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The College Baseball Blog covered the Cape Cod Baseball League All-Star game for the third straight summer and second straight at Fenway Park. The Western Division used a strong group of pitchers to grab a 5-0 victory over the Eastern Division in front of 10,470 fans. Arizona State’s Zach Wilson was named the Western Division MVP after going 1-5 with an RBI double while Caleb Ramsey was named the Eastern Division MVP as he went 2-4 with an RBI. Tyler Ray from Troy got the win while Kentucky’s Braden Kapyten got the loss after giving up a run in the fifth inning without giving up a hit. Here are some of my thoughts on the game in no particular order.
Pros
- The best thing about the 2010 Cape Cod Baseball League All-Star game was working the event with Katherine Cornetta who was excellent in the Live Chat with me during the game. We plan on doing many more events together in the near future including covering the 2011 College World Series.
- Duke’s Marcus Stroman improved his draft stock this summer with his performance in the CCBL and in the All-Star game on Wednesday night. He ended up pitching one inning on Wednesday giving up a hit while striking out a batter. In the entire 2010 season, Stroman is 1-0 with a 0.00 ERA as he hasn’t given up a run in 23 innings while picking up eight saves. In those 23 innings, he has only given up nine hits.
- The two pitchers that really stood out on Wednesday was the last two pitchers from the Western Division in R.J. Alvarez from Florida Atlantic and Tony Zych from Louisville. Alvarez pitched the eight inning giving up a walk while striking out two batters. Zych worked a perfect ninth inning to close out the game. Both of them had fastballs in the upper 90’s and were spotting them well. Alvarez and Zych used the stage to their advantage as many scouts and scouting directors were in attendance at the game.
- Matty Ott from LSU has returned to his form from the 2009 season in which he went 4-2 with 16 saves in 50.1 innings of work while holding opponents to a .237 batting average against. He pitched a scoreless fourth inning giving up one hit. In the 2010 Cape season, Ott has been outstanding with a 2-0 record in 14 relief appearances while picking up six saves in 18.1 innings and striking out 17 batters. If Ott can return to his 2009 form, the LSU could possibly have an absolute stud closer or another solid weekend starter for next season.
- TCBB contributor Aman Reaka has been touting to me how impressive Coastal Carolina’s Daniel Bowman is going to be for the 2011 season. The CCBL All-Star game was the first time I had a chance to see him and he didn’t disappoint. He ended up going 1-2 in the game with a double off the left field wall and hit out six homer in the HR Derby with his quick wrists. He is definitely someone to follow for next year’s draft.
Cons
- I hate the Cape Cod Baseball League All-Star game being at Fenway Park. I have covered the College World Series, multiple lacrosse games, and other sporting events at major sports stadiums. This was the second straight year that the Red Sox decided to make everything more difficult for the media members from having post game press conferences in the stands instead of being in a conference room like a regular Red Sox game. The media wasn’t even given a post game spread or any drinks. The New England Patriots had drinks for the media members of the New England College Lacrosse Classic which only had 10 media members in a 300 person press box.
- The attendance was announced as 10,470 fans which was roughly four thousand less people then the 2009 CCBL All-Star which was played in the rain and lasted only 4.5 innings before being called. I think that the fans might of had a bad taste in their mouths after last season’s sham of a game. In 2008, the game was played at Veterans Field in Chatham and drew 8,629. So why make the teams and fans travel about two hours to the city during a weekday while dealing with rush hour traffic.
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