at a time at the plate; we’re going to trying to win every pitch we can,” Navarro said.
“We’re pretty loose but we can be serious at times when we need to be; it’s all about having fun,” Hampton said. “We’re all friends and I would want to play with anybody else.”
This Warriors Baseball Academy 2018 group is made up entirely of players that just completed their freshmen year in high school. Warriors Baseball Academy 2017, a team comprised of players right out of their sophomore years, also competed at the 16u PG WWBA West Memorial Day Classic this weekend but finished 0-2-1 and didn’t advance to the eight-team playoffs.
It has been standard practice at WBA to keep its players together by class and never move individuals up or down regardless of age. That system breeds familiarity among teammates and has certainly paid dividends with this 2018 group, which has had its core players together since they were 11 or 12 years old. This roster was actually trimmed from 14 down to 11 in an effort to get each one of the young men more playing time this weekend.
Damion Easley played 17 seasons in the big leagues – including some part-time duties with the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2006 – and started Warrior Baseball Academy about six years ago after his playing career came to a close in 2008. Navarro had known Easley through the years and went to work at WBA as soon as it was established.
“It’s not all about only baseball, it’s an all-around thing for us; it’s about making your life easier later on,” Navarro said. “If somebody’s going to offer you a scholarship to go play baseball and get a college education, nobody can say what’s going to happen in the future but if you can get that college education it’s going to maybe make your life a little easier.”
Monday’s semifinal round at the 16u PG WWBA WMDC is set, with Warriors Baseball Academy 2018 (4-0-0) facing Nor Cal Young Guns 15u (4-0-0) from Escalon, Calif.at 8:30 a.m. on Sox Field 5 at Camelback. The other semi pits the AZ Athletics (4-0-0) from Peoria against MWBA Horns Select (4-0-0) out of Cottonwood Heights, Utah, at 8:30 a.m. on Sox Field 6.
Navarro insists Warriors Baseball Academy doesn’t dwell on winning tournament championships but instead concentrates on helping the young prospects get better. If the WBA coaches do their job the winning will come, and if they teach the fundamentals and have everyone moving in the right direction, championships will be the result. The players have always bought in.
“We figured out what it meant to be in a championship (game) and it was a pretty big deal. We lost last year so we’re looking to come back and win it this time,” the veteran Hampton said.
“We’ve always had high expectations,” McLaughlin added. “We expect a lot from (ourselves) and that’s how our coaches teach us to be. We always want to make it to a championship (game) and win it. I can’t wait for (Monday) and the rest of the summer.”