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Tournaments | Story | 10/2/2020

Cannon arms carry loaded CBA

Jeff Dahn

Photo: Christopher Scinta (Perfect Game)

FORT MYERS, Fla. – It is impossible to underestimate the value of a deep and talented pitching staff at a Perfect Game national championship tournament and the Cannons Baseball Academy 2022 American put some cannon arms on display here Friday.

Playing their first two games at the 19^th annual PG WWBA Underclass World Championship at the cloudy, cool and comfortable Terry Park Complex near this city’s historic downtown River District, the CBA 2022 American proved cannon balls can be delivered from the arms of pitchers as effectively as from the bats of hitters.

Thanks to exceptional starting pitching from 2022 lefthanders Christopher Scinta and Alex Walsh, the Cannons 2022 Americans let it be known they just may have the goods to make a deep playoff run this weekend, especially if their hitters get around to unpacking their bats.

“In our last tournament it took us a couple of days for (the hitters) to get warmed-up,” Walsh told PG after completing his outing early Friday afternoon. “But our pitching staff always keeps us (in it) and if we can get two or three runs every game we usually get the win.”

That was definitely the case on the second day of play at the PG WWBA Under World, with Fort Lauderdale, Fla.-based CBA 2022 American getting past North East Baseball, 3-0, in the day’s lid-lifter before dispatching the Iowa Sticks Scout 2022, 6-1, in the nightcap.

Seven Cannons BA pitchers limited the hitters from those two teams to a total of one run on five hits over 14 innings of play. The Cannons hitters weren’t that much more productive, totaling just eight hits – three against NEB and five against the Iowa Sticks – in the pair of wins. The run total was boosted in game two because Sticks pitchers issued seven bases on balls.

“There are just so many high-level ballclubs here,” CBA founder and head coach Nick James told PG after watching his team get stymied by NEB 2022 lefty Dakota Stone in the opener.

“You come out for an 8 a.m. game with the wind blowing in and you’re facing a lefty who’s 87 (mph) touching 92 in the first inning, it’s going to be tough on all the offenses the entire day,” he said. “We were fortunate enough to scrape a couple across early and then our pitching and defense kept us in it.”

James could have said the same thing after watching his team win its second game of the day, as well, but there was no denying that it was the outstanding starting effort put forth by Christopher Scinta that carried the day against NEB.

Scinta, a 6-foot-1, 210 pound Miami commit ranked as a top-500 national prospect in the class of 2022, threw five no-hit shutout innings with eight strikeouts and one walk. He issued that walk with one out in the bottom of the first (it came via strikeout) and then retired the next 15 batters he faced, seven of them punch-outs.

“My mindset was to pound the zone; just put the ball in play and let them hit it,” Scinta told PG postgame. “The changeup was on, the curveball was on, so I was locating. I knew their strengths so I just kept them off-balance.”

“Chris is such a tremendous competitor,” James added. “Not only does he have great stuff but he’s just so into it; he has the ability to throw pitches in any count. Lefty, righty it doesn’t matter who he’s facing he always wants the ball.

“He wants to attack guys and he goes about his business very seriously but doesn’t take himself too seriously. When we give the ball to him we know what kind of outing we’re going to get.”

Another Miami recruit, the No. 455-ranked righthander Cole Derks, threw the sixth and allowed one hit while striking out two, and lefty Brandon Barriera, a 2022 Vanderbilt commit ranked No. 5 overall nationally, pitched a 1-2-3 seventh, striking out two.

It was more of the same against the Iowa Sticks with James marching out, in order, the left-hander Walsh (No. 425, Texas Tech), righthander Jake Clemente (No. 244, Florida) and righty Brandon Gonsalves (t-500, UCF).

Walsh almost matched Scinta’s effort, allowing one run on three hits while striking out seven and walking one in 4 1/3 innings. Clemente pitched 1 1/3 innings of hitless shutout ball, striking out three and walking one and Gonsalves allowed a hit, struck-out one and walked one his inning of work.

“We all try to be great; we try to push each other to be better,” Walsh said of the relationship the pitchers enjoy with each other. “We all battle with each other just to become better and compete for outings. It’s a real good environment.”

As mentioned previously, the Cannons’ bats were fairly quiet in the two wins. They scored all three of their runs in the opener in the top of the second on the strength of a leadoff single from Jonathan Gonzalez, an RBI fielder’s choice groundout from Joseph Toman, three walks, an error and a passed ball.

Erik Blair doubled, singled and scored a run, Scinta had an RBI single and Miguel Sosa delivered a sacrifice fly to provide the offensive highlights in game two. But don’t expect the bats to stay silent moving into the weekend – this team is just too talented.

James founded the Cannons Baseball Academy in 2004 and it was initially based in Jacksonville. He has been a high school educator and coach for more than 20 years and was the head coach at Westminster Academy in Fort Lauderdale from 2009-19.

“I was a high school coach for a long time and obviously South Florida is a very tough market to be a baseball coach and have good programs,” he said. “We really started out with our youth program and with the bulk of these guys, like Brandon Barriera, who’s been with us since he was 10 years old.

“We’ve brought them up and here we are six or seven years later and we feel like we’ve gained a reputation for working hard and trying to do things the right way, and really developing guys so they can be successful.”

James told PG that, for the most part, this team is a collection of young prospects who have been playing together “forever”. With few exceptions they all come from the Fort Lauderdale and Miami areas of South Florida and they’ve grown up playing side-by-side on the same travel ball teams. That is especially true among the top guns who makeup this CBA 2022 American pitching staff.

Other highly regarded arms rostered with this ballclub include (all 2022s) righthander Evan Dobias (No. 88, Virginia) and righty Logan Plasencia (No. 134, uncommitted); corner-infielder Adrian Dominguez (No. 185, Miami) is also rostered but did not play Friday.

“It’s just part of the culture,” James said when asked what makes this team special. “They’ve been together, they train together, and we’re fortunate enough to be able to work out in an indoor facility. These guys get in there and they get after it; they push each other to make each other better. The saying iron sharpens iron is 100 percent accurate with our arms for sure.”

Even though these guys are still juniors in high school, they’ve already played a lot of baseball both with their high school teams in the spring and with their travel ball teams in the summer and fall (2020 not with-standing).

They’ve become used to the amateur baseball grind, used to the double-headers and rain delays, used to the long days and equally long nights. James feels like it’s his responsibility and the responsibility of his assistant coaches to try to help these young players with their preparation more than anything else.

“Their skillsets obviously speak for themselves and so we’re just trying to hone-in on some small areas where we can help them understand the situations of the game and understand situational baseball,” he said. “Again, their athleticism and just their raw talent is obvious and apparent; it speaks for itself.”

When assembling a roster such as this, James explained that he and his staff are looking first and foremost for kids of high character that come from families who value and want to understand further the process involved with college recruiting.

It’s a testament to these players and their families, James said, that most of them have been with the Cannons Baseball Academy for five, six and even seven years, longevity that proves they’ve bought-in big-time and never really gave much thought to being sellers.

James emphasizes that the people involved with the Cannons Baseball Academy love the developmental side of this process and they love trying to help their players find the college fit that will ultimately work the best for them in the long-term.

For some, that might come in the form of a scholarship offer from a powerhouse D-I school in the SEC or ACC and for others it just might come in the form of an offer from D-II, D-III or NAIA schools. Every young man has his own set of priorities and there are many who will make their choices based on academics over baseball.

“Everybody develops at a different time in this process and everybody’s recruitment process is different,” James said. “A lot of it is just education because there’s so much noise out there. Credit to our families that they’ve done a great job listening to what we think is a good path for them.”

“This is a family,” Scinta said of the team’s personality. “Everyone knows each other well and we just play with heart and passion. I’ve known these guys for a while and it’s like a family.”

The feeling of family, even as powerful as it is, will only take a team so far at an event like the PG WWBA Underclass World Championship. James called baseball “such a game of focus” and knows that in the days ahead his ballclub will be running into many of the best underclass teams in the country.

He’s going to ask his players to lock-in on every pitch while also realizing that is sometimes the hardest thing for these young guys to understand. If, in fact, they can learn how to play the game one pitch at a time and stay focused, James said, the results typically take care of themselves.

Alex Walsh, the talented Texas Tech recruit and winning pitcher in Friday’s second game, felt like he was energized by the performance of Christopher Scinta in the game just before the one he threw. Maybe just feeding off every positive performance that preceded the next one up really can be enough to carry the day.

“We had a lot of momentum coming into this game; we came out early and got a couple of runs,” Walsh said of game two. “My defense did well out there with no errors and my catcher did really well today … and we were able to win the game. We just wanted to stay concentrated and get a couple of ‘dubs’. We want to get into Sunday and make sure that we do make it into the playoffs.”

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