FORT MYERS, Fla. – By early afternoon on Thursday, the players and coaches that are members of the Team Elite 15u Prime ballclub could be found wearing their “PG BCS National Champions” T-shirts with the same cool confidence – with the same class, really – with which they had worn the figurative targets attached to the backs of their Team Elite uniforms for 10 games over the past seven days.
Playing at jetBlue Park, the top-seeded Elite 15u Prime – featuring an imposing roster with 13 prospects from the class of 2020 ranked in the top-105 nationally – overcame an early 1-0 deficit by pushing across four runs in the bottom of the fourth inning, and held off the No. 7 Elite Squad 15u Prime for a 5-3 victory in the championship game at the 15u Perfect Game BCS National Championship.
The Elite 15u Prime completed their week's worth of work with a dominant 10-0-0 record, outscoring its six pool-play opponents by a combined 61-6 and its four playoff foes by a combined 30-8. Five of the 10 wins – including the first two playoff victories – came by shutouts.
“This is just really a lot of fun,” Elite 15u Prime’s No. 37-ranked 2020 catcher/third baseman Jack Bulger said after pulling himself away from a celebratory dog-pile out on the jetBlue Park pitchers’ mound. “Everyone on this team is really talented and it’s just a lot of fun playing with them; it’s a great experience.”
Team Elite 15u Prime head coach Brooke Richards noted that many of these top 2020 prospects have been with the program and have been playing together for two or three years now, and he came to know early on it was special group.
He could feel their positive energy – their desire to accomplish something special – even before they played their first game at the 15u PG BCS National Championship. He sensed they had come to Southwest Florida to earn a PG national championship trophy and PG national championship rings and not to spend a week vacationing on the beach.
“They talked about it all week. They talked about this dog-pile at the end of the championship game and they achieved their goals,” Richards said. “It’s a special group of kids and I couldn’t be more proud of them and more excited for them. This is about them and this has nothing to with the coaching staff here, this is about these kids and what they’ve done.”
The Squad 15u Prime (7-3-0) took a 1-0 lead in the top of the fourth inning when Giuseppe Ferraro and Riley Rosario delivered back-to-back, two-out singles, but the lead was short-lived. The Elite 15u Prime came back with four in the bottom half of the frame, the first two coming on a throwing error after Kellum Clark laid down a perfect bunt, and the next two coming across on RBI singles from Bulger and Dalton Porter.
Undeterred, the Squad 15u Prime got back on the board when Jake Isenman led-off the top of the fifth with a double and came around on an RBI single from Kolby Avens. Elite 15u Prime negated that run when Bulger came through with his second RBI single of the game in the bottom half of the fifth.
The Squad 15u Prime added a single run in the top of the seventh thanks to an Isenman single, a walk, an error and a hit batsman, but could get no closer than the 5-3 final. 2020 left-hander Wyatt Crowell got the start for the Elite 15u Prime and was the most effective of the day’s pitchers, allowing two unearned runs on four hits and striking out five without issuing a walk in four innings of work.
Bulger, a 5-foot-11, 195-pound solidly built athlete from Bowie, Md., who will be a sophomore at Dematha Catholic High School in Hyattsville, Md., in the fall, went 3-for-3 with two RBI in the championship game.
It capped what certainly ranks as one of the most ridiculously productive offensive performances in 15u PG BCS National Championship history. He finished 17-for-26 (.654) with six doubles, 11 singles, nine RBI and two stolen bases, and was named the tournament’s Most Valuable Player.
“I was feeling really comfortable; I was going the other way well,” Bulger said. “I got pitched outside a lot and then when they came in, I was able to drive the ball down the line. I struggled during one (pool-play) game and then I was able to turn it back on for the playoffs; I was just seeing the ball big – seeing beach-balls it seemed like – at the plate.”
At least four of his Elite 15u Prime teammates also enjoyed MVP-caliber tournaments, with Luke A. Wagner (.522), Treyjyn Fletcher (.478), Robert Moore (.435) and Alek Boychuk (.421) all hitting .421 or better while combining for 14 extra-base hits and 33 RBI. Moore, the son of Kansas City Royals general manager Dayton Moore, not only hit .435 with four extra-base hits and eight RBI but also stole eight bases in 10 games.
Alex Edmondson, a 6-foot-2, 195-pound right-hander from Simpsonville, S.C., made two appearances and threw 7 2/3 innings of three-hit ball for the Elite 15u Prime over the past week, and allowed just one earned run (0.90 ERA) while striking out 12 and walking four; he was named the Most Valuable Pitcher.
“This is just so awesome; this group of guys is amazing,” Edmondson said. “Everybody on this team can hit the ball or throw strikes every day, and it’s just over and over and over; it’s just awesome.”
As far as playing with a target on their backs, these young prospects have already been in the national spotlight for at least a year or two and they genuinely embrace the challenge.
“We come out every game just kind of thinking that we’re the team to beat and we try not to let anybody down,” Bulger said. Indeed, those Team Elite jerseys seem to come with the target already sown-in, and that’s just fine with these guys.
“You know you’re going to come out here and compete against the best teams in the country every day, and knowing you’re one of the best teams in the country, it’s great,” Edmondson said. “We love (having the target on our backs) because everyone is coming right at us; we just love it.”
The coaching staff certainly understands the expectations and it embraces them, as well. They assembled this Elite 15u Prime team with the definitive purpose of winning PG national championships and they want to keep the program at the level – the highest level – where everyone is gunning for them.
“I think there are a lot of people who want to come out and watch us play, and see the big arms that we have and all the great bats,” Richards said. “We try to stay focused on what we’re doing in between the lines and teaching these guys to not worry about the radar guns and to not worry about the college scouts right now.
“We want them to focus on playing the game of baseball and playing it the right way, and our guys have bought into that this summer,” he said. “I think that’s the big reason we’re holding the trophy at the end of the day.”
The summer season is winding down for both the Team Elite 15u Prime and the Elite Squad 15u Prime, but two big events remain. Both teams will be in attendance at the 15u PG WWBA National Championship July 14-21 and many of these players will be included on combined Team Elite and Elite Squad rosters at the 15u PG World Series July 25-29. Both events will be contested at the LakePoint complex in Emerson, Ga.
By winning the 15u PG BCS National Championship, the Team Elite 15u Prime can expect to still be wearing that target on their backs when they stroll into PG Park South-LakePoint for those two blockbuster tournaments at the end of the month.
“I think these guys are as hungry as ever,” Richards said. “I think these guys want to prove that they’re the number-one (15u) team in the country this year and I think we have the talent (to make that claim). These guys are really hungry and they’ll want to get after it at the WWBA and World Series a little later on this summer.”
2017 15u BCS National Championship runner-up: Elite Squad 15u Prime
2017 15u BCS National Championship MVP: Jack Bulger
2017 15u BCS National Championship MV-Pitcher: Alex Edmondson
