NVDaily article:
A chance at the big time: MLB hopefuls perform in front of scouts
http://www.nvdaily.com/sports/...uls-perform-in-f.phpMLB DREAMS ON DISPLAY FOR SCOUTS AT BRIDGEFORTH
July 20, 2012
By ROBERT NIEDZWIECKI
The Winchester Star
WINCHESTER — The last few months have been somewhat frustrating for former Winchester Royal Gabe Ortiz.
During the middle of his senior season at Virginia Tech, Ortiz, dreaming of being drafted by a Major League Baseball team just like the rest of his peers, tore the posterior cruciate ligament in his knee. And in June, the draft went by without his name being called.
Finally recovered, Ortiz made his first stab at attending a MLB Scouting Bureau tryout camp last month by making a seven-hour drive to Kentucky, only to see it canceled because of weather.
The good news for Ortiz was that MLB held 13 such camps across the country this summer, giving hundreds of athletes like him a chance to showcase their skills in front of scouts and continue their dreams of playing professional baseball.
And the fact that the last camp of the summer was at Winchester’s Bridgeforth Field — home of the Valley League Baseball Royals — made Thursday’s event that much sweeter.
“I love baseball too much to just give it up,” said Ortiz, a 23-year-old outfielder who hit .302 in 41 starts for the 2009 Royals, when he was a teammate of current manager Steve Sabins and assistant coach Bobby Rauh. “I decided to give it another try and see what happens, and try to change my luck.
“When I heard it was Winchester, I was like, ‘I’ve been there, I’ve hit there, I’ve played there, so that’s awesome.’ [Coming here], I felt like I was back at home.”
Home was a lot more crowded Thursday than it was in Ortiz’s Royals days, however.
With no participation fee, 164 players tried out in Winchester in hot and sunny conditions. The city was selected to host because Brad Fidler, the MLB Mid-Atlantic Scout who ran Thursday’s camp, has frequently worked with the Valley Baseball League, which is sponsored in part by MLB.
Fidler contacted former Royals president and current official scorer Jim Phillips about hosting, and he put Fidler in contact with Winchester Parks and Recreation.
There were players as old as 36 and as young as 15 (Sherando catcher Chase Smallwood, a rising junior); former Minor League players like Ryan Meade (Kansas City Royals); recent college graduates who formerly played in the Valley League, like Ortiz; current college and Valley League players and other high-schoolers.
Perhaps most notably to local fans, recent Sherando graduate and Winchester Star Baseball Player of the Year Tre Porter was in attendance.
He will play football at Hargrave Military Academy this fall, but showed he could still have a bright future in baseball by being one of nine infielders and outfielders who were asked to stay for the entire tryout, which lasted about 31⁄2hours.
The 18-year-old Porter, a shortstop, ran the fastest 60-yard dash (6.58 seconds) of anyone in attendance.
Some scouts from actual Major League teams attend the camps — Gene Kerns of the Atlanta Braves stopped by Thursday because he lives in Hagerstown, Md. — but the main reason MLB holds them is so pro scouts don’t have to.
The MLB scouts who run them write up reports on the players they think are legitimate prospects, and make them available to all 30 teams. Teams that are interested in those players will then contact them to set up their own tryouts and decide whether to sign them to contracts.
Fidler said he ran a camp in Hagerstown last year that saw two players eventually signed to pro contracts. But he said it’s unreasonable to ever expect many more players than that to get serious interest from a given tryout. Typically, he said, 70 percent of attendees are college players — most of whom have recently exhausted their eligibility — and 30 percent are high-schoolers.
“For those kids who think, ‘Oh, I didn’t get a fair look [in school],’ or, ‘Maybe somebody doesn’t know about me,’ or maybe they didn’t play in college because of an injury, whatever the situation may be, this is their opportunity,” said Fidler, though he acknowledged that he rarely recommends players 23 and over because most serious prospects should be in Double A or even Triple A at that point, not starting their pro careers.
“That’s why I like doing this, because it’s a chance for them to go out and showcase their ability.”
With so many players in attendance at the camps, Fidler has to set some standards to get through them.
While the pitchers and catchers were off to the side working on the bullpen mounds Thursday, tryouts began with infielders and outfielders — who start off facing sideways as if they’re in their leading off first base — running the 60-yard dash. Fidler wants to see players run it in seven seconds or less to consider them prospects, though he’ll cut first and third basemen some slack since speed isn’t as important at those spots.
From there, Fidler had the outfielders throw from right field to third base and home, hoping to see them throw hard on a line rather than far with a high arc. Infield practice followed as second basemen, shortstops and third basemen took grounders and threw to first from short. For Fidler, it was most important to see good footwork and active feet, in addition to seeing strong and accurate throwing arms.
With pitchers, Fidler wanted to see them throw in the 90-91 mph range, but he’s not going to expect a 16-year-old lefthander to throw that fast. He said MLB wants to see hard throwers, so unless their secondary pitches are off the charts, sub-90 hurlers likely won’t be recommended.
He and fellow scout Don Kohler, who was in charge of pitchers Thursday, were particularly impressed with Jake Roberts of St. Joseph’s College (Ind.), a 21-year-old who throws 94 mph.
When all the fielding drills were over with, there were only nine players left among the more than 80 infielders and outfielders who started the day, including Porter and Ortiz. By making the cut, they were allowed to take batting practice.
Porter took his first and, admittedly nervous, fouled his first two pitches off the top of the batting cage, then hit a grounder toward short on his third swing. He then began to show some opposite-field power, before driving his last two swings to center. The second-to-last shot one-hopped the center-field fence.
Porter heard about the tryout from a family friend, and he was glad he showed up.
“There’s a lot of great guys out here,” he said. “To be out here and make the first cut, it showed me something, that I can actually play with some of the guys.”
Porter was particularly pleased with his running, especially since he got caught checking his footing on the ground when he was supposed to start running, allowing the person he was running against to get a head start. He was glad for that, though.
“I kind of let him go ahead of me so I could have something to chase, and go a little harder,” he said.
Shortly after, Ortiz took his cuts and hit two home runs, including one to center. Not a bad finish in his return home.
“It was about what I was hoping for,” he said. “Hopefully, I got some attention from it.”
— Contact Robert Niedzwiecki at rniedzwiecki@winchesterstar.com
