The Meteors won their 5th straight tournament this weekend, sweeping the Bullets Bash in their final tuneup before the big State Championship next week.

Full story and stats to follow. 

This past weekend was truly one of the great, remarkable events in our long and storied history.

We could not have possibly had more obstacles to overcome.  We had come off two consecutive tournaments where our effort was lackluster and inconsistent at best.  Then we were missing 4 starters - Mike and Jason out with the flu and Andrew D and Colin up north.  With Tyler missing the first game because of high school, that left us with 8 players for the first game, then 9 players the rest of the weekend. 

We picked up Matt's little brother Mike, so we would have enough to play.  Then we challeged the players who were their to step up and seize the opportunity they had.  Some of them had not been starters in the bigger games in the past couple of tournaments, and that gave them an opportunity to show what they could do.  Just about every single guy out there really cashed it, and are going to make it very difficult to decide who the starters will be in future events.  That is a really good problem to have for an elite travel team that plays as many games as we do.

We opened with the Tampa Rays.  Although we have played against some of these players before, we had not played this particular group of players, which was a rec ball all-star pony team.  We came out smoking right from the start, jumping out to a 6-0 lead in the first and never looked back, winning 12-1.  Donovan, Alex, Jaleel, Jon and Mike all had multiple hits and Matt was brilliant on the mound for us, throwing a complete game 3-hitter with 5 strikeouts.

We stayed hot in game 2 against the Polk Gators, exploding for 7 runs in the second inning to cruise to a 10-1 win.  Donovan, Jon, Michael and Matt were the offensive stars and Jon, Donovan, Jaleel and Alex each went an inning on the mound to hold the Gators offense in check and give us the #1 seed out of the 14 teams in the tournament.

In the quarters we faced Hit and Run, and we played a beautiful game where we did all the little things right on offense and played tremendous defense.  We generated offense with hits, walks, bunts, baserunning and just overall great team hitting.  The story of the game was Jon, who had struggled on the mound with his control, but was dominant in this game, spinning a 5-inning, two hit shutout with 6 strikeouts for an 8-0 win.

In the semis we faced the Bullets Black, who seem to just get better every single week by working hard and doing things the right way.  Once again, they battled us tough and gave us a scare leading the game 6-5 heading into the last inning.  We proved yet again that we are the best late-inning team in the country again as we rallied for 5 runs in the 6th.  Matt walked, Josh and Tyler singled and Donovan walked to load the bases.  Jaleel then came up and roped a big 2-rbi double and Jon finished the scoring with a sac fly and the time expired with us up 11-6.  Mike started on the mound and gave us a couple of quality innings, but Donovan picked up with with with 2+ strong innings of relief.

The Championship Game was another epic Meteors title game for the history books.  We faced the Tampa Bandits, which is basically the old Team Easton with a couple of our former players Brandt Burrows and Jonathan Diaz.  We knew those guys were going to give us a tough battle and they did.  The other problem we had was that we had no rested pitchers left to put on the mound against a good offensive team.  Donovan started and was outstanding, but his work in the previous game took a little wind out of his sails and we could only get 3 innings out of him.  We still lead 2-0 heading into the bottom of the 4th, but our relief pitchers could not hold the lead as we gave up 7 runs with 2 outs in the 4th to go down 7-2.

It was at this point that the Bandits joined the ranks of a lot of other teams to pay the price for trash talking us once they get a lead.  They had a good time for the one inning when things were going their way, and got really loud, but it served well to motivate our guys and we answered right back with 4 runs in the 5th when Matt and Josh both roped huge RBI hits.  Alex held the Bandits scoreless in the bottom of the 5th, and when neither team scored in the 6th we headed into the final inning down 7-6.  With one out Mike singled to light the spark.  Matt then got hit by a pitch and Josh walked to load the bases.  Tyler then had an RBI groundout to tie the game with 2 outs.  Donovan then singled in a run to make it 8-7, then Jon stepped up and crushed a majestic 370' grand slam bomb over the right centerfield fence at Plant City High to rip the game open.  Jon then mopped up the last 2 innings with scoreless relief to pick up the win.

We have never been more proud of our team and the boys on it than this weekend.  We were shorthanded and battled adversity, but the guys rallied together, played their hearts out, and showed that they were true champions.  Their is a reason why we have won 56 tournament championships.  The pride that we have in our team really finally showed up this season, and it was the kind of weekend where a team can turn a corner and go to another level.  I believe we are about to do that.  The next two big events we will have our full roster together, and we should be able to really make a final statement over the next two months that we are the kings of Florida travelball heading into the big national tournaments.

The War on I-4 lived up to its name, because this past weekend's tournament in Plant City was a war with most of the top programs in the State on hand to battle it out.

We opened up with the W. Boynton Tornadoes, and we played about as bad as we possible could play in a 6-2 loss.  We did not have much energy, enthusiasm or focus and were beaten by a very good team.

We woke up on our second pool game against the Young Guns, and won 14-1.  Jason was 3-4 with a pair of RBIs and Donovan was 2-2 and also drove in two.  Cody and Josh also had multi-hit games to pace the offense.  Colin, Donovan and Jaleel combined for the win on the mound.

That set up a rematch of last week's loss to the Flash.  This time we brought out A-game to the table, jumping out to an early lead and holding steady in a 6-3 win.  Jason drove in Donovan with a single to start the game, and we followed that up with 4 big runs in the second when Donovan singled, Cody and Andrew walked, Tyler singled and Mike drove in two runs with an RBI single.  Jason was huge for us again on the mound, throwing 4 strong innings before running out of game.  Mike came in to get the last big out to end a Flash threat in the final inning.

The semi-final game against Team Reebok was strange to say the least.  We jumped out to a big 9-2 lead, put the subs in, pulled our starting pitcher, and went on cruise control into the final inning.  Reebok then came roaring back and actually tied the game 9-9 to send it to extra innings.  We responded scoring 8 runs in the first extra inning after the starters went back in to advance to the championship 17-10.  Jason, Cody and Colin all had multiple hits and Matt hit a huge bomb for a three-run HR to left to ice the game.

In the Championship, we were unable to execute our pitching plan and got beat by a hot Tornadoes team.  We battled right to the end, and was sparked by a HR blast by Donovan in the 4th, but it was not our day as we were out of gas and were beaten by a better team on this particular weekend.

All in all it was a great weekend with tons of reps for everyone.  Exactly what we hope to accomplish in a March tournament.

We have always said the Spring season for travelball really begins March 1st.  That is when most of the bigger tournaments start - including next weekends War on I-4 that already has 15 teams at our age group.  We have always used February as practices and go get out team together and work on things.  That period is now over.  What we also got out of the final February weekend tuneup tournament is a little extra motivation heading into the season.

The pool games were pretty sloppy, but we pounded the baseball as we did all 3 games.  Donovan, Jaleel, and Cody each hit one home run and Jason hit two HRs in an 8-2 over the Ocala Heat.

We were even more lackluster against MBA, sleepwalking our way through a 10-7 win. 

Then we squared off against the Florida Flash in the semis.  They played great, we didn't play especially well.  A costly error in the first inning led to 3 unearned runs.  Two more errors in the 3rd led to 2 more unearned runs.  The Flash cashed in on our mistakes and they led 10-3 after 3 innings.  However, that is when the Flash started taunting and trash talking our team, coaches and individual players.  We should emphasize that it was not the players on the Flash.  The players played the game how is was supposed to be played and conducted themselves appropriately.  It was the nonsense we heard from outside the lines that was insufferable.

It was tempting to make it tit for tat, but we chose to be quiet and just play the game.  The trash talking helped our players finally come alive in the 6th inning, scoring 5 runs on home runs by Jon and Matt, followed by singles from Tyler, Jaleel and Mike sandwiched around a double by Jason.  However, we popped out to first to end the game, leaving the tying runs on base, and the time limit kept us from playing a 7th inning and we lost 10-8.

For 12 months, from December 2009 - December 2010, we won every single tournament we entered in the State of Florida.  That was a remarkable 22 tournament championships.  That included both the Spring and Fall Super NITs, the State Championships for USSSA, IBC, and AAU, 2 Championships in national tournaments, 2nd place at the USSSA Elite World Series, 130 wins including 58 wins a row, and a final ranking of #2 in the Country by Travelball Select.

When you have that kind of unparalleled success over such a long period of time, you can get complacent.  You can believe that you cannot be beat, and will cease to play with the kind of focus and intensity that got you to the top in the first place.  That is why many great athletes in all sports will tell you that it is harder to stay at the top than it is to get there. 

As coaches we have been talking about this problem for the past month.  We did not see the same fire, the same hunger, from the players that we had seen over the previous 12 months.  Then the last 4 innings of the Florida Flash game in Leesburg happened to us.  Not what happened on the field from their players, but what was directed at us from off the field when we got behind.  Our players got to hear that, feel what it felt like.  We saw in our players eyes a look of anger and disgust when they left the field that we need to see - that we havent seen in a long, long time.

In hindsight, the Flash did our team a really big favor.  They awoke a sleeping giant, just in time for the really big tournaments.  I doubt the coaches will have to say much to try and motivate the players when we play them again.  Their behavior was exactly what the doctor ordered for us.  We will do our talking on the field.

We made it two for two on tournament championships to start off the Spring season, taking the Bullets Bash.

Pool play looked like it was going to be no sweat as we cruised to a 11-0 win over Team Impact.  Alex and Mike combined on the mound for the shutout.  Jaleel had two hits and Jon hit a home run to deep left.

However, we got sloppy and sluggish in the second game, and were outplayed by a fired up Scorpions team in Game 2, losing 7-3.

The loss meant that we missed out on a first round bye and had to play in the rain Saturday night, making it a 13 hour day.  After a slow start against the Bullets Black, the offense exploded in the 3rd and 4th and we led 10-1 when the game got rained out.

We advanced to the semis against the #1 seed Tampa Panthers on Sunday.  We jumped on them early when Donovan and Jaleel singled and Jason doubled and Mike hit a 3-run HR to give us a 4-0 lead.  We continued to pour it on with 4 more runs in the 2nd when Cody, Andrew D, and Tyler each singled and Jaleel hit an RBI double.  Meanwhile, Jon was outstanding on the mound, giving up just 2 runs in 5 innings of work.  Donovan closed the game out with 2 great innings and Jason put the finishing touches on a 9-3 win with a HR blast in the 6th.

The Championship was somewhat anti-climactic.  We face the Coastal Storm, and they kept the game close for a few innings, and even had a 3-2 lead in the 6th.  Jason pitched awesome again and Mike closed out the game with two strong innings of relief.  We exploded for 7 runs in the bottom of the 6th to put the game away, behind another 3-run HR by Jon and doubles from Tyler, Jason and Cody.

We outscored our opponents 63-12 in taking the first tournament of the season, the IBC Birdland Bash.  It was a nice warmup tournament before the bigger stuff the come.

In Game 1 we beat the SWFL Thunder 22-0.  The star of the game was Alex, who reached base all 5 at-bats, scored 4 runs, had 3 RBIs and pitched a complete game shutout.  Donovan and Jason both had big days at the plate as well.  It was also great to see Jaleel back in a Meteors uniform where he belongs.  It just never looked right seeing him in other colors last season, and he returned to his previous form with a single, double, triple and 5 RBIs.

We took the second pool game 15-5 against the SWFL Warriors.  Alex, Jason, and Jaleel each had multi-hit games as well as guest players Danny and Leyton.  Jon had the biggest day at the plate with a single, double, triple and 4 RBIs.  Donovan went most of the way on the mound to pick up the win.

In the semi-finals we faced the Braden River Hurricanes.  We scored 7 in the top of the 1st and never looked back, posting a 13-2 win.  Mike and Jon hit back to back HRs in the first to pace the offense.  Jason hit an RBI triple and went the distance on the mound with an outstanding outing.

In the Championship we faced a solid Naples Scorpions team that made us play 7 innings in a 13-5 win.  Tyler and Donovan set the table for our offense all night at the top of the order, reaching base a combined 8 times in 10 plate appearances and scoring 6 runs.  Jon was outstanding on the mound, allowing 0 runs in his 4 innings of work, and Mike cleaned up with 3 solid innings for the Meteors 54th tournament championship.

A key ingredient to our program's success is that we have regularly played tournaments in the older age groups against very tough competition.  We have done it every season since Fall 12U.  The purpose of these events is to push us to our limit as a team and for each individual player.  We have a winning record overall in these games, but most important is that we challenge our players an it benefits them in the long run when we play teams our own age.

This weekend at USSSA 16U Winter States we faced 2 of the top 16U majors programs in the State and another solid club.  We led in all 3 games, and got a win, a tie and a one run loss.  We accomplished what we set out to do.

In the first game we came back from 8-2 and 11-6 deficits to battle the Orlando Reds to a 12-12 tie.  We fought extremely hard every single inning on offense even though we were not at our best on the mound.  Tyler (2-2, 2 walks, 3 runs, 3 RBIs, SB) and Brandt (2-2, BB, 2 runs) were the offensive starts of the game. 

Game 2 was an even better performance as we handled the Pasco Predators 10-4 despite 4 unearned runs.  Cody had his best outing of the season, going 6 innings to pick up the win.  Jason (2-4, 2 RBI), Donovan (2-3, 2 runs, 2 RBI), Brandt (2-3, run) and Matt (2-2, RBI) led the offensive attack.  This game also featured the Meteors debut of Jonathan Diaz on the mound, and he closed the game with a solid 7th.

We got a first round bye for Sunday but had some bad luck by drawing the Central Florida Sting, one of the top programs in the State.  They tried to save their ace, but they fell behind 3-0 after 2 innings when Mike and Alex had big hits.  Jason had all his pitches working and the Sting was forced to bring in their ace in the 3rd.  He as nasty and we were unable to get anything going on offense after that, leaving several runners stranded.  The Sting chipped away at our lead and took a 4-3 lead in the 5th.  Jason threw 5 outstanding innings and Jonathan came on to hold the Sting scoreless for 2 more.  We had a great chance to win the game in the bottom of the 7th with bases loaded, 1 out and our top of the lineup up.  But a lineout and strikeout ended our threat.

We have claimed all the biggest prizes the 14U division has to offer this Fall season.  We also have played three 16U tournaments.  We continue to strengthen or roster with key additions.  Alex and Jonathan coming on board in November have put the finishing touches on our team.  We now head into our last event before Christmas, and then we will have some time away from the game for a couple of weeks.  It has been a wonderful ride this season and we are all looking forward to wrapping things up on strong note next week.

The last time we played in the Atlanta Braves spring training stadium we lost the national championship game at the Elite World Series 9-6 to TABU from California.  We returned to that stadium this week and defeated a previously unbeaten Weston Hawks team to become the first team in the country to qualify for the 2012 Elite.

It was a loaded tournament with 14 outstanding teams, almost all of whom loaded up with good players from other teams.  First place was a trip to represent Florida in the Elite World Series in August, so a lot was at stake. 

We squared off on Friday night against the PBA Sabrecats from Ohio.  They had players from the former Massilon Heat and Beaver Valley Red.  It was bombs away right from the start as the PBA pitcher threw hard but throwing hard does not get our hitters out.  Mike, Jason, Cody, Colin and Tyler all had big hits and it was 7-0 before the Cats got their second out in the top of the first.  We reached the mercy rule with 5 more runs in the 4th on hits by Mike, Jason and Cody.  Our pitchers were dominant as Jon, Jason and Cody combined on a one-hitter and a 12-1 win.

The second pool game was against the only weak team in the tournament - the Orlando Thunder, and we clinched the #1 seed and a first round bye with a 12-0 win.  Tyler was 2-2 with a triple, steal and 2 RBIs.  Donovan and Andrew D. also had multi-hit games to lead the offense.

In our first bracket game we faced the Longwood Rebels.  We got off to a rough start as Cody struggled with his control and two hits and two walks led to a run and the bases loaded with nobody out.  We changed to Jon and he put the fire out with a strikeout and 2 infield pop-ups.  Our offense them jumped all over the Rebels to answer back and allow us to get Jon off the mound quickly.  Jason, Cody and Brandt all hat two hits a piece and Christian hit probably the farthest ball he has ever hit for an RBI double to right center.  Mike came on to throw the final 3 innings of relief and we cruised to a 14-3 win.

In the semis we faced PBA again, who had upset the Warriors by coming back from a big deficit to win in extra innings.  The star of the game was Jason who threw a complete game four hitter and was 2-2 at the plate with an unbelievable laser to right field for a triple.  Tyler, Jon, Donovan and Andrew D all had big RBI hits.  Andrew's defense was also spectacular as he made play after play all weekend after a tough start in the first game.  We won 10-1 and headed to the Championship.

The Championship Game was the one everyone wanted to see.  Weston had just beat the Flash and headed into the game with a season record of 29-0.  Andrew Cabezas was ready to go out the mound and he held us in check, pitching himself out of a few jams.  Jon drove in Jason with a huge RBI triple in the first, then Jason scored on an error to give us a 2-0 lead.  Jon was also awesome on the mound, giving up just 1 run in 4 innings on 2 hits.  We needed a couple of guys to step up and give us great relief for the final 3 innings, and Donovan and Cody did just that.  Donovan pitched a scoreless 5th and Cody redeemed himself from his struggle earlier in the day, closing out the game with 2 innings of relief for a 3-2 win.

We will return to the Elite World Series for the 3rd year in a row as Florida's Champion.  Since we went into the tournament as the #1 seed and held onto that seed throughout, we were able to play all 5 games in the Braves Spring Training Stadium as Disney's Wide World of Sports.

The 15U Team USA head coach for 2012 was at the tournament to personally scout players for invites to the tryout next August.  Tyler Tyson, Jason Heinrich and Jon Register received invitations.  Our program is about recognition and raising the profile of our players to give them the recognition they deserve that will benefit them in the future.  We have had more players make the TBS All-American Team than any other program in the country for the past 4 years.

The 3 biggest tournaments of the Fall in Florida are Triple Crown Fall Nationals, USSSA States, and the USSSA Thanksgiving Super NIT.  We did what no Meteors team has every done in the past 9 years - sweep all 3 events in the same season.  We went 15-0 in those 3 tournaments.  We lost half our roster in August and ended up with a better team than we had before in a couple of months.  This is because of the leadership, heart and character of the returning players, the talent and rapid development of the new players, and the content and strength of our program.  We won every single tournament we entered this Fall.  We are 141-3 on the big fields.  We have been and continue to remain the undisputed kings of Florida Travelball!

Click on the headline above to see the USSSA national points rankings.  These are very important as they determine seeding for the Elite in August.

In our final tuneup before the big USSSA Thanksgiving Super NIT this Friday, we won the Bullets Thanksgiving Bash tournament this weekend.  We were able to stretch out all of our pitchers and got a ton of at bats for all of our hitters.  That was the main goal and we accomplished that.

We won our first pool game against the Tampa Legends 10-1 and lost the second pool game to the Bullets Grey 5-4.  The Grey game was an ugly one where we made 4 errors in the infield, had 4 walks and hit a batter.  But, pool play games are the time to experiment and work out the kinks for big tournaments, and we had 3 guys playing infield positions they had not played all year until that game and also tried out a new pitcher.  The good thing is those guys played great defense on Sunday.

The first bracket game was agains the Tampa Thunder and it was bombs away in an 18-0 win.  Alex went the distance for a two hit shutout.

We figured the semi-final game against the Coastal Storm was going to be the toughest game of the tournament for us and we were right as the game was a tight battle every inning.  The game went extra innings and we trailed 5-3 going into the bottom of the 8th.  That is when the character, heart and experience of our team of champions came through as Tyler led off the inning with a solo blast to cut the lead to 5-4.  Jason then singled and Jon reached on an error.  A run then scored when Alex reached on a error, and Donovan then came through with a big single to left to a walk-off win.

In the Championship we battered the Bullets Grey pitching for 16 hits, including 4 doubles and 2 Home Runs.  The Grey had only 3 hits in the game and we won by a 15-5 mercy rule score.  Jason was 4-5 with a double and a HR, Jon was 4-5 with a HR, and Brandt was 2-2 with 2 doubles.  Jon and Donovan combined for the win on the mound.

HERE ARE THE RESULTS OF OUR TOURNAMENT BRACKET GAMES AGAINST THE BULLETS GREY IN 2010:

11/21/10 -  METEORS 15, GREY 5  (MERCY RULE WIN)

10/17/10  - METEORS 12, GREY 0  (MERCY RULE WIN)

9/12/10   -  METEORS 5, GREY 4   (WIN)

9/5/10   -    METEORS 14, GREY  5  (MERCY RULE WIN)

4/18/10  -   METEORS 19, GREY  4  (MERCY RULE WIN)

2/7/10   -    METEORS 9, GREY  1   (MERCY RULE WIN)

TOTAL COMBINED SCORES:  METEORS  74,  GREY  19

METEORS  12,  BULLETS WHITE  0

METEORS  12,  TAMPA LEGENDS  2

METEORS  13,  BULLETS BLACK  1

METEORS  12,  BULLETS GREY  0

48 RUNS SCORED

3 RUNS ALLOWED

25 SINGLES

9 DOUBLES

7 HOME RUNS

16 STOLEN BASES

Enough said about that, now some news and notes...

- This was the 50TH TOURNAMENT CHAMPIONSHIP for the Meteors. 

- Mike was 9-10, 4 HRs, 11 Runs, 16 RBI, 3 SBs at the plate. 

- Jon stayed undefeated on the mound for the Meteors with a complete game no-hit shutout of the Bullets Grey in the Championship.

"You find out a lot about a team, not when winning 48-12.  You find out a lot about a team when you get hit and come right back."

 - Urban Meyer

In another remarkable feat, we entered our first wood bat tournament with our 11 regular 14U players, played in the 16U division, won 2 games and took 2 others to the mat.  

We wanted to give our boys a rigorous test the weekend before the big Triple Crown Fall Nationals, so we decided to play up in the 16U division.  Since our strategy was to prepare for next week, not to win the tournament, we set up our pitching to throw each of our primary pitchers 80-90 pitches even in the pool games and only save one pitcher for bracket play.  Everything went according to play, and our pitchers were fantastic throughout the weekend.

In Game 1 we faced the Indian River Select.  Runs were hard to come by with wood bats against two big hard-throwing 16 year olds.  Tyler walked in the first and scored on an error.  Chase drove in a big run in the second with an RBI hit.  We weren't able to score again until the 5th when Donovan and Christian had back to back RBI singles to give us a 4-0 lead.  Cody went the distance on the mound and was outstanding, allowing just 1 run on 4 hits to pick up the win 4-1.

In our second pool game we faced a tougher test in Bad Company.  Tyler led off the game with another manufactured run in the first, but BC evened the score 1-1 in the bottom of the inning.  Donovan did a solid job on the mound, allowing 3 runs in his four innings of work, but we just couldn't get the big hit and fell 4-1.

We went into our final pool game as heavy underdogs against the undefeated Black Sox.  We played probably our best game of the tournament though to get the win.  Mike started on the mound and did an excellent job, only allowing 1 earned run in his 4 innings of work with 6 strikeouts.  However, we trailed 2-1 heading into the 5th when Andrew and Tyler drew walks and Jason drove them in with a huge double to give us a 3-2 lead.  Matt and Jason then threw scoreless innings and we won 4-2.

Nobody expected our team of all 14U players to go 2-1 with 7 runs allowed for the #4 seed in a 16 team tournament loaded with elite 16U teams.  We had already exceeded our expectations heading into our bracket game Sunday against MBA.  In a wild game that we had won no less than four times, and had a number of calls go against us and made some costly errors, we ended up on the short end of a 9 inning 10-9 score.  Donovan had a big 2-RBI triple and Christian drove in two with a big double in the 6th to give us a 6-5 lead.  We led by that score until an error led to an MBA run in the 7th to send the game into extra innings.  We scored in both the 8th and 9th innings, but could not hold the leads and we game up short.  We battled very hard and earned a lot of respect from the older teams who could not believe how good we were.

We now head to our biggest event of the Fall season, battle tested and ready.  It is going to be a great weekend and a lot of fun playing great competition in college stadiums.  See you there! 

The Meteors swept through the IBC Fall Classic with outstanding pitching and improved defense. 

We opened with the Bullets Black, and their starting pitcher did a good job on us for the first two innings.  We finally broke through with a run in the 3rd when Andrew was hit by a pitch and was driven in when Tyler reached on an error.  We got another run in the 4th when Cody had an RBI single.  Our big inning came in the 5th.  Brandt walked and Tyler reached on an error.  Another walk and error around Christian's RBI single gave us a commanding 8-0 lead.  Cody, Donovan and Jason all looked outstanding on the mound, combining on a three hit shutout.

Our second pool game was against Team Lakeland, a new team with a lot of experienced travelball players.  Brandt singled in the 1st and Mike drove him in with a double.  Jason then blasted a two run HR to give us a 3-0 lead.  Lakeland answered back with 2 runs in the bottom of the inning and we only had a 3-2 lead heading into the 3rd.  Tyler led off the inning with a walk and Brandt doubled, followed by RBI hits from Mike, Jason and Donovan to break the game open.  Those same three guys had back to back to back hits in the 5th joined by Donovan and we led 11-2.  The final was 11-4 to give us a first round bye and the #2 seed.

In our first bracket game we faced Team Lakeland again, who had upset Hit and Run.  It was a strange game as we hit balls hard right at people the entire game and made some costly outs on the bases.  We got some timely hits though as Tyler singled in Cody in the 4th and Jason and Christian had big hits in the 5th.  Four runs would be enough though as we finally got Jon on the mound and he was outstanding, throwing 5 shutout innings before a rain delay.  Donovan finished out the last two innings to give us a 4-1 win.

The Championship Game against the Tampa Panthers was rained out and we were awarded the Championship on fewest runs allowed for the tournament, plus Andrew won the rock paper sissors match to clinch it with the Panthers' representative at the concession stand.

Next week we hit the 16U USSSA Fall Nationals wood bat tournament in Lake Myrtle before we head to the big one in St. Augustine.

What a great weekend as we hosted by far our most successful Meteors tournament ever.  61 teams came to Sarasota (previous record was 49) as this event has grown every single season for the past 10. 

I am so proud of the parents, each of whom worked so hard to make this tournament a success.  Many teams support themselves financially through sponsors, a "sugar daddy" or by collecting dues from parents.  We have always believed that it builds character and togetherness to have to come together and work for something, rather than have it handed to you or given to you by someone else.

The boys raking the fields so other teams can play builds character.  Picking up trash, watching their parents work the concession stands and gates.  These are valuable life experiences that a lot of kids today never get exposed to.  All the players learn that honest, hard work and team work is a lot more rewarding than receiving a handout.

We raised enough money to pay for our new uniforms and all the tournament entry fees for the rest of the Fall season.  That is a great accomplishment and is no less significant than any tournament championship.

Mike Campoamor, Jason Heinrich and Darren Miller were all voted onto the TBS 13U All-American team.  This is a tremendous honor as they were recognized by the head coaches of the top programs in the country.

This team represents the very best of the best all-around players in the country.  A few of our other players from last season certainly deserved consideration, but these were the three guys who were most productive in the biggest national tournaments, and those are the events that matter the most.

For the rest of the players in our program, there are only two ways to react to these 3 Meteors being chosen for the team.  The first is to be happy for them because each of these three guys have worked extremely hard on their games and are dedicated to be the very best at this great game.  They are your teammates and brothers and you should not ever be jeolous of a teammate or brother.  These three guys came up big in big games and each of them worked hard last year to improve an area of the game that was weaker the year before. 

The second way to react to their selection is honest self-reflection.  One of the most important qualities any successful person can possess is the ability to be self-critical and accurately perceive and evaluate your own strengths and weaknesses.  If you refuse to do that, you will never improve and will be doomed to fail in certain areas.  Great players, and people who achieve greatness in all endeavors, recognize their weakness and attack them.  They are dogged in their determination to shore them up and correct them. 

I challenge each player to identify the weakest aspect of his game.  This game is about pitching, defense, hitting and baserunning.  Which one or two areas are your weakest?  Look in the mirror and ask yourself how many hours you have dedicated to work on that weakness last season.  Now ask yourself what you are going to do about it this season.  Be determined to make that part of your game a strength by the time the national tournaments start next June. 

In reality, the coaches don't choose the All-American team, players do with their performance on the field.  There were a few guys on other teams I voted for who blew me away when I watched them play this summer.  Did you blow away opposing coaching watching us with your performance this summer?  Did they stand there watching you play with their mouths open, saying "Wow, that kid is an awesome player!"  Each of the kids I voted for produced that reaction from me when I saw them play.  I voted for Joe Demers as national player of the year because he was the best 13 year old I have seen since I saw Bryce Harper at the 13U Elite.  

If you want to be considered one of the best 32 14U baseball players in the United States in 2011, you better be prepared to bring it in all phases of the game next summer and produce this same reaction from opposing coaches who see you play.

Click on headline above to see the team.

Grit, heart, character, determination.  These are the words that describe our team right now.  How many teams can lose 6 players from their team from last season and come out and win the first two tournaments of the next season?  The answer is only one.

This week we welcomed to our family two new outstanding players - Andrew Cabezas and Steven Alvarez.  They played great baseball for us all weekend and came up big in big games to help us win our 47 tournament championship.

We are still a work in progress as a team.  We always set high goals and aspirations - State Championships, National Championships, 100 win years, etc..  Those goals have not changed a bit.  We have seen a snapshot in the last two weeks of the formula to achieve those things this 14U year.

Andrew D. and Colin played with us week 1 and brought to the table a package of things that any great team has got to have.  Then Andrew C. and Steven A. come in week 2 with a different package of skills.  Put together, these four players with our returning players and new players will form a team better than the one we had last year.  But we are not done.

We have 6 great returning players.  We added 3 outstanding new full time players - Johnny, Brandt and Christian.  We are being very selective on who we bring onto this team for the final couple pieces of the puzzle.  We have already taken a look at a lot of players and are going to continue to do so over the next month.  But we will not settle.  Any player we take onto this team must demonstrate the athletic ability, commitment and desire to achieve greatness in this sport.  The Meteors are not satisfied with good, we expect great.  Not that you are great now, but you are determined to become great.

The loss of several players presents a challenge and an opportunity to all of our players.  For our returning players, they have to step up into a leadership role and take command of this team.  Other players who are not with us have been the louder, more vocal members of the team.  The returning players natural talent and ability exceeds the others, but now they have to learn to become leaders, and that is already beginning to happen.

The new players are learning that our program expects the game to be played a certain way, and for each member of the team to conduct himself accordingly.  They see close up first hand why this organization has been the most consistently successful travelball organization in Florida for the past 9 years. We are not satisfied with getting by or doing just OK.  These new players see that they are going to have to step up their games in all phases to help pick up the torch and carry on the tradition that has been established by Meteors teams for the past 16 seasons. 

One thing we are perhaps more than ever is united.  We are loyal to each other and committed to each other.  We are on the same page and determined to prove that the Meteors is not about any individual, or group of individuals with their own agendas, it is about all of us together achieving great things with high character, committment, and loyalty to each other. 

In competitive sports we all depend on each other to some degree.  This is not golf or tennis where you can go out on your own and be successful.  To be successful in this game you have to learn to rely on each other and commit to each other.  It is a lesson some people never learn.  Although these nomadic players may achieve individual success in the short team, they rarely ever experience the joy that comes with accomplishing things as a band of brothers.  That is something truly special, and is something we are all going to make happen this year.

The Meteors pounded 8 Home Runs in 4 games, sweeping through the Bullets Bash tournament by a combined 53-16. 

We headed into the first tournament of the Fall with usual turnover for our program.  We brought in some new players, kept a strong nucleus of returning players, and didn't know exactly what to expect.  We were pleasantly surprised to say the least as we exceeded both our hopes and expectations.

Game 1 against the Bullets Black started out slow.  We hadn't played 60/90 since May, and we were out in front of everything at the plate.  We got our first run of the season when Tyler, who has been working very hard on his swing during the off-season, led off busting a double in the gap and was driven in an single by Jason.  The bats cooled off for an inning but Colin was excellent on the mound, allowing 1 unearned run in his 3 innings of work.  We finally exploded in the 4th when Colin singled and Andrew D. and Cody walked to load the bases.  Christian then made his presence on the Meteors felt with a bang, blasting a big grand slam to centerfield.  Tyler then followed that up later in the inning with a 3-run blast that went way out to left.  Jason, Colin and Andrew D. kept the party going with hits and Cody made it 3 Home Runs in the inning with a big 3-run black to give us an insurmountable lead and a 14-2 win.

In the second pool game we faced a tougher matchup in the Tampa Legends.  The bats came out hot again though and stayed hot the whole game.  Donovan, Tyler and Jason opened with back to back to back doubles and we led 2-0 after the first.  Jason hit another big double in the 2nd and Mike drove him in with an RBI single and we led 5-0.  The Legends answered back with a couple in the 2nd and the game turned into a shootout as our pitchers struggled with the strike zone.  The game was never out of our control though as we scored at will.  Christian, Cody, Donovan and Mike all drove in runs with hits in the 3rd and we got a first round bye with a 15-9 win. 

In the semis we faced the Bullets Grey who had won their play in game.  We started terrible, making 4 errors in the top of the 1st and fell behind 4-0.  We have been around the block a little bit, and the big tournament experience of our players kept us from getting rattled.  We answered back with 3 runs in the bottom of the inning, then won every single inning for the rest of the game.  Tyler and Donovan led off the 2nd with singles and Jason followed with a big 2-run blast over the left field fence to give us a 6-4 lead and we never looked back.  Andrew D. and Christian both reached base in all 4 of their at-bats and Mike drove in 3 and scored 3.  Cody settled in the mound after the errors and Mike closed the game with 3 strong innings and we went to the Championship with a 14-5 win.

We dominated the Championship in our rematch with the Tampa Legends, who had just beaten the Bullets White.  Tyler, Jason and Mike hit back to back to back HRs in the 3rd inning and the route was on.  Mike followed that up with another HR in the 4th.  Jason was outstanding on the mound with one of his best outings, throwing 4 no-hit shutout innings on the mound with 9 strikeouts.  Donovan closed the game and preserved the no-hitter, striking out the side in the 5th for a 10-0 mercy rule win and our 46 tournament championship!

This tournament should give us a lot of confidence going into the rest of the season.  Christian, Johnny, Andrew, Brandt and Colin are great additions for us and the returning players really look great.  We should be really excited as our schedule gets increasing difficult heading into the heart of the fall season.

We set up our team for the 13U team to play and be successful a certain way.  We wanted our pitchers to pound the strike zone - if they got hit that was fine but we refused to walk people.  We wanted our defense to make the routine plays - we did not expect anything spectacular or outstanding on defense.  We wanted to hammer people with a dynamic offense of power and speed up and down the lineup.

That was the Meteors blueprint for the 13U year.  When we executed that plan, we won every time.  The few games we lost were all attributable to the same thing - bad defense.  We scored enough runs to win every single game we played.  We pitched well enough to win.  When we played just average defense we won.  When we played terrible defense we still won most of the time, but those were the few times we also lost.

This season we are constructing our team a little differently with a renewed emphasis on pitching and defense.  We have the personnel where we no longer have low expectations on defense.  Our pitching staff is better than it has ever been.  Our expectations are that we will play outstanding defense and have the best pitching in the country.  We will continue to score plenty of runs, but our focus in not going to be just beating teams' brains in with our bats. 

The bottom line is that the 14U Meteors are going to be a more complete, balanced team that the 13U version.  We are going to play cleaner games on both sides of the ball.  We expect this team to be better and more successful that the one we had in 2009-10.  This is a big challenge, but we have the players to do it!

We have said before that it is difficult to describe an event like the Elite 32 to someone who has not been there.  It is the only true National Championship for travel baseball - the only one where all the the top teams in the country gather for a 7 day tournament to determine who is the best of the best.  The only one where each of the teams there had to qualify by winning a major tournament. 

Last year this team went there for the first time.  It was an eye opening experience as it is for anyone who goes for the first time.  Many teams and players who think they are good get a reality check as they are exposed to the very best travel ball teams and players from every part of the country.  Last year we saw what it took to play at this level and knew what we had to do as individuals and as a team to make a run when we returned at 13U.

We saw throughout the week that teams that were already good - the best teams in their states, almost all loaded up with great players from other states who played on teams that did not qualify.  This made the teams there even more difficult to beat.  The Beaver Valley team we played added guys from Ohio, the TABU team players from Lamorinda, the Maryland team players from Virginia.  We were determined not to do that, but to take them on with the Florida boys who have played with us all season.

One thing we learned about this tournament is that you can't win it in pool play but you can lose it.  What that means is that many teams there for the first time don't appreciate what a mental and physical grind this tournament is, and they use up too much pitching and effort in what are relatively meaningless pool games.  We decided to keep our powder dry, set our pride aside, and hold back our best baseball for bracket play.

That said, we did not expect to play a game as bad as our first pool game against Beaver Valley.  We played a horrible game with 7 errors and a number of other mental and physical miscues.  The 9-1 loss was a disappointing start, but the good news is that the players and coaches had a unity of purpose and understood the big picture.

Our second pool game was a fantastic effort.  Donovan, Brandon and Mike led an offense that exploded for 15 runs in four innings in a 15-1 win over the DBAT Mustangs from Texas.  Bret, Luis and Jason were outstanding on the mound and the defense played error-free.

Our final pool game got pushed back to Tuesday morning because of rain, and with bracket play starting that afternoon it was important to hold back our pitching.  Andrew, Tyler, Donovan and Zak pitched and we lost 10-4 to TABU from California.  The result of the game was meaningless because our seed was locked in whether we won or lost the game.

In the first bracket game on Tuesday night we faced the Weston Hawks from Miami, and it was a great game played by both teams.  Darrin was awesome on the mound for us and the Weston pitcher almost matched him pitch for pitch.  The only runs we gave up were unearned on a dropped flyball.  We had to scratch out our runs in bits and pieces.  The biggest hit was Mike's two run HR to left to give us a 4-2 lead in the 4th.  We held on for a 7-2 victory and a huge win to start bracket play.

Our second bracket game was against the Georgia Yarddogs, who had beaten us in the 2009 Elite.  Their style of play gave a lot of team fits - the defeated eventual tournament champion TABU 10-5 in pool play.  They had an excellent offense and defense and were the fastest team in the tournament.  We were locked in for this game from start to finish on offense.  Jason, Jaleel, Luis and Brandon each had multi-hit games to lead the offense.  Luis was outstanding on the mound, stopping the Yarddogs running attack by keeping them off base and picking off a couple of runners for an 11-3 win.

In the third bracket game we played the Warriors, who had played a great game the night before an upset the nationally-ranked Illinois Bruins.  We jumped on them early in the Braves stadium and never looked back en route to a 10-0 win in 4 innings.  Darren and Jason had back to back home runs to end the game in style, and Jason and Bret combined for the shutout on the mound.

Since it was double elimination in this round, we had to defeat the Yarddogs again, who had beaten Weston and the Warriors to win the loser's bracket.  This game was similar to the first one as we took an early lead, but we could not put the Dogs away until the 6th.  Jaleel, Mike and Brandon lead the offense and Cody and Zak got the job done on the mound for us in a 12-4 win to advance us to the Final Four.

In the Final Four on Saturday morning we faced the Maryland Baseball Academy, who was 8-0 in this tournament, and undefeated this summer as they blew through the field at AAU Nationals to win that tournament.  To make them an even tougher team to beat, they added 3 outstanding players from Virginia to their roster before the Elite.  We got off to a great start in the 1st inning as Jason had a big double to drive in two and Jaleel followed up with an RBI groundout to give us an early 3-1 lead.  Maryland anwered back with a run in the 2nd, but the story of the game was Darren who dominated on the mound, allowing only 4 hits and striking out 9.  Our defense behind Darren was also outstanding and we held on for a huge 4-2 win and a spot in the national championship game!

The Championship Game against TABU in the stadium was entertaining for the large number of fans who came out to watch, as the game went back and forth, and it was 6-5 in the 6th inning.  Brandon was the offensive leader, going 3-3 with a HR, and we scored 6 runs off of Joe Demers, who many consider the best pitcher in the country.  Our pitching was also excellent as Luis and Jason kept a tough lineup off balance and induced a lot of groundballs.  However, the story of the game was our defense, which had a game similar to the Beaver Valley one as we made a number of errors that proved very costly and we lost the game 9-6. 

Although we did not win the championship as we hoped, we went to the tournament with our regular team and played great baseball for most of the tournament.  For four days we played the game at the very highest level, and only lapsed for a few costly innings in the final game on the 7th day of the tournament.  It was a week we can all look back on now and years from now and be very proud of what we accomplished.  As the tournament director noted, 7,400 teams played in Super NITs around the country just to attempt to qualify for this tournament.  Of those teams, we finished on the podium #2.  Not what we hoped, but not bad either.

The new national ranking from Travel Ball Select are out and we moved up from #2 to tie the defending national champion Oakley (CA) Stingrays at #1.

Although this isn't going to help us win any games at the Elite World Series, it is a great honor to be considered the best 13U travelball team in the Country.

To see the full rankings and read the write-up on each team, click on the headline above.  You have to purchase a subscription, but they are very inexpensive.

Thanks to John Heinrich for working so hard to put these together!

It was a long, hot gruelling week against the toughest competition you will ever find at a baseball tournament.  Multiple teams ranked in the Top 10 nationally.  More Top 25 teams.  Almost every other team ranked in the Top 10 regionally.  Every team but 3 had a loss after their 5 pool games.  That is how tough this tournament was and that is why we travelled to the Battle.

After pool play we were the #1 seeded team out of the 42 teams in the tournament.  We advanced to the Final 8 with our 6th straight mercy-rule win.  At that point in the tournament we had the most runs scored of the 42 teams and had also given up the fewest number of runs.

We then squared off in the game everyone wanted to see - the #2 ranked Meteors against the #5 ranked Georgia Roadrunners.  The Roadrunners ace was outstanding, and we fought hard on offense, scoring 5 runs in 6 innings and ringing up his pitch count to 114.  We just could not execute our plan on the mound or on defense, and the Roadrunners hitters were outstanding, making us pay every time we made a mistake and we lost 11-5.

Highlights of our great tournament run and stats later this week.

The Meteors blistered the field and wowed the best of the Midwest, taking the Michigan Major Elite 13U NIT Championship.  We went 8-0 and outscored our opponents by a combined 92-9.  The semi-final game was the one everyone wanted to see, with the #1 ranked team in the Southeast v. the #1 ranked team from the Midwest (Mudhens).  We won that game in a mercy-rule shortened 8-0 game, then cruised to the title against another ranked team, the Ohio Elite.

We opened up with the Detroit ICE.  They were well-coached and not intimidated by us.  They played hard and had an outstanding starting pitcher on the mound who kept them in the game for 3 innings.  When he came out of the game, the offense opened it up, but we would struggle with the 54/80 distance at the plate throughout the first day.  Darren was the star of the game on offense, going 3-3 with 2 HRs and 5 RBIs.  Mike and Cody were spectacular on the mound, combining on a one-hit shutout.

In Game 2 we faced the Plainfield (IL) Diamond Dawgs.  They put their ace on the mound, and he was very tough.  Although we were able to score 4 runs, we left a lot of runners on base.  Perhaps the most important thing we were able to do is make him throw over 90 pitches, so he was unable to throw against us when we faced them again the first game on Sunday.  The four runs were enough though, as Luis, Jason and Bret combined for another one-hit shutout.

We then squared off against the Ohio Elite, one of the top-ranked programs in the Midwest.  This was Day 2, and our hitters had worked hard with the coaches and had locked in and found the range from 54'.  Tyler, Jaleel and Donovan each had multiple hits, but the star on offense was Jason, who was a triple short of hitting for the cycle, including a monster grand slam HR.  Darren went the distance on mound for our 3rd straight shutout, this time a two-hitter.

In the final pool game we were stuck playing until 11:15 PM on Sat night against the Sterling Titans.  Both of us were 3-0 in our pool and were playing for the #1 seed.  We unloaded with 6 runs in the top of the first and never looked back, hammering their pitching for a 17-3 win.  Tyler reached base 5 times and scored 4 runs.  Darren had a single, triple and HR.  Jason reached base 3 times with an two-RBI double.  Donovan had a pair of hits and Nick was 3-4 with 3 RBIs.

The tournament was whittled down to 16 teams for Sunday, and we were the #1 overall seed.  We faced the Dawgs in a rematch and we took them apart piece by piece each inning.  Tyler was 4-4 with 3 runs.  Jaleel was 3-4 with a two-run blast over the trees in right.  Bret had a pair of doubles and scored 3 runs.  Mike and Bret combined on the mound to hold the Dawgs to 3 runs and we took a 13-3 win.

We then played uninspired in the Final 8 game against the Sterling Titans.  We got a lead early and went into cruise control.  It was a sloppy game, but we got another mercy-rule win 11-3.  Cody was big for us on the mound, going the distance and allowing only 2 runs.  Donovan had the big day at the plate in this game, going 3-4 with 4 RBIs.

The semi-final game against the Mudhens seemed to be the one everyone wanted to see because we drew a big crowd for the game.  Their pitcher threw as hard as anyone we have seen, but hard throwers don't get elite hitters out.  We were held in check for 2 innings, but the bats caught fire in the 3rd and we never looked back.  The Hens threatened first with bases loaded and 1 out in the 2nd, but Luis got us out of the jam.  Vic led off the 3rd with a big double, then Luis, Tyler and Darren hit back to back to back singles.  Jason hit a sac fly and Jaleel followed it up with an RBI single and we led 3-0.  We poured it on with 5 more in the 4th.  Vic had another big double, Tyler an RBI single, then Jason put the game away with a huge 3-run HR into the parking lot.  Luis found his rhythm and it was over 8-0 after 5 innings.

The Championship was almost anti-climactic.  The Ohio Elite survived 3 bracket games but were out of pitching.  Tyler was 4-4, Cody was 2-2 and Jason had another big 3-run blast.  Jason was also outstanding on the mound, and Vic closed the game for a 13-1 win and a big Championship.

Now it gets even tougher as we head to Tennessee for the Elite Battle in the South!

Junior Catcher Bryan Voelkl, who played for the Meteors for 10 seasons and was our first team captain, was named Player of the Year by the Bradenton Herald.

The Meteors now have the 2010 Players of the Year for Manatee and Pinellas County (Casey Turgeon).  We are the best of the best of the best....

Click on the headline above to read the full story.

10 games in 9 days in 3 different cities finally caught up with us in the Championship Game at the USSSA North Florida 14U State Championship.

It all started Friday night in Kissimmee last weekend at the Super NIT.  Four games in Kissimmee then the final game gets rained out.  We then had to travel to Northwest Tampa late Wednesday night to play the Championship Game at Team Easton.  Finally, a very long trip up to Lake City so we could punch our ticket to be eligible for the Elite World Series.  That Wednesday night game, the brutal heat and humidity of Lake City, and a hot Baker Boyz team led to our first defeat in our last 58 games.

We were also short handed in Lake City, missing 3 players, but we battled hard and came from behind 3 times against 14U teams, going 4-0 against them to reach the Championship Game.  We simply had no fresh pitcher available to pitch the final game and a staff that had given up less the 2 runs a game this year surrendered 13 to the Baker Boyz.

Kissimmee, Tampa and Lake City.  A lot of games and a lot of time on the road.  This week rest is a lot more important that practice.  Everyone has got to get their batteries recharged before our last tournament in Florida - AAU States next weekend.  We will request no Friday game to get the extra day of rest.  Take it easy this week, especially the pitchers. 

I wanted to especially thank the boys and parents from Southwest Florida - the Marreros, Ferrers and Blasuccis.  They had it the toughest this week by far.  It is 4 hours for them to Kissimmee, 3 hours Forrest Hills, 5 hours to Lake City.  They were road warriors this week and showed what Meteors families are all about. 

Next weekend is a big tournament, and we are not going to settle for second! 

The Meteors blew through the field in the USSSA Sunshine State Super NIT, outscoring our five opponents by a combined 54-9. 

The Super NIT is the most important tournament of the year for USSSA in Florida.  The winner of the tournament represents Florida in the toughest, most prestigious tournament in the country - the USSSA Elite World Series.  However, since we already qualified at the Thanksgiving Super NIT, we showed up this weekend as spoilers and hoped to rack up the big prize of 300 points. 

In Game 1 we faced Team MPact on Friday night and it was never a game.  Each month that we are together the gap seems to widen between us and the other top programs in the State.  We jumped out for 8 runs in the top of the 1st and never looked back, pasting the shell-shocked MPact 16-1.   Cody, Jaleel and Bret had multiple hits in the game and Luis, Darren, Bret and Cody combined to keep the MPact hitters quiet.

Game 2 was another beat down as we dominated the Yard Dogs 15-2.  The last time we played the Dogs we had to run poles after a sloppy 3-2 win, and we were looking to make a statement that that game was a fluke.  Jaleel led the offense with 2 HRs and 5 RBIs.  Darren and Brandon also had big games at the plate with multiple hits and RBIs.  Victor got the win with three solid innings and Donovan looked sharp striking out two in the final inning.

We drew the #2 seed going into bracket play, and got a rematch with the Yard Dogs who won their play-in game.  This game was a lot like the other one as we jumped out to an early lead and never looked back with a 12-1 win.  Donovan was 3-4 with a HR and Jason also went 3-4 to lead the offense.  Darren and Mike combined on the mound to end the game early on mercy rule.

In the semis we faced the Baker Boyz, and for the first time this weekend we faced serious adversity.  Jason threw well but they had his number, jumping out to 5 runs in the top of the 1st.  Cody came on and was spectacular, throwing 6 shutout innings in relief to keep us in the game.  We were able to tie the game in the 3rd when Donovan reached on an error and Jason drove him in with a big double.  Jaleel was then hit by a pitch and Darren and Bret followed with big run scoring doubles.  We finally took the lead in the 5th when Jason singled and scored on a double by Jaleel, and had to hold on for a 6-5 win.

The Championship Game was rained out, but we agreed to play it Wednesday night against Team Easton on the home field in Forrest Hills. We scored nearly every inning, but could never get the big inning to put the game away.  Tyler reached and scored twice and Brandon, Mike and Luis had big hits, but the story of the game on offense was Jason.  Jason was 3-3 with 2 doubles, a HR and 4 RBIs against his former team.  Luis was stellar on the mound again throwing 6 shutout innings and allowing only 1 hit.  Mike came on the close out the game in the 7th and we took the Championship 6-0.

We wanted to make a statement in this tournament after we were moved up to the #2 ranking in the country.  We did that and more with a dominant performance all weekend.  The offense, pitching and defense were outstanding.  We are peaking at the right time heading into the big national tournaments.

In our final tuneup before the big end of season Spring tournaments, we continued to click on all cylindars against the Bullets Blue and Bullets White.  We batted 13 players in both games, but that certainly didn't slow down our offense as everybody on the team up and down the lineup hammered the ball.

We led the Bullets Blue 10-0 after 3 innings, and finished with a mercy-rule shortened 12-4 win.  Donovan, Jason, Brandon, Cody and Cory all had outstanding games at the plate, but Jaleel was the headliner with a triple and a three-run HR to deep right.  Cody tossed a one-hit shutout for his three innings of work, then Jaleel and Donovan finished up the game on the mound.

The game against the Bullets White was no contest right from the start as we hammered their two best pitchers for 16 runs in 4 innings.  Donovan, Victor, Bret, Brandon, and Cory had multi-hit games to pace the offense.  Victor, Bret and Jason combined for a shutout to give us a 16-0 win.

Now it is time for the biggest tournaments of the Spring.  Next week the USSSA Super NIT, then USSSA States in Lake City, followed by AAU States.  We still have a great undefeated 2010 season going, and we will hopefully finish up strong in these events before the Summer national tournaments.

The Meteors finished a rain delayed USSSA Elite Invitational this weekend, defeating the Warriors 11-0 and Team Easton 10-7.

We had a first round bye for bracket play, then squared off against the Warriors, who had just beaten the Vipers.  It was no contest from the start as we jumped out to a 5-0 lead in the first when Bret, Jason and Victor hit back to back singles and Jaleel followed that up with a double to drive in two.  Brandon kept things going with an RBI single and we were off an running.  Cody was outstanding on the mound, throwing four no-hit, shutout innings.  We exploded to put the game away with 7 more runs in the 4th.  Brandon led off with a single and Luis drove him in wth a base hit.  Robert then walked and Andrew drove in another run with a single to left.  Donovan then hit a rocket to left for a double and Nick and Jaleel finished up the scoring with RBI singles.  Donovan then came on to pitch a scoreless 4th and preserve the combined no-hitter.

In the Championship Game we faced Team Easton, and for the first five and a half innings we put on an absolute clinic of how to play the game the right way at the plate, on the mound, in the field, and on the bases.  With a 7-0 lead, we let our guard down, played sloppy, and almost blew the game.

Luis started on the mound and was excellent.  He had all his pitches working and threw nearly 5 innings of scoreless baseball against a very good offensive club.  The Easton starter was effectively wild and kept us off balance in the early innings.  We broke through for a run in the 2nd when Jaleel singled, stole second, and was driven in on a single by Luis.  Easton repeatedly hit the ball well, but our defense was outstanding.  Bret made several outstanding plays at SS, and Tyler and Jaleel were fantastic also, tracking down every ball hit into the outfield. 

We scored every single single inning starting with the 4th.  Brandon, Luis and Tyler walked, Jason had a RBI single and Tyler scored on a baserunning play to make it 3-0.  In the 5th, Jaleel singled, Mike walked and Brandon singled in Jaleel.  Mike later scored on a passed ball and it was 5-0.  In the top of the 6th, Jason reached on an error and Victor drove him in with a big double.  Jaleel then drove in Victor with another hit and it looked like the game was over 7-0.  Jason had come on to relieve Luis in the 5th, and he struggled in the 6th, allowing two doubles, and hit two batters and suddenly it was 7-3.  We answered right back in the top of the 7th with 3 big runs.  Tyler walked, Donovan singled, then Jason and Victor drew back to back walks.  Bret hit a sac fly to drive in a run and Jaleel finished the scoring with an RBI single to right.  The now 10-3 lead looked safe again, but three straight Easton hits and two walks and it was 10-7 with runners on 1st and 2nd with two out.  For some reason the Easton runner at second then took off to steal 3rd, and Brandon made a great throw to gun him down to end the game.

Jaleel was name the Offensive MVP for the tournament.  He went 6-7 in bracket play with 5 RBIs, 3 runs, and 3 SBs.  Luis was named tournament MVP.  He threw 5 shutout innings to get the win in the championship game and was 2-4 at the plate with 2 RBIs.  We did not get to name a defensive MVP, but if we were able to it would have been a tough choice between Bret and Tyler, who were both outstanding.  We now take a weekend off before we head into the final month of our Spring season.

The Meteors won the 550th game in their history, defeating the Bullets Grey 19-4 in the Championship Game of the AAU Slug a Rama.

Our focus is on preparations for our four big national tournaments this summer, where we will have to win 8-10 games in just a few days against very tough competition.  To simulate that as much as possible, we decided to enter BOTH the AAU Slug a Rama in Auburndale and the USSSA Florida Elite Invitational in Fishhawk during the same weekend.  In both tournaments, the divisions were split before the events started, so every game was against a Platinum or Majors division team.

We decided to play the pool games with our regular 15-man roster on Saturday.  Since we would have to play at two locations the same time on Sunday, we had to add 3 more players so we could send 9 players to one place and 9 to the other.  Zak was slated to go to Fishhawk since he is on our USSSA roster, and we added Derek Paparella and Danny Schoeder to our AAU roster because those were two guys who had played for us before and were good players who fit in well with our team.

We started the day with an 8:00 AM pool game at Lake Myrtle in the Slug a Rama.  It was a shaky first pool game for the 4th time in the last 5 tournaments, which is really unacceptable.  In the game against the Yarddogs we made 7 outs at either 2nd, 3rd base or home, and our baserunning was just simply disgusting.  We had to come from behind to win 3-2, when Bret, Darren and Tyler came through with big hits in the 5th.  Donovan started out great on the mound with two outstanding innings, then couldnt find the strike zone in the 3rd.  We then went to Victor, who gave us three shutout innings.  Luis pitched a scoreless 6th to pick up the save.  Since we could not figure out how to run the bases, we decided to make the day even more difficult by practicing running poles before the next game.

We needed a win in Game 2 against Space Coast to get a desperately needed #1 seed and a first round bye on Sunday.  Our pitching plans for the day fell apart in this game.  Luis started and could not finish the 1st.  Cody bailed us out retiring the next five batters in a row.  We battered Space Coast for 10 runs in the top of the second.  Darren, Brandon, Tyler and Jason had the key hits to break the game open.  At this point we tried to steal a couple of innings from guys who dont normally pitch for us, but it didnt turn out well.  Jaleel, Nick, and Tyler surrendered 6 runs on 9 walks and Space Coast was right back into the game 11-7.  Darren came in and put out the fire with a scoreless 3rd, and we tacked on 3 more insurance runs when Cory, Jaleel, Robert and Brandon had big hits for a 14-7 win.

As soon as that game was over we had to hop into the cars and head straight over to Fishhawk.  We jumped out to an early lead against Team MPact when Jason drove in Donovan with a double.  We took a 4-0 lead in the 2nd when Darren and Brandon had base hits, then Tyler followed with a big blast to left-center for a 2-run HR, his first one to clear the fence on the big fields.  Tyler later drove in another run with a double to stay hot at the plate.  The story of this game was the pitching of Brandon.  We had used way more pitchers than we wanted to at Lake Myrtle and needed another non-pitcher to step up and give us some innings.  Brandon did way more than expected with 3 innings of shutout ball before he tired in the 4th.  Jason came on in relief with runners on and struggled with his control early and MPact broke through with four runs to cut the lead to 6-4.  We added a badly needed insurance run in the last inning when Jason singled and scored on a passed ball.  Jason then took the mound and pitched a perfect 5th to end the game.

By Game 4 we were all pretty tired.  We had been playing for 11 hours, our pitching was thin, and the legs were going.  We only had one pitcher left available without burning one of our top guys for Sunday.  We called upon Bret and hoped he would at least be able to give us 3-4 innings, then we would try to patch something together with other guys.  Bret is a clutch player who really comes through when the team needs a lift, and this was a very memorable performance as he dug deep and gave us a 7 inning complete-game shutout.  It was a good team hitting performance as almost every player had at least one hit to give us a 7-0 win.

After over 13 hours of baseball, we ended the day 4-0 with the #1 seeds in both AAU and USSSA heading into Sunday.  We did it without using any of our top 5 pitchers more than 30 pitches, so we were ready for 5 bracket games on Sunday.

Unfortunately, rain knocked out Sunday bracket play at Fishhawk.  We had all 17 guys head over to the Slug a Rama, and there is just no team in Florida that can handle our full squad with our best pitchers on the mound.  We hammered Hit and Run 14-4 in a game that was not as close as the score, then scored 15 runs in one inning against the Bullets Grey in the Championship Game for 19-4 win.  All 17 players on the team played in both games and contributed.  Cody and Darren were solid on the mound in the semis.  Luis struggled with his control, but Mike was effective in relief.  Jason was absolutely dominating, striking out the side in the 3rd to end the game.

It was another great weekend for the boys.  We got the 550th win in the history of our program.  Kept our undefeated season alive after 40 games.  Extended our streak of 21 straight tournaments where we reached the Championship Game.  Reached our 90th Final Four.  Darren Miller, the final addition to our roster for the rest of the Spring and Summer, showed why he was going to be a key guy for us going forward, playing 6 positions extremely well and hitting the ball all over the ballpark. 

We have the best travel baseball team that has ever existed in Florida at any age group.  No team in the country is better than us at regulation (60/90) distance.  The big question is whether this highly talented group of kids is going to be able to win major national events at the hybrid distance (54/80) used by the 13U teams in the rest of the country.  It is going to be a big challenge, and quite honestly after playing well over 100 games at 60/90 it will be a big disadvantage for us.  But, we love challenges - the more difficult the better - and I believe this special group of boys will rise to the occassion this summer.

Think about how many tens of thousand of 13 year olds are playing baseball in the world right now.  How many teams are there with 13 year olds?  Thousands of rec ball teams - little league, babe ruth, pony, dixie youth, and thousands of travel teams.  Of these thousands of teams, only a small handful - about 25-30, can be said to be truly elite national programs capable to competing with the best of the best in a loaded field.  Sure, there are other teams out there who can compete with these 25-30 teams in a head-to-head one game matchup where they have their ace on the mound, but none of them can stay on the same field with an elite team if they have to use anyone other than their #1 or #2 starter.  Therefore, they have to avoid playing in the major events that are deep and loaded, and their players do not get 20-25 at-bats against the best of the best. 

We do what we do, the way we do it, so that our boys end up with 400+ at bats against the best in the country for their age group ever single year.  No other travel ball program in Florida give their players anything remotely close to that.  Our pitchers face the best hitters in the country.  Our catchers the best base-stealers, and on and on.  As we have said many times, you are who you play.  You can artificially create high self-esteem in a young player who is shielded and protected from facing players who are better than him.  When you do this, you ultimately face a day of reckoning because you can't insulate yourself from the real world forever.  Sooner or later, in a competitive world you will come face to face with the best.  The question is, will you be ready, physically and mentally to deal with that challenge.  Our boys unquestionably are because we put them in this position every single week.  We have never feared defeat, because when you face the best and do your best you have already won, no matter what the scoreboard says. 

So many of the players now playing in the lower divisions of travelball and seek to avoid the best teams in the country by steering clear of the toughest events, should just stay in their local leagues and play rec ball.  That is because their brand of travelball is not better baseball, it is only more baseball - little league plus.  That is OK if your expectations in high school and beyond are low - or if you misguidedly believe playing in the lower divisions does not put you an an enormous almost insurmountable disadvange with colleges and pro scouts. 

If you are going to play at a lower division program in high school, playing rec ball will certainly get you ready for that because it is essentially rec ball that is the equivalent of an after-school intramural pickup game for a major program.  But if you want to prepare yourself to play at a 5A-6A school, where college and pro scouts attend your big games, you better walk into that high school with a a resevoir of experience playing at the highest level from 10U-14U.  That is the track Meteors players are on and have always been on.  That is why so many Meteors are now so successful at the highest level of high school baseball in the state, before the eyes of college and pro scouts on a weekly basis.  Scouts that would never set up shop outside the fences of lowel level programs.

Kids tend to live up the expectations we set for them.  If you settle - and set your bar low, kids will tend to reach the low ceiling and be satisfied.  They will be lulled into a false sense of achievement because those around them have limited ability and the same low expectations.  Doctors say you are what you eat.  In competitive athletics, you are who you play.  If you play and compete against the best, you will give yourself a chance to rise up and become the best yourself.  If you shy away from contact - and never put yourself in a position to have your skills tested by the best of the best, you will atrophy and be lulled into falsely believing that you are better than you really are.  The cold bucket of reality is out there though, ready to be dumped onto their heads.  Sometimes it can be rather cruel.  But it could have been avoided by simply setting ego, and fear of failure aside to face difficult challenges that only serve to make you stronger in the long run.   

The Meteors outscored our opponents by a combined 62-4 in sweeping our five games at the IBC Battle of the Bats in Plant City.

We opened with an 8-0 win over the Polk Gators. Victor was outstanding on the mound in that game.  Bret was equally good in the Titans game where we needed a shutout for the #1 seed in a 17-0 whitewashing.  In our first bracket game we got a rematch with the Titans and it was pretty much the same result as we hammered them 15-1 behind Mike's pitching.

There was a lot you could say about this team and the way they go about their business, but I think our comments should be just limited to this.  Most travelball teams and coaches are concerned only with their own team, their own players, and have a sincere desire to work hard to make them better baseball players.  Other coaches and parents spend a lot of time worrying about other teams and what they are doing.  This is a team that needs to worry more about themselves and what they are doing instead of everybody else. 

Next we play the Yarddogs, a good team with good coaches who have not yet given us their best game.  We scored 11 in the top of the first and never looked back, taking the game 14-2 with a complete game by Jason.

In the Championship we got the Bullets Blue, and they played us tough again with excellent pitching and defense.  The game was tied 1-1 in the bottom of the 6th when we finally broke through with big hits by Donovan, Jason and Mike gave us the lead.  Luis was dominant on the mound to give us another Championship and a 6-1 complete-game win.

... and doubles to help lead 6A Sarasota JV to a win over Riverview in the final regular season game of the season.  The Sailors finished the regular season 17-3 and will begin a week-long JV tournament to wrap up the season beginning this weekend.

The top high school baseball programs from around the State of Florida came to Sarasota this week for the week-long Sarasota Baseball Classic tournament.  Sarasota High kept it's undefeated season going, and moved up the national rankings to #12, by taking the tournament championship over defending 4A State Champ Naples High.

SHS Meteors Sean Hurley and Brandon Haarer were huge all week for Sarasota.  Both hit over .400 for the week and Sean threw 6 shutout innings against West Orange High in the semi-finals.  Here are videos of Brandon and Sean from the Chamionship Game against Naples.

After 9 years of Meteors baseball and nearly 800 games, it gets difficult to find new things to accomplish for the first time.  In these past several years, both Meteors teams have played up in tournaments in older age brackets to get tougher competition and challenge our players.  Although we have often played very well (slightly over .500), it is difficult to play up in travelball tournaments and the best we have ever finished in a elite, majors division event is 3rd. 

This past weekend we wanted to travel to Lake City to play some new teams from North Florida, and unfortunately there were not enough 13U teams to have a tournament at that age group.  We decided to jump up to play the 14s, and were able to run the table against the older boys and win another championship.

We opened with the Ocala Blaze, which was regarded as the best team in the tournament.  It was a very sloppy game by both sides as they spotted us 5 runs in the 1st on only two hits.  Our sloppy play and erratic pitching was equally bad and the game ended in a 9-9 tie.

We needed to win our second game against the Bay County Diamond Dawgs from Panama City to advance to the majors division.  We left no doubt about that as we came out a lot more focused and opened up on the Dawgs with 11 runs in the top of the 1st.  Victor, Jaleel, Cody, Robert, Andrew, Tyler and Jason had big hits in the inning.  We just kept pouring it on with 6 more runs in the 3rd, and Cody and Donovan combined on the mound for a 17-0 whitewashing to give us the #2 seed in the elite division.

We got a rematch with the Ocala Blaze in the semi-finals, and this time is was a much better game with both sides playing at a very high level.  They started their ace on the mound and he was very effective.  The Blaze defense also made key plays when needed, including turning a triple play to end a threat in the 4th.  Meanwhile, Jason was matching him pitch for pitch, throwing a brilliant five and two-thirds innings of shutout ball.  We also made some great plays behind in the field as Jaleel got a lot of action in centerfield tracking down several ball.  We finally broke through as the game was tied 0-0 in the 6th.  Tyler led off with a single and scored on a big double down the line by Donovan.  Jason then hit a sac fly to move him to third, and Donovan scored on another big hit by Victor.  Luis came on to relieve Jason in the 6th and was outstanding, retiring four straight batters for the save to preserve a 2-0 win.

In the Championship we faced the Naturalz from Gainesville, and this game was a lot like the Bay County game where our offense exploded for 11 runs in the 1st and never let up.  Jaleel, Tyler, and Donovan had big hits and the inning and Victor finished it up with a huge blast for a 3-run home run to deep left.  We scored every inning, including Jason's first home run as a Meteors, and line-drive shot to center and we cruised to a 16-3 win.  Cody picked up the win on the mound despite having to pitch on a upset stomach.

The first third of the season is now over and we take a break with an undefeated record.  We will get going after Easter with some of the big Florida state tournaments in April and May.

It seems like the baseball gods are finding new and creative ways each week to place obstacles in our path to overcome.  Somehow, we always manage to pull through and overcome them.  The way this season is going, by the time we reach the national tournaments this summer there will not be a single situation we won't have already faced and dealt with.

This week was the AAU March Madness.  Because of Spring training and college tournaments, we had to play at fields that were less than ideal in our pool games Saturday.  Our first game was on a field that had a 40 mph wind blowing straight in the hitters faces, making it almost impossible to generate offense except by walk or error.  To make matters worse, all Friday games were rained out, so the tournament had a 1:30 time limit for all games the entire weekend.  That meant 4-5 inning games at best and any team that fell behind early was in trouble.  We trailed in 3 our of 5 games, which made things a little stressful.

In Game 1, the wind blew Donovan's pitches all over the place and we got off to exactly the kind of start you don't want.  4 walks and a hit batter led to two runs by the Polk Gators without a hit.  Bret and Victor came on in relief and were outstanding, only allowing 1 run the rest of the way, but 3 runs was a lot on that field on that day.  We finally broke through in the 3rd when Jason singled in Tyler, but time was running out.  Victor tied the game with a huge hit in the 4th, driving in Mike and Donovan.  We loaded the bases in the bottom of the 5th, but the Gators second baseman made a leaping grab on a hard liner by Donovan to end the game in a 3-3 tie.

This unexpected result left us in a position where we would be playing in the Gold division for the first time in 9 years if we lost our next pool game against the Tampa Thunder.  We jumped out to a 4-0 lead in the top of the first, and it looked like we were going to cruise.  However, we had switched fields and this time that gale wind was blowing directly out.  The Thunder took advantage of that, exploding for 8 runs on 7 hits, including a grand slam.  The first two innings ate up an hour of the time limit, so we only had 30 minutes left.  We also trailed 8-4.  We hustled on and off the field and our pitchers only took 2 warmup pitches between innings.  Jason, Cody and Mike quickly retired the Thunder batters in order in the 3rd, 4th and 5th, with the Thunder's half of the innings lasting no more than 2 minutes.  We broke through with 3 runs in the 3rd when Victor led off with a home run and Mike had a big double to cut the lead to 8-7.  Jaleel then hit a monster home run off the roof of the house across the street that was called foul.  That ended the our threat, and when we went down in order in the 4th, we were fighting for our tournament lives down a run heading into the last inning with time expired.  Victor was up first and blasted another HR to deep left to tie the game and it was on.  Luis made it back to back with another HR, then Brandon ripped a 3-run HR to center.  Bret and Jason added RBI hits and we pulled out a great comeback with a 13-8 win.

Sunday was yet another test as we faced 2 very solid new teams and one tough old team in our Platinum Divison bracket games.  Since there was only 1 field available, our games times were spread out where we had to start at 10:30 AM and finished at 10:00 PM.  We faced the Space Coast Academy from Brevard County, a team that had beaten several quality teams this season already.  Zak was on the mound, and he kept us off balance early with his changeup and the game was tied 0-0 after two innings as Cody matched him pitch for pitch and our defense was outstanding.  Once we learned to lay off the changeup, the offense started to heat up.  Brandon was hit by a pitch to open the 3rd and was bunted to second by Cody.  Luis then ripped a double and Tyler followed that up with an RBI single.  Donovan had an RBI groundout to finish the scoring and give us a 3-0 lead.  When Cody retired the side 1-2-3 in the top of the 4th, we had a chance to end the game early with a big inning.  Jaleel led off with a double and scored on a sac fly by Brandon.  Cody, Luis and Tyler then reached on errors and Donovan drove in two with a single to make it 7-0.  Jason had a chance to end the game and came through with a hard single to left and an 8-0 mercy-rule win.

After a long break, we faced the Bullets Blue who had a bye so were coming out for their first game and it was on their home field.  We got off to a terrible start, making 3 bad errors in the first and were behind 4-0 on only 1 hit.  With the short time limit, we were again up against the clock and had to scramble to come back quick.  Luis shook off the errors and shut down the Blue, allowing only 1 run in the next 3 innings to keep us in the game.  We manufactured a run in the 2nd when Jaleel was hit by a pitch and scored on an error to make it 4-1 after 2.  We finally took the lead in the 3rd when Jason, Victor, Bret, and Jaleel each singled and Brandon and Luis followed with big RBI hits to give us a 5-4 lead.  The Bullets answered right back to tie the game in the bottom of the inning, but Jason came on to relieve Luis and we got out of inning.  We took the lead in back in the 4th when Bret singled in Dovovan, then added insurance in the 5th when Tyler and Donovan drove in Mike and Brandon with big hits.  The Blue would not go quietly, scoring a run to cut the lead to 8-5 with runners on 1st and 3rd, but a great double-move by Jason picked off the runner at first to end the game.

In the Championship we faced a strong Yard Dogs team from Lakeland that had soundly beaten the Bullets White in the semis.  This was one of those games, however, where we smelled the Championship, got on roll early and never let up.  Jason and Jaleel drove in Tyler and Donovan in the 1st to give us a 2-0 lead.  We exploded in the 2nd when Mike, Brandon, Donovan and Victor had big hits and the game was pretty much over at that point 8-0.  Mike was outstanding on the mound and our defense made all the plays behind him and we won another Championship in dominating fashion 9-1.

Next week, we add a new challenge for the boys as we will be playing in the St. Pete Stars 14U tournament with many of the top 14U teams in the State.  It is going to be our toughest test in a while and it will be fun to see how we do back in this age division.  We have played 27 games against the older age group, and our record in those games is 14-13, so we have certainly held our own.  It should be a lot of fun and will make us better.

The Meteors swept through the King Of Diamonds tournament in Longwood, defeating the Central Florida Knights 6-4 and All-Pro Baseball 13-3 in pool play, then the Knights 8-3, 17-0 against the Orlando Show and 5-0 in the Championship against Team M-Pact. 

We opened the tournament after a long rain delay in freezing cold, windy conditions against the Central Florida Knights.  The Knights had gotten off to a hot start to the season, and they were one of the few teams we had never played.  Although we wanted to take care of business and get the win, our priority in pool games is development of players so our entire roster will be prepared for the summer tournaments.  Therefore, we chose to bat all 13 players, which made it difficult to turn our batting order over.  This game also featured the Meteors debut of Jason Heinrich, and he made an impact right away with an RBI single in the first, driving in Bret who had reached with a double.  The Knights answered right back with two runs in the bottom of the inning and we trailed 2-1 going into the 3rd.  Cory, Robert and Andrew then all reached base with Cory scoring on a passed ball and Robert on a sac fly by Tyler to put us up 3-2.  We were able to extend the lead to 6-2 in the 4th, but the Knights answered back again right away to cut the lead to 6-4.  Mike, who went the distance for us on the mound, struck out the final batter of the game to put us in the driver's seat for the #1 seed. 

In Game 2 we faced an overmatched All-Pro Baseball Academy.  We didn't start this game until 8:30 PM in freezing weather and were anxious to get it over early.  Our offense battered All-Pro's pitching with 10 runs in the top of the first.  Tyler had a big hit in this inning over the centerfielder's head to drive in two...

... Donovan and Jaleel combined on the mound to give us a quick 13-4 win in just three innings.  Donovan picked up a nice strikeout of the final batter he faced ...

Sunday morning the rain was gone and we had the #1 seed, but we knew it was going to be a tough day with some very good teams looking to end our undefeated season. We opened again against the Knights, who had won their play-in game. We got the party started in the 2nd, jumping out to a 3-0 lead behind Tyler's two-RBI single. The Knights got a run in the top of the 3rd, but then we took solid control of the game with three more runs as Jason led off with a double, Mike and Donovan had back to back hits, then Victor drove them in with a big double. The Knights would not go quietly as Luis, who had been almost unhittable all season, was not as sharp as usual and they were able to cut the lead to 6-3, but a big defensive play by Bret and Jason ended the threat.

We then put the game away with two more runs in the 5th and the 8-3 win let us advance to the semis.

In the Final Four we faced the Orlando Show, but it was the Meteors who put on a show, battering their pitching for 17 runs in 3 innings.  Tyler, Donovan, Brandon and Cody helped crank up the offense early with an RBI singles...  

As everyone associated with our team well knows, we are completely focused on the big national tournaments this summer.  Our plan was to expand our roster to 15 players by then, because it is necessary to run a gauntlet at those events and win 7-9 games in row in a weekend where nearly every team you face is a state champion.  We also were in a position to be very picky about who we gave those final two roster spots to.

Jason Heinrich is a player we have loved and respected for years.  We have played against him at least twenty times.  He has pitched against us probably 15 times.  He has been an All-American every year since he was 10 years old.  He is a high character kid with a winning attitude and he is a tough competitor.  He knows our boys well and we know him well.  Despite all the big, hard-fought games we had on opposite sides, we have always had that mutual respect for each other and there has never been an ounze of animosity.

Jason is a perfect fit for the Meteors and the Meteors are a perfect fit for Jason.  We now have 5 current All-American on our roster, 1 former All-American and several other players very deserving of being in that select group.  Our lineup is unbelievable and our pitching staff is amazing.  This is now the best travel baseball team I have ever seen, at any age group, in my 10 years doing this.  We are now prepared to make a run at a National Championship and our goal is to finish this 13U year as the #1 ranked team in the nation. 

We are excited to have Jason committed to us full-time and I can't wait to fill out our lineup card this weekend!

It was the largest event we have ever hosted in the 9 years of Meteors baseball with 50 teams coming to Sarasota from all parts of the State.  We had several of the top 3 ranked teams in every age group, which made for some of the best youth baseball ever seen in this area.

The tournament was also easily the smoothest run with the fewest problems.  That was because of the hard work by everyone on our team.  Coach Ken worked extremely hard lining up quality teams, fields and concession setup.  Coach Mike set up and maintained a live, up to date website with the schedule, score and pitching so the coaches and players didn't have to scramble to find out what was going on. 

The parents really worked hard all weekend and stepped up to the plate to keep concessions going round the clock at four different facilities.  We received many compliments on the quality of the concession and the friendliness of our parents.  Finally, the players did a great job picking up trash, working the gates and helping out whereever needed.

This tournament is the most important thing we do all season.  It is the liveblood of our program.  No travel team in the United States plays more tournaments and more national events that we do.  It is very expensive to do that.  Unlike other teams who do much less than us, we do not charge the parents any team dues and do not rely on a "sugar daddy" parent to finance the team.  People who do that always expect something in return, and that expectation can often lead to a lot of dissention on teams.  The success of this event is one of the big reasons why Meteors teams always stay together over the long hall.

Now, back to the fun stuff.  We are jumping into an Orlando event this weekend and will keep you posted on that as soon as we can.

We had to play a single seeding game because of an odd number of teams in the 14U Division.  So we played against the 14U Orlando Baseball Academy.  We treated the game as fun and batted a continuous 13 guys.  We worked in pitchers we are developing for the summer - Donovan and Jaleel, and even threw Brandon for a couple of innings. 

The boys played fantastic!  The pitchers allowed 1 hit against their older opponents and just about every player in the lineup had at least one hit, including a blast off the wall by Bret and a towering Home Run by Luis for a 9-1 win.

What a way to start the season!  It seemed like we had to clear one hurdle after another en route to another tournament championship.  This was the kind of weekend that really builds toughness and character.  We showed that we have a lot of that, and we have never been more proud of our team and our boys.

For starters, the weather was brutal.  It was freezing and windy with some rain mixed in.  We were just coming off a one month break and knew we would be rusty - especially at the plate.  In our pool games we started out with Hit and Run and it looked like we would pick up where we left off last season as we scored 4 in the first when Tyler and Bret singled, Jaleel doubled, Donovan tripled and Cory followed with an RBI single.  However, the bats quieted and we were only able to scratch out 3 more runs the rest of the game.  The pitching was outstanding though, as it was the whole tournament.  Donovan and Cory combined to allow just runs and we took the first game of the season 7-3.

In game 2 we faced the West Volusia Attack.  It was a very similar game to the first as we jumped out to an early 4-0 lead, then was only able to score four more runs.  Once again though, pitching was the story.  Luis, Mike and Jaleel combined for a one-hitter and we clinched the #1 seed with an 8-1 win.

The first bit of adversity kicked in after this game.  Tyler injured his groin on a slide play and had to be carried off the field.  It was clear that our leading hitter and centerfielder would not play on Sunday.

In the semi-final game we faced a solid Baker Boyz team from Jacksonville.  The offense showed signs of the firepower from the fall, but we left a lot of runners stranded.  Mike and Bret had the big hits in the game, and Mike was the MVP of this game on the mound.  Mike totally dominated the Boyz hitters, spinning a 5-hitter to lead us to a 6-1 win.  During this came, Cory had to be taken out for the rest of the day with an arm injury.  We were now down 2 starters.

Then the next little twist essentially gave our next opponents a first round bye.  The Attack forfeited their quarterfinal game against team Easton because they supposedly had two players with "sore arms" and were unable to put 9 players on the field.  This allowed our semi-final opponent to come out at 2:30 for their first game of the day against us - not only saving pitching, but also not having to deal with the elements all day.  Easton jumped out to an early 1-0 lead as an error led to an early run.  We answered when Jaleel singled in Victor to tie the game at 1-1.  Then we exploded in the 4th and 5th as the Easton pitchers struggled with the strike zone and we had some key hits.  Luis was spectacular on the mound, throwing a complete game with 0 earned runs and only 3 hits and we advanced to the Championship 12-4.

In the Championship we faced our old friends the Hurricanes, who had some more new players since the last time we faced them.  Timely hitting, great baserunning, excellent defense and the pitching of Cody was the same formula we used to come out on top for the 3rd straight time.  Donovan, Victor, Bret and Jaleel make several spectacular plays to bail us out of bases-loaded jams almost every inning.  We led 6-1 going into the final inning when Cody tired and loaded the bases.  Bret came on to put the fire out to pick up the save in a 6-2 win and another Championship.

Few tournament championships have been as satisfying as this one.  When you overcome obstacles and adversity it makes you stronger.  Our boys proved again that they are champions - when they take the field they don't hope to win, they expect to win.  We do not believe anything can stop us, and that goes a long way on the field.  We will keep working hard and take on every challenge in front of us.  This upcoming President's Day tournament is loaded and will be just as difficult as last weekend.

We ended an unbelievable season with a 51-2 record after sweeping through the USSSA Winter World Championship in Kissimmee.

We opened against the top team from South Carolina - the Sox, who led the nation in the USSSA points rankings coming into the tournament.  We played a fantastic game in all phases and dominated the game from start to finish in a statement game 10-1.

Our other two pool games were against South Carolina teams, but they were overmatched as we rolled 12-0 against the St. Andrews Beast and 12-4 against USSSA Team South Carolina.  We earned the #1 seed and a first round bye.

Team South Carolina then defeated the Orlando Gators in bracket play, and we faced them in the Astros Stadium in the semis.  Our guys were very focused and it was a whitewashing from start to finish.  Mike was unhittable on the mound and the offense was clicking as we rolled to a 15-0 win.

The Sox had also won their semi game 15-0, setting up a rematch in the Championship back in the Stadium.  This time the game was tighter, but we relied on the pitching of Cody (4 hits, 1 walk) and 0 errors on defense to hold the Sox to 2 runs.  Meanwhile, big hits by Tyler, Bret and Jaleel gave us the runs we would need in a 5-2 win.

It was a great win and will vault us in the #1 ranking in the country in USSSA heading into the Spring 2010 season! 

We have come to the end of a long and spectacular Fall 13U season, and it is time for a break.  We went into this past weekend's tournament with an amazing 32 game winning streak, and extended that to 35 games with convincing wins over the Bullets Grey (10-0), Tampa Panthers (14-4) and Sal Urso (8-0).  We then took a 5-2 into the final inning with the Bullets Grey but could not hold it and lost 6-5. 

Usually you learn more from your losses than your wins.  We learned that we got a little complacent, and when that happens, you can get beat.  We had beated the Grey in our three previous matchups by a combined 26-1, and that led to an air of self-confidence that we warned the players about before our semi-final game.  We did not play with the focus and intensity that has brought us unparalleled success all year, and it cost us the the game.  Hopefully, the boys learned a valuable lesson, and it was good that we experienced a loss in a smaller event rather than one of the Fall State Championships or the Super NIT. 

We are now building a Spring schedule that will be the most difficult in the country.  We played a lot of local events for the first time in a while this past season, and that is appropriate for the Fall.  However, the Spring is different.  This Spring and Summer we will play several national events and will seek out the toughest possible competition in the most difficult formats.  We are going to put our team and our players on the biggest stages, and we expect great things. 

When we come out of this Spring 13U season, our players will have faced the best 13U teams and pitchers from every part of the country.  Nothing will prepare them for great high school careers like this season.  It will help form the foundation of their future in this game.

23 teams showed up for the biggest event of the Fall Season so far - the AAU Slug a Rama in Lake Myrtle.  The Meteors blew away the field again, outscoring our opponents by a combined 46-4 en route to our 5th tournament championship of the season.

In Game 1 we faced the Lakeland Thunder.  Tyler and Jaleel paced the offense with two hits each and Mike had a big two-RBI hit to break the game open in the 3rd.  Cody, Brett, Zak and Mike combined for the shutout, but were helped out by two outstanding plays from Cory and Andrew on defense.

Only one team out of 23 would get a first-round bye, and our shutout in Game 1 gave us a shot if we were able to keep the runs down in the second pool game.  The offense came out smoking right from the beginning as we hammered the Central Florida Warriors pitching staff for 17 runs on 16 hits.  Bret was 3-3 with two monstrous home runs, including one that cleared the fence over the 340' mark, and 6 RBIs.  Victor had two hits and an RBI and Cory was 3-3 with 3 RBIs.  Meanwhile, the pitchers did the job to secure the bye as Victor and Cory put out fires to preserve a 17-1 win.

The bye advanced us to the Final Four of the platinum division.  We were hoping to square off against the Bullets Gold or the St. Pete Hurricanes out of the other side of the bracket, but those teams were unable to advance to the championship.  We faced the Titans Red and hammered them for 10 runs on 8 hits in just 3 innings.  Tyler was 2-2 with 2 runs and 2 steals, but the offensive star of the game was Donovan who was 2-2 with a triple, 2 runs, and 5 RBIs.  Bret and Mike combined on the mound for a one-hit shutout.

In the Championship we faced the Hit and Run, and actually trailed for the first time in the tournament 1-0 going into the 2nd inning before the offense exploded.  Bret was 2-2 with a double, RBI and 2 SBs, Brandon and Cory reached base all 3 times and scored 3 runs each.  Mike had a huge RBI triple in gap and walked twice.  Cody and Zak were excellent on the mound again and we cruised to an 11-3 win. 

The Championship Game of the Slug a Rama was the 700th Game in Meteors history.  We picked a good one for this milestone!

At the beginning of this season when we dominated games, we heard a variety of things coming out of different teams.  Sometimes it was the umpires who allegedly conspired to make sure we won.  Or it was because we played on the big fields sometimes last season.  The problem with these theories is that we have now done it with AAU, USSSA and IBC umpires.  Most of the crews, including those this weekend, we had never seen before and did not even know.  The results have been the same every single time.  In fact, our most lopsided wins were with crews we have never seen before.

Some said that we played up last year to try and get a jump on everyone for this season.  That is totally ridiculous.  As we said to all the parents and players when we did it - the reason was that we wanted to demonstrate to our own players that bad habits and fundamentals would lead to failure on the big fields.  It was intended as an eye-opening experience for the players, and it was.  On the small fields you can get away with bad habits.  On the big fields they will sink you.  We have the athletes to dominate, but we also have players who have good fundamentals and play the game the right way.

If that theory was correct, then the other teams would be gaining on us week to week as they got used to the big fields.  However, every week we are blowing out teams by bigger and bigger margins.  The gap continues to widen because our team did the kinds of things necessary to succeed at real baseball from day one.  While other teams focused on the little field game, we assembled a team of great athletes and emphasized the areas of the game that didnt necessarily win trophies on the small fields, but have led to complete domination once the training wheels came off.

It's a great time to be a Meteor.  We are having a blast with each other on and off the field.  There are few experiences more enjoyable than being a part of a team like this.  We have stuck together through thick and thin.  Through highs and lows.  We have been loyal to each other.  This team is writing perhaps the greatest chapters in a long and storied line of youth travel baseball at the very highest level.  The next year and a half is going to be a really fun ride!

GO BELOW AND READ THE ARTICLE AGAIN THAT WAS POSTED ON THIS WEBSITE LAST MARCH.

The Meteors travelled to the Bullets field to play a one day tournament.  Two costly errors let to five unearned runs and we tied the Bullets Grey in our first pool game.  We had to win the game against the Bullets White to win our pool, and we got the job done with a 6-1 win.  The Bullets Gold had defeated the Scorpions and Tampa Thunder to win Pool A, and we took on the Gold for the third time this season in the Championship, and we put on a show in a convincing 10-1 win. 

Our defense was spectacular in this game, especially Tyler and Victor.  Cody spun a 53-pitch complete game on the mound.  Our offense was also outstanding, hitting several bombs to the opposite field and ringing up the pitch counts of the opposing pitcher.  We forced the Gold starter to throw 106 pitches in just 4 innings, including 47 pitches in the 4th!  We also swept through this tournament without Bret and Jaleel, two of our leading hitters. 

This was a total team effort and we are very proud of the boys.  We have worked very hard for two years and build the kind of team that is a dominant force on the big fields playing real baseball.  Teams that focused on assembling small field heros now realize they are in big trouble.  We will continue to get better and keep on rolling.

We played great baseball all weekend until several mistakes cost us the Championship at the IBC Fall Classic.

On Saturday we only had 9 players with 4 missing for different reasons.  These guys played great baseball on a long, tough day which began at 8 AM and ended at 5 PM in the scorching heat.  We won the first pool game 7-0 against the Braden River Hurricanes.  Donovan led the offense with a single, double and HBP.  Robert Shay also had a big two-RBI single, Brett and Cody reached base twice on hit and walks and Andrew had an RBI single and two walks to pace the offense.  Brandon, Cory and Brett combined on the mound for a no-hit shutout.

In the second pool game we faced a tougher Tampa Panthers team.  The game was tight throughout and was tied 3-3 heading into the 5th when Jaleel drove in Cory to give us a 4-3 lead.  We added some insurance in the 6th on hits by Robert S., Andrew and Brett to give us a 7-3 win.  Jaleel, Donovan and Brett scattered 5 hits for the win.

In our first bracket game we faced the BR Hurricanes again.  This time we had all our players back and the offense exploded, scoring every inning in a short 11-0 win.  Tyler and Jaleel were both 3-3.  Brett and Brandon both had big two-RBI hits.  Victor threw a complete game no-hit shutout with no walks to pick up the win and preserve his 0.00 season-ERA.

In the semis we squared off against the Tampa Titans who had knocked off the Riverview Rage.  This was another tight one for most of the game.  We got a run in the first when Brett doubled and scored on a passed ball, but the offense would sputter for the next two innings and we led 1-0 heading into the 4th.  Zak had thrown 3 shutout innings but tired in the 4th and a costly error led to three runs and the Titans led 3-1.  We answered back with a run in the 4th as Donovan led off with a single, stole second and was driven in on a single by Robert S.  Brett came on in relief to shut down the Titans and the offense finally broke it open in the 5th when Tyler doubled, Brett and Jaleel singled, Brandon walked, Donovan drove in Tyler and Brett with a double, then Victor and Robert followed with RBI singles for a 7-4 win.

In the Championship Game we faced a collection of players from teams all over the State.  It was the Cat5EastonDiamondCanesGold and it presented a great challenge for our boys.  The "St. Pete Hurricanes" had picked up 3 players from the Bullets Gold, 3 from CAT5/Easton, and 2 from the old Diamondbacks.  Overall, it was a great game where we hit some absolute bombs and had runners on base every inning.  However, several baserunning mistakes, a few defensive lapses and a couple of close calls that didnt go our way were the difference in the game as we came up short 6-3.

It was another great weekend where we got 5 games in and all the boys got a lot of work in - especially the ones there the whole weekend.  Once we fully make the adjustment to the big fields and iron out our mistakes on defense we will really get clicking.  This team is not even close to its full potential, we will keep working hard and by the Spring we will be rolling.

99% of the coaches involved in travel baseball are in it for the right reasons.  They enjoy working with kids, teaching the game, and developing players over time to prepare them for high school.  They put their teams together, finding the right group of kids that they are comfortable with and that are comfortable with their program.  They try to keep them together, are loyal to them, and expect loyalty in return.  These coaches enjoy watching their players improve over time as they learn the game and develop.  That is why they coach.

Travelball teams come in all shapes and sizes and their is no single "right" approach.  Some choose to limit their rosters to a single Little League park to develop the "All-Star" team.  Others draw from multiple parks in their city, some from a broader region.  All of these are positive as long as the coaches and players stick together, play together, and learn from each other.

Then there are the other 1%.  These are coaches who don't really have "teams" - they simply put together a collection of players for a specific tournament.  We saw this at the Battle in the South, the USTBA at East Cobb, Cooperstown, the Elite 24, and again this past weekend.  This has been going on for years in this country - coaches paying the travel expenses of families of players to get them to play for them in a particular tournament.  Coaches flying in players from other states.  Some even hand the parents cash for "expenses" during those weekends. 

If you play travelball at the elite national level, as Meteors teams have done for many years, you run into these teams all the time.  It can be frustrating, but we enjoy competing against these "Dream Teams" at these events because it makes us stronger and presents the ultimate challenge for our boys. 

We have a lot of respect for programs that try and put together a stable roster and try to work with their players and develop them over the long term.  They are not on the phones every week trying to pick up multiple players from other teams while the kids who practice with them all week sit on the bench when the games start.  All of the programs like ours who work with their kids and are loyal to them, and try and play at the elite level, get our respect and hopefully they respect us as well.  Team like the Tampa Titans, Lakewood Longhorns, Bullets White, Bullets Gold, Tampa Thunder, North Florida Hurricanes, Team M-Pact and others are out there doing things the right way.

The guys who spend a bunch of cash putting together these so-called "Dream Teams" represent the dark, ugly side of travel baseball.  They are all over the country, and have been around for many years.  They are simply trophy hunters.  They do not develop players or even practice.  When they assemble for a tournament, the players don't know each other's names.  It is funny to watch them at the awards ceremonies after tournaments as they struggle to remember the kids names as they call them out for their medals.  These guys get no loyalty in return from their players, so they are constantly having to find new ones until they eventually have burned all their bridges.  They want respect from other coaches for their tournament victories, but they get none because the real coaches see them clearly as frauds.

We will continue to be loyal to our players, and that is why we have had so many players stick with us for so long.  The coaches around the State who follow the same path will be able to take great pride watching the players they have developed star in high school, while the other guys sit home and watch their trophies gather dust as they struggle to remember the names of they guys they paid to win them.

The Meteors remained undefeated on the big fields, with speed, power and outstanding pitching on full display at the September Shootout.  We defeated the Bullets Gold 8-4 in the seeding game, rotating a different pitcher in every inning.  Then we posted a 9-1 win against the Longhorns behind the hitting of Tyler and Jaleel and the pitching of Cody and Zak.  In the Semis we faced the Cape Coral Cannons and the offense hammered out 7 runs in the top of the first as we cruised to a 13-3 win.  In the key game of the tournament, we continued to pound the ball against the Bullets Gold and got a 12-7 despite several defensive mistakes.

We outscored our opponents 42-15 in the tournament, but we can get a lot better.  Although the offense is clicking, almost all of the runs we allowed this weekend were unearned because of defensive lapses.  We will work on improving defensively and continue to get better.

The Meteors continue to dominate on the big fields, sweeping through the AAU First Pitch tournament by a combined 24-3.  Our speed, athleticism, power and depth were on full display this weekend as we were stellar in all phases of the game.  Everybody played an equal number of innings and nobody pitched more than four innings for the weekend.

We defeated the Polk Gators 9-2 and the Bullets Black 11-1 in our pool games to clinch the #1 seed and a first round bye.  The problem at that point was that hardly any of the teams wanted to compete in the "Platinum" Division, so we advanced to the Championship and were only able to play one game on Sunday.  In a game that was not as close as the score, we defeated the Tampa Titans 4-0 behind a combined two-hit shutout by Cody and Zak.

MESSAGE TO FLORIDA HEAD COACHES:

The landscape of travel baseball in Florida has changed so much over the last ten years, and not for the better.  It started fifteen years ago as a small number of very elite, loaded teams that played at the highest level.  About ten years ago the number of teams exploded as many average to below average players wanted to get into it.  For several years after that, all these teams played in the same tournaments - there were no separate "divisions."  The weaker or newer teams took their lumps, but their players who had ability got better by playing great competition.

Once travel baseball organizations separated the teams into divisions, the quality of travelball in Florida has steadily declined.  The vast majority of coaches are no longer interested in playing against the top programs and challenging their kids.  They would rather win a trophy against cupcake competition.  When both Meteors teams started, we played the very best teams every week and took many beatings.  We ate our fair share of humble pie and were run-ruled many times our first couple of seasons with both teams.  But, we also got better and learned and that is the biggest reason we are at the place we are at now.  As we have said before, you are who you play.

Our team is a regional team that draws players from a surrounding areas.  We do that to be able to compete at the elite national level with teams from Miami, Tampa, Orlando, Atlanta, Los Angeles, Dallas, etc.  It is very difficult for teams with players from one area to compete against teams like that.  It is not necessary to always play against this kind of competition when you are primarily a local team.   However, you should do it from time to time because that is the best way to get your kids ready for high school.  Travelball is not about playing more baseball, it is about quality baseball.  Many of the teams playing in the lower divisions are no different that most rec-ball teams.  Why bother to spend the time and money travelling to play competition not much different than you would find at your local little league?  For a trophy?

We give a lot of credit to teams like the Tampa Thunder, South Florida Xtreme, Lakewood Longhorns, St. Pete Stingers, Bullets White, Tampa Titans, etc..  These are teams that are made up primarily of kids from the same area, but they are not afraid to take on the big programs and elite teams from the larger cities.  Unfortunately, the number of coaches willing to do that shrinks every year.

Coaches around the State need to step up to the plate, challenge their kids, and play top competition from time to time.  You may not win a trophy, but at the end of the day your kids will benefit.  They will get more out of a 7-2 loss to an elite team than they will out of a 10-4 win over a cupcake team of rec-ball quality wearing travelball uniforms.

As we talked about for two years, the best days of our program lie ahead of us on the big fields where strength, speed, and fundamentals are at a premium and many of the small field heroes are left behind.  The playing field conditions made it difficult for all the teams to score runs, and it certainly cost us more than a few, but we still managed to average 7 runs a game en route to the Championship.

We played a difficult schedule right out of the chute, which was great to get our season off to a strong start.  The Bullets Black have been around for a while, the new Tampa Titans were stacked with talented, experienced travelball players, the Longhorns were solid as always and the new Riverview Rage was also loaded with experienced players and some drop-down players from the older age division.

We will have a full story on the games and stats tomorrow.

Next week we will play on very fast fields at the beautiful Lake Myrtle complex.  Our offense should really get clicking next weekend as we build on the momentum from this great opening event.

When Coach Ron started his older Meteors team in 2002, travel baseball had not yet exploded in our area and around the state.  There were four programs in Sarasota County - the Snappers, the Mariners, the Manasota Meteors, and the Venice Pythons. 

We wanted to affiliate ourselves with one of these organizations.  The Snappers were primarily kids from 12th Street.  The Pythons were primarily kids from Venice.  That left the Mariners or the Meteors.  Both practiced out of Twin Lakes Park in Sarasota, which is where the older Meteors were going to form and practice.

The Mariners philosophy was to take local kids mostly from the same park and keep them together, improve their all-star team, etc..  They also chose players who were good ballplayers but not necessarily great athletes.  The Meteors were coached by Dave Grant, a police officer from Sarasota.  Their philosophy was to recruit from a wider area (hence the "Manasota") name and to play in bigger events against national teams.  They also recruited players who were great athletes and encouraged an intelligent, agressive style where the players controlled some of the decision-making during games such as calling pitches, when to steal or bunt, etc..  This was the philosophy Coach Ron felt most confortable with, and so we chose to make our 2002 team the Manasota Meteors.

The original Meteors team coached by Dave Grant has just graduated from high school.  We feel our philosophy - playing with great players (wherever they live) against the best players, in a tournament setting is the best formula to prepare you for the next level.  Here is what the graduating Meteors Class of 2009 is doing:

BOBBY BORCHERING - signed to play baseball for the University of Florida.  Also drafted in the 1st round, 15th overall pick, by the Arizona Diamondbacks. 

MICHAEL HELLER - signed to play baseball for the University of Florida.  Also drafted in the 29th round by the Pittsburgh Pirates. 

GARRETT CUSTONS - signed to play baseball for United States Air Force Academy.

KARSON KRAVEC - signed to play baseball for South Florida Community College.

KYLE GIBBS - signed to play baseball for Florida Southern University.

CAS DEAN - signed to play baseball for Palm Beach Atlantic University.

RYAN GRANT - signed to play baseball for Siena Heights University in Michigan.

ERIC WILLIAMS - signed to play baseball for Columbia University in New York.

MICHAEL PETRILLA - attending the University of South Florida and received an invitation to try out for the baseball team.

ALEX KRINSKY - attending Duke University in North Carolina.

Each year, our goal is to play the most tournament games of any travel ball team in the United States.  We accomplished that goal.  We try to build the most difficult schedule and play the most games against nationally-ranked programs.  We did that too.  Here is a summary of our 12U year:

125 TOURNAMENT GAMES

84-41 OVERALL RECORD

71-26 AGAINST 12U TEAMS

26 GAMES AGAINST 13U TEAMS

13-13 AGAINST 13U TEAMS

30 GAMES AGAINST TEAMS RANKED IN TOP 25 OR HM

15-15 AGAINST NATIONALLY RANKED TEAMS

PLAYED TEAMS FROM 10 DIFFERENT STATES

PLAYED 81 DIFFERENT TEAMS

What a great way to finish our time on the small fields.  We played in the toughest tournament in the country where every game was against a national powerhouse.  All the best baseball players in the country were there - either on their own teams or on loaded up teams.  Many national powers added teams from other States, making this tournament the most difficult test a travelball team could face.

We went 2-1 in pool play, losing a heartbreaker when the Georgia Yarddogs came back to beat us 8-7, but we posted wins against nationally ranked Inside KC Sports Blues (#22) and national Honorable Mention Columbia (SC) Heat.

We then squared off against the Florida Fire, who had added some players for this and were expected to be a tough test since they had knocked us out of AAU States.  However, we came out smoking and played a phenomenal game, mercy-ruling them 11-1 behind Donovan's pitching and home runs by 4 different players on the 250' fields.

Then we got to play the game we wanted all year - the #1 ranked Norwalk Stingrays from California.  Not only were they the #1 team coming in, they added the top 2 players from the #3 ranked team in the country!  We faced their big gun pitcher who threw harder than anybody we have seen this year anywhere.  Zak matched him on the mound though and we have them their toughest game of the tournament losing 4-2.

We then beat Team Express (SC) to survive another round in this double-elimination event, but then fell to nationally ranked Team Rawlings (CA) Elite who had loaded up with some outstanding players from other states.

All 3 of our losses in this tournament were to teams who finished in the Elite 8.  We got to play 7 games against the best of the best.  There was no better way to cap off a great 12U year!

Notice that the players in this picture are the same ones as the one in the picture at the top of this website!

The Cooperstown Dreams Tournament was a fabulous experience for our team.  The 102 team tournament featured a representative picture of travel baseball in America.  There were teams from small towns, little league all-star teams, travel teams who draw from one area, travel teams that draw from larger regions or cities, and teams that loaded up with guest or paid players. 

We went to the tournament with our same team from the entire season.  The boys really came together in a big way and I think our parents and relatives made up the loudest most enthusiastic cheering section in the park.  We won 10 straight games, 10 different players hit 43 home runs, we used 10 different pitchers.  Everybody played a ton and everybody played great.

Our expectations werent that high - we just wanted to have fun.  We are designed for big field baseball and haven't played a single game all year on 200' fences.  This tournament showed that our team is too big, strong and athletic for small fields and the best days for this team are yet to come.

In Game 1 we squared off against the Arlington Texas Heat.  Tyler Tyson was 3-3 with a HR, Brandon hit a 3-run HR, and Mike hit a two-run bomb to pace the offense.  Donovan and Mike combined on the mound for a 6-0 two-hit shutout.

In our second pool game we faced the Rocky Mountain (CO) Thunder.  Victor, Jaleel, Donovan and Mike all hit HRs and Cody threw a complete game shutout to give us a 13-0 win.

We knew our 3rd pool game was going to be our toughest test against the Coral Springs All-Americans.  We came out very focused and played a total team game.  Brandon had two doubles, and Jaleel, Mike and Cory went deep.  Zak was outstanding on the mound and we got a big 10-2 win.

The fourth pool game against the Sawnee Mountain (GA) Thunder was a bizarre game to say the least.  The umpire was brand new and it was very difficult for both teams.  The base umpire even walked off the field refusing to work with him anymore.  The result was that the runs were artificially way up for both teams but we pulled the win out 17-10.  Victor had a HR and Robert Shay hit his first-ever HR.

In the next pool game we faced a 4-0 Midland (OH) Cardinals team and once again we came out very focused knowing we needed to bring our A-game.  This game was a fireworks show from beginning to end as Nick, Brandon, Victor, Robert L. and Tyler S. homered.  However, the star of this game was Mike who hit THREE home runs and threw a complete game to give us a 20-1 win.

The final seeding game was about positioning and we needed to keep our runs down against the Ft. Lauderdale Lightning who came into the game with a 3-2 pool record.  The Meteors fireworks show was on full display again as Jaleel, Zak, and Robert L. hit bombs to pace a 15-run attack.  More importantly we called on Cory to pitch for the first time in a year and he was sensational, allowing just one run in a complete game.

This win gave us a 6-0 record and kept our runs allowed down enough to earn us the #3 seed out of 102 teams.  Then single elimination began Wednesday morning.  Because of our perfect pool record we earned byes to the Final 32.

Our first game was against an excellent North Texas Titans team.  We fell behind 3-0 in the 1st, but battled back and hammered the Titans pitching staff.  Tyler T., Jaleel, Victor, and Cory hit home runs.  Tyler T. reached base 4 times and scored all 4 times.  Donovan picked up the win in 2+ innings of work and we advanced to the Sweet 16 with a 16-4 win.

We thought we were going to face the Bullets Gold next, but they were upset by a tough Team Bama team 6-4.  We jumped on Bama early and the game looked well in hand as we led 11-3 behind HRs by Jaleel,  Brandon, Mike, Cory and Robert L..  Zak was pitching well but got tired in the 4th and a good hitting Bama team exploded in the 4th and 5th to tie the game 11-11.  Mike came on to quiet the storm, then Brandon led off the bottom of the 6th with a dramatic walk-off HR to give us a 12-11 win and a berth in the Elite 8.

We then faced a surprising Sal Urso team that also came into the game with an 8-0 record.  Our bats in this game were unbelievable as Tyler T., Brandon, and Mike homered and Jaleel hit 2 bombs and it was never a contest.  Mike was nearly unhittable on the mound and we advanced to the Final Four with a 20-1 win.

We then squared off against an excellent East Cobb Braves team and both teams came into the game with 9-0 records.  This was a game was was closer than the final 8-2 score as the hot-hitting Braves had scoring threats in virtually every inning.  Jaleel hit two monster bombs, and Brandon, Mike and Donovan also homered to pace the offense.  Donovan was outstanding on the mound and got help from Mike at end when he tired to send us to the Championship Game.

There could not be a bigger thrill in youth travel baseball than playing a Championship Game in the stadium at Cooperstown.  The players were introduced individually to the crowd of over 2,000.  We got to run around the field and high-five the fans before the game.  The game was webcast live.  Our pitching was pretty much wiped out and we did not play our best in losing to a loaded Tamiami Outlaws team, but it didnt matter as we enjoyed every minute of an experience none of us will ever forget.

This weekend we hit two big milestones - our 50th win on the season and the 450th win for the Meteors organization.  However, the best is yet to come for this great team.  Next up is our final small-field tournament - the AAU National Championship at Disney.  Then we are on the the big fields. 

The Meteors served notice once again that we will be a force to be reckoned with on the big fields this Fall, rolling through the Fire Division of the AAU Fall State Championship before running out of pitching in the Championship Game. 

We opened with the Lutz Lightning, and jumped on them early and often.  Jaleel was driven in by Donovan in the first to give us an early 1-0, then exploded for 8 more runs in the 2nd.  Jaleel hit a monster grand slam well over 300' to break the game open.  Cody, Zak, Jaleel and Mike combined to allow only 2 hits for a 12-3 mercy-rule win.

Game 2 would promise to be a tougher task as we took on the Golden Gate Hammerheads.  The Hammerheads hammered us in the fall and won the Fire State Championship last season.  We opened the scoring when Tyler singled, stole second and third and scored on a passed ball.  The Hammerheads answered back and took a 3-1 lead into the 5th when Mike drew a two-out walk, Jonathan singled and Mike scored on a passed ball the cut the lead to 3-2.  We just could not get the big RBI hit though and lost 3-2.  Victor was incredible on the mound, throwing 4+ innings of shutout ball in relief.

In our first bracket game we opened with the St. Pete Hurricanes White, a solid 13U club that has been together for a few years.  It certainly did not look like it was going to be our day early as the Canes hammer the ball and jumped on us for a 4-0 lead.  Suddenly though, our bats came to life when Donovan led off the 4th with a double, Brandon got hit by a pitch, Victor singled in Brandon, and Robert S. got hit by a pitch to chase the Canes starter.  Robert L. then had an RBI groundout to give us a 5-4 lead.  We added a big insurance run in the 5th when Tyler led off with a double and was driven in by Donovan.  The Canes answered back with a run and we clung to a 6-5 lead going into the last inning.  Tyler then came through with a big single driving in Robert L. and Jonathan and that seemed to break the Canes spirit.  Donovan picked up the win with 3 outstanding innings of relief and Mike picked up the save.

In the semis we faced the Sharks who had their outstanding ace ready to go.  It was a tight pitcher's duel throughout as Mike matched the Sharks pitcher and the game was tied 2-2 going into the 5th.  The Sharks put two runs on the board to go up 4-2 and things looked bleak.  However, the Meteors showed a lot of heart and character in the 6th.  Victor opened with a single, Robert L. walked, and Mike and Cory hit back to back singles to cut the lead to 4-3 and load the bases.  Andrew then drew a bases-loaded walk to give us the lead.  Tyler then followed that up with another two-RBI single and we advanced to the Championship 6-4.  Mike, Zak and Jaleel combined for another excellent game on the mound for the Meteors pitching staff.

We decided to manage this tournament on the big fields capping each pitcher at no more than 50 pitches.  That meant that we were essentially out of pitching for the Championship against the Tampa Terror.  Jaleel, Andrew, Robert S., Robert L., and Cory battled hard and did their best, but the Terror is an experienced team and we just didnt have any gas in the tank and lost 9-1.

This tournament once again showed us how different the game is on the big fields.  Guys like Victor who doesnt pitch at all on the small fields continued to be our best pitcher on the big fields.  Tyler Tyson who didnt play infield all year on the small fields was out starting shortstop on the big fields and was outstanding.  No team in the country is more prepared to play real baseball in less than two short months.  We have everything we need - pitching, speed, power, depth at every position.  The next two years are going to awesome for this program!

The late-season national rankings have been published by Travel Ball Select and the Meteors are now ranked #7 with our punishing strength of schedule and our consistent success against the major powers.

Click on the headline above to see the rankings.  You may have to go to www.travelballselect.com and subscribe.

JUNE 2009 - #7

APRIL 2009 - #6

FEBRUARY 2009 - #22

AUGUST 2008 - #22

JUNE 2008 - HM

The Meteors wrapped up another league points title for best overall season in Florida AAU.  We pride ourselves on consistent excellence.  Since we don't rely on pickup players from week to week, we are able to reach the Final Four and usually at least the Championship Game in every tournament we enter.  Here were the Top 5:

1.  METEORS

2.  BULLETS GOLD

3.  SCORPIONS

4.  DIAMONDBACKS

5.  HIT AND RUN

Click on the headline above to see the Florida State Rankings.

Click on the headline above to see the highlight video of Jaleel and Brandon at the USTBA Nationals at East Cobb, GA.  When you click on headline, then click on "Video Gallery" and they are the first videos at the top of the page.

We got 5 more good solid tournament games in before next week's big Elite Battle in the South and accomplished all of our goals.  We got 5 games in, assigned each of our pitchers their own game and stretched them out, allow the players who have been subs to play all of the pool games, and get some good at-bats against excellent pitching.

At the Battle, every game is going to be a war and we had to find the best possible competition again this week to prepare.  Most of the top teams in the State were signed up for the Slug a Rama, so we chose to go there after being undecided whether to play there or in Clearwater.  

Our pool games were against the Windemere Warriors and the Williston Warriors.  Our bats were smoking hot against Windemere and Zak pitched great to give us a 13-3 win.  The bats cooled against Williston's 25 mph knuckleballer, but Cody rose to the occasion and pitched a two-hit shutout for us and a 4-0 win.

That is when things started to get interesting.  One of the 2-0 teams who was supposed to be in the Ice Division was permitted to go down into the Fire division.   A 1-1 team, Team MPact, who had just won USSSA States, was supposed to be out of the tournament but were moved up into the Ice Division.  This division was then reseeded based upon record and runs (according to the rules) which would have had the MPact playing the Bullets Gold in the quarterfinals.  However, MPact was inexplicably moved up to the #6 seed ahead of two undefeated teams.  The Gold then drew the Lakeland Heat, who also wanted to be in the Fire Division but weren't given that option. 

All of these shenanigans left 4 of the top 5 teams on one side of the bracket - us, the Xtreme, the Scorpions and MPact.  We didnt complain, because this tournament was practice for us and we wanted the most difficult road possible.  However, this is something that many of the 12U teams in both the Ice and the Fire Divisions thought was highly odd to say the least.

We came out on Sunday against the Xtreme and faced our friend Mike Zimmerman on the mound.  Mike was outstanding as usual and gave us trouble until we finally broke a 1-1 game open in the 5th.  Jaleel started on the mound but was not sharp, and Mike came on to get us out of a bases loaded jam, the pitch 5 more innings of shutout relief for a 4-1 win.

The semis was a rematch of the USSSA State Championship Game with us playing the MPact.  However, this time the schedule had us on a more equal footing and the result was very different.  We scored every inning, battering MPact pitching while Donovan spun a great game on the mound for a 12-4 win. 

In the Championship we were simply spent from two brutal bracket games and came up short to a well-rested Bullets team who mercy-ruled their opponents.  In the last 5 tournaments we played, we have reached the Championship Game all 5 times.  That means we are maximizing the number of games we play and playing great competition every weekend.  Now we head into our biggest tournament of the year!

28 teams rolled into Leesburg with different objectives at the USSSA State Championship.  10 teams wanted to play in the AAA division, 10 in the AA division, and 8 toed the line for a shot at the Majors State title.  Our goals going in were to spread the playing time around as equally as possible and prepare for Tennessee.  That is our goal next week.  We did not expect to necessarily win the tournament or even make the championship game.  We almost pulled it off unexpectedly though.

In Game 1 we faced the Oviedo Styxx who had some quality wins this season against good teams.  We jumped all over them though, unloading for 10 runs in the top of the first and it was never a game.  Mike, Andrew and Victor combined for a no-hit shutout and a 16-0 win.

In our second pool game we were matched up against the Central Florida Diamondbacks, who came into the game undefeated (31-0), ranked #3 in the nation by TBS, and had won every tournament they entered this season including the Georgia Super NIT.  It was a great game and a tight one until the very end.  Tyler led off with a single, stole second and scored on a passed ball to give us a 1-0 lead.  We would cling to that lead all the way until the 6th inning as the Dbacks pitchers kept us at bay.  But Zak was equally masterful, pitching his best game maybe ever, shutting out the Dbacks on 2 hits in his 4 innings of work.  We finally got the bats going in the 6th as Tyler, Robert L., Zak and Cody all had big hits.  Cody and Donovan then closed the game to give us a big 7-1 win and the #1 seed heading into Sunday.

We didnt get any bonuses by being the #1 seed as we drew the 8:00 AM bracket game AGAIN for the 3rd consecutive tournament.  This would perhaps prove to be costly as we had no energy, bat speed or life in the Championship 12 hours later.  We got a rematch against Oviedo and this time they had their ace on the mound and he threw a great game.  We pulled the game out 5-1 on big hits by Robert S., Andrew, Cory and Robert L..  Mike was outstanding on the mound, dominating the Styxx hitters with a complete-game one-hitter with 7 strikeouts.

We then had a 4 hours break and faced the Diamondbacks in the semi-finals.  This was clearly our day as Brandon opened the game with a two-run HR.  We scored every single inning, breaking the game open with three in the 3rd inning and four more in the 4th when Cody hit a bases-clearing triple down the line.  Donovan stymied the Dbacks hitters as he has in the past, allowing just 1 run to lead us to a 10-1 mercy-rule win.

We then had another 2 hour break and started the Championship Game against a tough Team M-Pact team at 7:00 PM.  We had no energy, enthusiam, or spark in this game and the M-Pact team had plenty of it, beating us easily 8-0.  It was a pretty poor effort and disappointing.  Although our objective was not to win the tournament, we had a major State Championship in our grasp and could not close the deal.  Hopefully, we learned from it and this will make us stronger for Tennessee.  We certainly accomplished the goals we set for ourselves this weekend.  Next weekend at the Slug-a-Rama we will continue to do the things you need to do to prepare for a major national tournament. 

So far this season, in our quest to have the toughest schedule in the country, we have played 15 games against teams ranked in Travel Ball Select's Top 25 or Honorable Mention.  Our record is 11-4 in those games against nationally ranked teams.

Hudson Boyd, who played for the Meteors during our 13U year, received a full scholarship offer from the University of Florida.  Hudson, a sophomore pitcher/3rd baseman from South Ft. Myers High has been clocked at 93 mph this season. 

Hudson played in a lot of huge games for us - he was part of the great teams that won the AAU State Championship and USSSA Super NIT in 2007 and had so many memorable tournaments for us, including AAU Nationals at Myrtle Beach, SC and the Elite 24 World Series.

Get this though - Hudson turned down Florida's offer because he wants to play for the University of Texas!  I'm sure he'll make the Longhorns radar screen at some point in the near future, but he might have a tough time turning down a big fat pro contract!

Wow!  What a weekend of baseball.  Teams and players from all over the United States travelled to the beautiful East Cobb baseball complex for a weekend of big time baseball.  We had to run a gauntlet of 5 outstanding teams, and one slip and you are out.  We made an incredible run through the tournament, losing in the Championship 6-1 to a Chiefs team that had flown in players from multiple states including 4 from Florida.

In Game 1 we squared off against a very tough, fundamentally sound, well-coached East Cobb Yankees squad.  The Yankees had won their first pool game and would advance to the Ultimate Division (Top 6) with a win against us.  Tyler was 4-4 in this game with 2 doubles, 4 RBIs, 4 Runs and a steal.  Mike was 2-3 with 3 RBIs and Jaleel hit a 3-run HR over the 275' fence, over the trees behind the fence and into the back yard of the house behind the complex.  Brandon was 3-3 with a triple.  Mike was also outstanding on the mound, throwing a no-hitter through three innings, but tiring in the 4th and the Yankees rallied.  Jaleel came on in relief with the bases loaded and nobody out with the lead cut to 13-5, and he struck out the first two batters he faced, then induced a groundout to end the game.

Game 2 was against the Centerfield Storm from Georgia.  They were a solid club with a very nice group of coaches and they fought hard and never gave up but were overmatched physically.  This game was off-site at a complex with 225' fences, and for our team to play on fields of that size right now basically turns games into a joke.  Imagine if our players were playing on 200' little league sized fields!  Tyler was 5-5 with 3 runs scored and 2 RBIs.  Jaleel was 4-5 with a home run over the powerlines behind the trees behind the fences for a grand slam, and other line-drive home run that left the park in about .1 seconds for a total of 7 RBIs.  Mike was 3-4 with a HR and 3 RBIs.  Brandon was 3-5 with 2 HRs.  His last HR was his hardest hit ball ever, just grazing the top of the 75' tall pine trees behind the fence.  Cody was 2-2 with a double and 2 RBIs and Tyler S. joined the party with a HR in the 3rd.  The Meteors scored 28 runs, had 21 hits, 6 HRs, and 3 doubles.  Zak was effective on the mound, picking up with win in his 3+ innings of work before Nick came on to close out the game for a 28-5 win.

We then advanced to the Ultimate Division, earning the #4 overall seed.  We squared off against the East Cobb Longhorns, who many consider one of the top teams in Georgia.  We knew this game was not going to easy, so we sent Jaleel to the mound.  Jaleel was brilliant, allowing 1 hit, 0 earned runs, with 8 strikeouts in a complete game win.  Tyler went 2-4 with a steal and 2 RBIs, Mike was 2-3 with a steal and an RBI, and the defense made stellar plays all game - especially Victor who made a couple of great plays at third.

We then advanced to the Final Four against the East Cobb Astros, who had a 1st round bye and were rested and ready for us.  The Astros won the AAU National Championship at Disney last summer and finished last year ranked #1 in the National by Travel Ball Select.  Jaleel opened the game with a HR over the light tower behind the 275' fence and it was game on.  Donovan looked shaky walking the first batter, then running the count 3-0 to the second batter.  However, he settled down to get out of the inning without allowing a run and was outstanding limited the Astros powerful lineup to 2 runs in his 4 innings of work.  Robert L. opened the 2nd inning with a huge bomb for a HR to left.  Then Jaleel hit another 2-run titanic bomb in the 3rd, we manufactured a run in the 4th when Jonathan was brilliant on the bases as usual, getting a great jump on a passed ball to give us a 5-2 lead.  However, we knew the Astros would not give up.  Cody retired the first two batters in the bottom of the 6th, but the Astros then came to life with a two singles, a walk and a double and suddenly the bases were loaded and we clung to a 5-4 lead.  The Astros hitter then hit a screaming grounder and Robert L. made a clutch play to give us a big win in a thrilling game!  The Astros coaches are outstanding and they are a class act.  It was a good example of two teams who can compete hard but still be friendly with each other before, during and after a big game.

The Championship Game was against the Chiefs, who theoretically are based out of Tennessee, but have players from multiple states.  They also brought in 4 well travelled players from Florida who have played on many different teams over the years.  All of their pitchers for their 3 games on Sunday were from Florida.  The bottom line was that we started this game at 9:00 PM and we had been out there for 12 hours straight.  Although we had scoring threats every inning, we were just out of gas and couldnt get anything going on offense to lose 6-1.  Hopefully, we will get another crack at the Chiefs, whoever they may have on their team, at another national event.

Our team has stepped up to another level in the past few weeks.  This weekend could not have been better.  This is what our program is all about - playing the best of the best in a difficult format and setting.  Beating the National Champions on their home field.  Jaleel hitting 6 home runs in 5 games - each over 300'.  Tyler going 15-20 at the plate with 14 runs scored.  We put on a show and were drawing big crowds by Sunday from the other fields and other age groups.  By Sunday the buzz all around the park was "the Florida team" everybody wanted to see hit.  It was a blast!

The 12U Meteors have arrived and we are rolling.  Now we head into a stretch of big tournaments tested and on a big time roll.

The Meteors dynamic offense of speed and power was on full display at the Triple Crown Clearwater Classic.  On the 300' fields at the Eddie C. Moore Complex we went 5-0 to take the Championship.  In those 5 games we scored 61 runs, had 3 doubles, 8 triples and 4 Home Runs!  Jaleel put on a show at the plate with a triple and 2 lasers that easily cleared the fences for 325'+ Home Runs.

We had 3 months on the big fields from November until February.  Then we had about a month to recalibrate and get adjusted back to the small fields.  Now it is time to roll.

We opened up with the Miami Critters and Tyler T. singled and stole second.  Victor then ripped a double to drive him in, then Victor scored on a sac fly by Jaleel.  Brandon then lined a double to left and we jumped out to a 3-0 lead.  Tyler Simmons started on the mound and did not have his best stuff but got himself out of a couple of tough jams.  We only led 5-2 heading into the 6th, but a walk by Brandon and a big triple by Donovan, then another big triple by Tyler Simmons and suddenly we had a comfortable 9-2 lead.  Nick was outstanding in relief, throwing a one-hit shutout in his 3 innings of work.

In our second pool game we faced the St. Pete Hurricanes.  Just like the last time we played, we spotted them a 6-0 lead as neither Donovan nor Mike were sharp on the mound.  However, we then showed that no lead is safe against us as we stormed back in the 3rd.  Cody led off with a walk and Tyler T. singled.  Nick and Mike then hit back to back RBI singles, but a costly baserunning error looked like it was going to kill the rally.  However, Donovan got it started right back up again with a single.  Brandon walked and Jaleel hit a monster triple in the gap to clear the bases and tie the game 6-6.  Cody then singled in Jaleel to give us the lead.   The Canes rallied for a run in the 4th, but a big HR by Donovan in the right center gap gave us an 11-7 cushion and that was all Zak would need as he threw two perfect innings in relief to pick up the save.

We earned the #1 seed coming out of pool play and drew a tough Hit and Run squad who had their ace on the mound.  We started hot and stayed hot, scoring in all 6 innings.  Donovan blasted another HR and Jaleel hit a bomb over the fence in left center.  Robert Lopez had a great game at the plate and field, going 2-2 with 2 walks, 2 RBIs and 3 SBs.  Jaleel was awesome on the mound, allowing just 1 hit and striking out 7 in his 4 innings of work.   Mike closed out the game with two solid innings of relief to preserve an 11-2 win and a berth in the Final Four.

In the semis we faced the scrappy, fundamentally sound Bullets Blue team.  It was bombs away right from the start in this one.  Victor and Jaleel walked then Mike singled in Vi.  Brandon then showed why you can't pitch around any of our hitters as he ripped a triple.  Robert L. then drove in two more and it was 5-0 after one.  The hits kept coming as Jaleel crushed another home run.  This one went over the scoreboard behind the right field fence, over the trees behind the scoreboard and rolled down the street.  On the mound Donovan was dominant, throwing a two-hit, complete game shutout with no walks and 6 strikeouts for a 9-0 win.

In the Championship we faced our old friends Bill Rek, Brett Maxwell and the St. Pete Stingers.  They were a great group of guys and a really nice team.  It was our day though as it was bombs away again in the 1st.  Tyler singled, stole 2nd then stole home.  Jaleel was walked intentionally then Mike, Brandon and Zak all hit RBI singles. Despite Jaleel's ability to pound the baseball, teams will soon realize that they have no choice but to pitch to him as we surround him with great hitters who can rip the ball also.  We kept rolling, scoring every inning as Cody quieted the Stinger hitters in his 3 innings of work on the mound.  We took an 11-2 lead into the 5th and maybe started celebrating early as the Stingers unloaded in the 5th with 6 hits and 6 runs to cut the lead to 11-8, but Nick came on to relieve Zak and put the fire out with a double-play ball.  We then did what we usually do in those situations - we responded in a big way, unloading for 10 runs in the top of the 6 to hang a 21-spot on the scoreboard.  Nick then closed the game with a perfect 6th to give us our 2nd straight championship and run our winning streak to 9 consecutive tournament games.

We have one more tuneup event before the big East Cobb tournament.  This team is clicking right now.  All the hard work has paid off - the boot camp, the time on the big fields.  Now it is time to reap the rewards.  We have an incredible team and are on an amazing roll.  Let's keep it going next weekend and then take that momentum up to Atlanta!

The Meteors blew through the field in the first ever AAU March Madness tournament, outscoring our opponents 35-2. 

This was a new format for AAU - a one day, all day tournament.  Two pool games, then the teams with the 3 best records play for the championship.  There were 7 teams and although the competition wasnt what we have grown accustomed to, we had a good time and got a chance to get everyone some good at bats and innings.

Game 1 was against the Bullets Grey.  We came out smoking as Tyler, Mike and Donovan singled then Robert L. hit a big blast to give us a 4-0 lead.  We added 2 more runs in the 3rd when Donovan and Robert L. walked and were driven in on a single by Cody and a sac fly by Robert S..  We capped off the scoring in the 4th when Brandon singled, Donovan walked and Robert L. hit another double in the gap.  Cody, who was hot all weekend, followed that with a two-RBI double.  Cody also started on the mound and spun three excellent innings before giving way to Nick who closed things out in style for a 9-2 win.

In the second pool game we faced the Port St. John Titans, who were a little league all-star team new to travel baseball.  They were a very nice team with good coaches but were just not ready for this level of play quite yet.  Our bats were absolutely on fire, battering the Titans for 14 runs on 11 hits in just 3 innings.  Victor impressed his girlfriend with two triples, a single, 3 runs scored and 2 RBI.  Mike also hit a monster triple in the gap to punctuate another Meteors offensive fireworks show.  Meanwhile, Zak went the distance on the mound, pitching a one-hit shutout, striking out 6 of the 10 batters he faced.

In the Championship Game we expected to face the Bullets Black, who went 2-0 in pool play to earn the #2 seed.  They took a 12-7 lead into the final inning of the play-in game against the 1-1 Bullets Grey, but the Grey came back to win 13-12.  They Grey admittedly had nothing left after that draining and emotional win, and we came out determined in the Championship Game.  We exploded in the 2nd when Robert L. and Zak singled and Nick hit a big triple in the gap.  Tyler then impressed Victor's girlfriend with a lazer in the gap for a HR and we had a 5-0 lead.  It was more of the same in the 3rd as Donovan opened with a double and Robert L., Cody and Cory each singled.  Donovan and Mike were dominant on the mound, shutting out the Grey hitters for a 12-0 win.

Travel Ball Select came down from Atlanta to sponsor their first ever tournament in Florida, the invitation-only Elite Travel Classic.  All the top teams in Florida showed up to get it on, and there were some awesome games all weekend on every field.  Our games were certainly no exception.

This tournament also featured the Meteors debut of Jaleel Del Valle, and the flame-throwing, power hitting 6' lefty did not disappoint.  We were certainly not looking for any more new players, but Jaleel blew us away when we saw him play a few weeks ago and we felt he would be the final piece of the dominant big-field team we have been building.

This was a tournament where every single team was outstanding and every game a battle.  Our pool was us, the St. Pete Hurricanes and the Bullets Gold.  Not a bad pool.  Tyler opened the game with a single and stole 2nd.  He was then driven with a single by Jaleel to give us an early lead.  That didnt last long however, as the Hurricanes offense came out smoking scoring 7 runs in the first two innings for a 7-2 lead.  We still trailed by 5 heading into the 5th, but Zak and Robert L. drew walks and Cody was hit by a pitch to load the bases.  Cory then hit a big double to drive in two big runs.  Nick came on in relief and quieted the Canes bats keeping us in the game.  We rallied in the 6th down 8-6 with another run as Tyler led off with a single and stole second.  Donovan then singled in Tyler, but the rally fell short and we lost 8-7.

The Bullets Gold and the Hurricanes then tied their pool game, so we were in a situation where both teams had to win their second pool game to avoid a Saturday night play-in game.  Both teams put good pitchers on the mound and went toe-to-toe.  We opened the scoring in the 1st when Donovan singled and was driven in by Jaleel.  The Bullets stuck back with a run in the bottom of the inning, but Donovan struck out 3 straight batters to end the frame.  In the second Robert L. and Cody walked and Andrew drove in Robert L. with a single.  Tyler then walked and Victor hit a big single to drive in two and give us a 5-1 lead.  Cody came in and was not sharp, giving up 4 runs before Jaleel came on in relief to get us out of the inning tied 5-5.  The Bullets then took a 6-5 lead in the 3rd when Jaleel walked the first two batters, but Mike came on and put out the fire.  We were already at the time limit heading into the 4th down a run when Cory led off with a big hit.  Tyler and Victor then followed with singles to tie the game.  The hits kept coming as Jaleel walked and Mike and Brandon singled to give us a 10-6 lead.  Mike then struck out the Bullets 3-4-5 hitters to end the game and give us a big win.

We then faced off against the Miami Enforcers.  We had played them 3 times previously and all 3 games were decided by 1 run, the last time in extra innings at Triple Crown Nationals.  This one was another classic.  Donovan cruised through the first two innings, but then the wheels came off the wagon in the 3rd as the Enforcers scored 7 runs and took a commanding 7-0 lead.  They still led 7-0 in the 5th and had already started celebrating and getting ready for the next game when we exploded.  Mike led off with a monster 250' triple in the gap.  Cory then singled, Robert S. walked, and Tyler singled.  Jaleel reached on an error then Victor continued his RBI team with another 2-run single.  Brandon then drove in a run to make it 7-6, then Donovan hit a big single to give us an 8-7 lead.  We could not hold the lead though as a walk, two hit batters and a balk gave the Enforcers a 9-8.  It was a classic game by two teams who have developed a great, friendly rivalry.

In the consolation game we had some fun and experimented with some new positions and pitchers against the Miami Storm.  We ended up with a 14-7 win to close out a fun weekend.  Players of the tournament were Cory (4-8, 2 RBIs), Brandon (5-9, 3 RBIs) and Victor (4-10, 5 RBIs).

After three months on the big fields, we really needed last weekend to knock the rust off and get our timing back for small-field ball.  That was certainly accomplished because this week we were locked back in throughout.

34 teams came to Auburndale and Winter Haven for the first major tournament of the Spring 2009 travel ball season.  We came out smoking against the Seffner Hawks, crusing to a quick three-inning 10-0 win behind the pitching of Donovan, Cody and Mike. 

Our second pool game looked like a much tougher matchup against the Bullets Black, who have always given us trouble.  This game was also televised live on the webcast, and the Bullets put their top pitchers on the mound and went right after us.  Their ace struck out the side in the top of the first, but Robert L. got us jump started with a two-run HR and we put up 6 runs in the 2nd.  Mike followed with a 3 run HR and a grand slam in the 3rd and 4th innings as the Meteors offense continued to batter the Bullets pitchers.  Tyler Simmons was outstanding on the mound and Tyler Tyson closed out the game for a 13-4 win as we advanced to the Ice Division.

In the quarters we squared off against and excellent Scorpions team that has added a lot of new players that played on the former Canes/CAT 5 team.  They had their ace on the mound ready to go and they were fired up to knock us out.  The game was scoreless in the 2nd when their #8 hitter hit a grand slam to give them a 4-0 lead.  We showed a lot of heart and character by shelling their ace and knocking him out in the 3rd, scoring 6 runs behind hits from Robert S., Tyler T, Victor and Donovan.  We just kept pouring it on after that as they continued to try different pitchers.  Donovan, Brandon, Daniel, Cody and Zak all had big hits in the 5th and Cody spun another complete game gem for a 15-4 win.

The two best teams in the tournament and the two best programs in the State then hooked up for the matchup everybody wanted to see in the semifinal game with the Diamondbacks.  The D'Backs recently merged with the Florida Fire and have a perfectly-constructed small field baseball that is now the consensus #1 team in Florida.  We believe we have the best big field team in the State, but we will not be able find out whether that is the case until August. 

The D'Backs sent their ace Kyle Cross to the hill, who is a TBS First Team All-American and was the ace of the Florida Fire for the past two years.  He was brilliant on the mound and although we threatened with runners in scoring position a couple of times, we just could not get the big hit.  Donovan was equally outstanding on the mound, surrendering only 1 earned run against the powerful D'Backs lineup that had averaged 14 runs a game.  We came up on the short end of a 3-0 game and certainly were able to give them their toughest test of this young season.

Our team has really turned a corner now and taken things to the next level.  We will not see our full potential until we get off the small fields, but we will contend in every small-field event for the rest of this season.  The events we are playing are going to get increasingly difficult as well, so our players are really going to be challenged to perform at a very high level. 

Click on the link above to watch our Saturday night game on the webcast with professional announcers.  Go to the Saturday at 6:50 PM game to watch our 14-5 win over the Bullets Black.

Our website has only been around for 2 years, but we just got our 15,000th hit.  It is obvious that a lot of people outside our team go on the site regularly to check our progress and cheer us on.  It is nice to have so many people care about our program and continue to check out our site!

THIS WEBSITE IS AND HAS ALWAYS BEEN 100% POSITIVE.  This website exists to promote our players and our programs.  We have NEVER used this website to criticize or denegrate another team, coach, players or organization.  Kids baseball websites should not be used for that purpose. 

We also don't sugarcoat how we do and we do a write-up after every single event - whether we do poorly or well.  We are proud of our boys, and this website is intended to demonstrate that.

Next week is the first big tournament of the season, the AAU President's Day tournament.  Since we have been on the big fields for the past three months, we decided to jump into the IBC Fall "Nationals" to work on our timing.

We saw really quickly what a dramatically different game this is.  We faced Team Easton first and faced two very hard throwers.  It was a tight game throughout but Victor and Donovan came through with some big hits to break a 2-2 tie late in the game and carry us to a 5-2 win behind 5 pitchers.  In Game 2 we faced an overmatched new team "Baseball Heaven" and won that game 15-3.

In the semis we faced the Salty Dogs and their pitcher who may be the hardest thrower in the State.  He was on, the strike zone was very generous, and he also hit a big 2-run blast.  We left runners in scoring position all 5 innings and just could not get the big hit to get things going offensively.  It was a classic example of a big pitcher being able to dominate on the small fields with effectively-wild gas.  An example of why we can't wait to get off the small fields.

We then played a consolation game against the Tri-County Bulldogs and cruised to an easy 7-0 win.  We were able to knock the small-field rust off and should be ready to go by next week.

It was the worst of baseball, and the best of baseball.  This tournament was just brutal for us.  When we play up in the 13U division on the big fields, generally the idea is to play in the Fire division.  However, in the First Pitch classic there was no Fire division and we had to deal with 6 Ice-caliber 13U teams.

Our first game was against the new "super team" Team Orlando.  We are overmatched physically, but hung with them nursing a 2-1 lead going into the 4th before the wheels came off the wagon and we lost 10-2.  We next took on the Winter Park Diamond Dawgs, and our pitching was terrible as we lost 13-6 and drew the bottom seed heading into bracket play.

This left us facing the #2 seed in the Ice, the Orlando Titans.  However, a completely different Meteors team showed up on Sunday morning and we played one of the greatest games in Meteors history to get our 100th win in a massive 9-5 upset.  Cody was brilliant on the mound, Daniel had the big hit on offense, and Donovan shut the door to close out the win.

In the semis we played another oustanding game, taking a 3-2 lead into the final inning before giving up 4 unearned runs in the last inning to drop the game 6-3.  We kept the game close enough to earn 3rd place in a brutal 13U Ice Tournament.

The guy who really turned a corner in this tournament was Daniel.  He had struggled with the adjustment to the big fields.  His bombs hit up in the air were just outs there, and he didnt begin to make an adjustment in his swing until recently.  This past weekend he had some beautiful at-bats and looked fantastic.

BATTING AVERAGE:  TYLER .476, VICTOR .425, MIKE .419

ON BASE %:  TYLER .533, BRANDON .525, MIKE .521

RUNS SCORED:  TYLER 49, VICTOR 38, DONOVAN 35

RBIs:  VICTOR 41, BRANDON 38, MIKE 31

XTRA BASE HITS:  VICTOR 20, BRANDON 16, DANIEL 11

STOLEN BASES:  TYLER 36, ROBERT L. 13, DONOVAN 9

PITCHING WINS:  CODY 8, DANIEL 5, MIKE 5

ERA:  DANIEL 1.35, VICTOR 2.92, CODY 3.14

Tonight we held our raffle drawing for the Cooperstown fundraiser.  Here are the winners:

Grand Prize($1000 gift card to Best Buy along with a WII system w/ WII fit):  Owen Steele w/ ticket #0820 sold by Donovan Petrey

2nd Prize( $500): Judd Hart w/ ticket # 1310 sold by Zak Wilson

3rd Prize($250): Laurie Labsan w/ ticket #0530 sold by Cory Labsan

Congratulations to all of our winners.  We appreciate your support along with everyone that bought a ticket from our Meteor players.  The Meteors sold a total of 1069 tickets.  Great start to an awesome experience. 

THANK YOU TO THE SHAY FAMILY FOR DONATING THE WII GAME SYSTEM!

Travel baseball teams come in all shapes and sizes.  Probably 85-90% of travel ball teams are made up of local players from the same town and draw players from a single rec league or a few surrounding rec leagues.  They typically play events in their region against other teams who are similarly situated.

The other 10-15% of teams draw from a larger geographical area or from larger cities.  They typically seek out other teams like themselves and travel to major state and national events.  Is one approach better than the other?  Is one right and the other wrong?  Certainly the answer to that is no. 

Parents choose travel baseball programs that best fit their needs, goals, desires as well as the ability level of their sons.  These are difficult choices, and parents put a great deal of thought into these decisions.  Playing on a team like ours requires a great deal of sacrifice - of both time and money.  It is a huge committment, and one which is not undertaken lightly.

Parents of exceptionally talented children have always made these difficult choices.  Some send their kids to places like Bolletieri for tennis or Julliard for music, to give them the best possible chance to see their potential blossom.  The same is true for the parents of exceptionally talented young baseball players.

The Meteors program has had a central guiding philosophy for 7 continuous years.  The nucleus of our team has always been players from the Sarasota/Manatee area.  However, we have supplemented that with players in the surrounding area who want the same things that we do. 

Meteors players and parents have always wanted to compete with the very best at the highest level.  We all have a committment to each other to get there.  By joining together, we are able to compete with the top programs in the country from the larger cities like Tampa, Orlando, Jacksonville, Miami and Ft. Lauderdale.  We don't care what town you live in, or what little league park you are from.  We only care that you share our passion and desire to maximize the potential of your son.

With this program we are able to face the top programs from the big cities and go deep into major tournaments.  Some of the smaller local teams do get to play a top program from time to time, but they rarely face that teams' #1 starting pitcher.  And more rarely do they face multiple #1 starters from top teams in the same day.  By coming together for the same purpose, we are able to do what our players could not by playing with players from their own area.

When parents choose to play in a program like ours, it can be tough but also highly rewarding.  The easy path is to play for your local team and play a few tournaments a season against teams in your area.  But you choose to go outside your comfort zone - to places like Knoxville, Atlanta, Cooperstown, Miami, Plantation, St. Augustine, Kissimmee.  You choose to drive an hour or more to practice.  You do this knowing that the payoff will make it all worth it.

Each weekend we come together - either for a tournament or practices.  We stay at the same hotel, eat together, go out together, hang out at the ball park together.  We end up spending more time together than people who live next door to each other.  The friendships the boys and their parents develop will last a lifetime and they will become like brothers.  It does not matter what town they live in, they share a common bond and experiences that others cannot understand. 

This Fall season our boys played the toughest schedule of any 12U baseball team in the country, period.  We travelled to every corner of the state, and faced nearly every team's ace in pressure situations.  Here are just some of the teams we played just this season alone:  13U ST. PETE HURRICANES, 13U SEBRING STREAKS, 13U BULLETS, 13U SHARKS, 13U HIT AND RUN, 13U OCALA BLAZE, 13U TAMPA TERROR, 13U GOLDEN GATE HAMMERHEADS, FLORIDA FIRE, SF XTREME, SEMINOLES BLACK, ST. PETE HURRICANES, CENT. FLA DIAMONDBACKS, BULLETS GOLD, PEMBROKE LAKES BULLDOGS, MIAMI ANGELS, TAMIAMI OUTLAWS, MIAMI ENFORCERS, N. FLA HURRICANES, GULF COAST MUSTANGS, CORAL SPRINGS PANTHERS, MIAMI LIGHTNING, MIAMI DYNASTY ELITE...

This season we have played a few 13U events.  We will do that a lot more this spring.  We are doing this for two simple reasons.  The first is that we are a team designed and built to play baseball on the big fields.  It is an entirely different game, and many players who are very good on the small fields simply cannot succeed on the big ones.  Since we are designed to play on those fields, we do not want our boys to develop bad habits that accompany the 12U game.

The second reason why we do it is more important.  Three years ago, USA baseball chose to move the cutoff date for baseball ages from August 1 to May 1.  The problem is that the schools systems use August 1 for enrollments.  Therefore, where traditionally 14U was 8th graders, 13U was 7th graders, etc., now there is a split.  About 66% of 13U players are 7th graders now.  That means that all the 7th graders playing 12U are playing a full year behind 66% of the boys in their high school class.  Where players would get two full years on the big fields before high school before, now 33% of them are only getting one.

Nothing we do is about trophies or resume building.  Everything we do is about preparing kids for high school.  We believe that the best thing we can do for the 7th graders on our team is get them on the big fields NOW competing against the majority of other 7th graders who are playing 13U.  For the 6th graders on our team, these games are a bonus.  Now, we feel that the level of competition we play at 12U is the equivalent of 7th grade ball.  The problem is that it is on artificial-size fields that distort the game.  We believe that 50/70 with 200' fences is simply way too small for outstanding 7th graders to play on during the Spring and Summer.  That is why we will do very few events at 12U in 2009.

The boys have grown up this season.  They have been tested in ways few teams have, and it shows.  We have all become close, and the boys really love being around each other and playing together.  The talent of our team, top to bottom, is exceptional.  We have no drama and no issues from the players or parents.  No prima donnas.  Everybody plays multiple positions, and the coaches' sons receive no favoritism.  No pitcher on our team threw more than 75 pitches this season.  What we have is very exceptional and rare.  I know this group of players is going to stay together for the long term and the boys individually and as a team are going to achieve great things in the near future.  All the coaches feel very privileged to be along for the ride!

Clash of the Titans indeed!  The Miami Youth Baseball Academy hosted their "Clash of the Titans" invitation-only annual tournament, and the field was exactly that. 

We travelled to the heart of Miami to square off against the best of the best of latin youth baseball in South Florida.  Our time on the big fields against 13 year olds paid off as we continued to show increased maturity, strength and speed.

Our first game was against the Coral Springs Panthers, a well-coached team that has won many tournaments and has been one of the top teams in Broward County for many years.  They outhit us in the game, but we had more extra base hits and had to told on for a 9-4 win.  That set up a showdown with the host Miami Lightning, where the winner would get a first round bye to the quarterfinals.  Our bats were smoking and the pitching of Donovan was outstanding as we rolled over the Lightning 11-1.  The Lightning are an outstanding, accomplished team, but we were on and they were not.  We earned the #2 overall seed and a birth in the Final 8.

In the quarterfinals we faced the Pembroke Lakes Bulldogs, another strong Miami team with a tough pitcher on the mound.  Again we started hot with the bats and manufactured several runs with excellent baserunning.  Cody was very sharp on the mound and Daniel did a good job in relief and we poured it on late to win 11-3 and advance to our 25th Final Four.

In the semis we faced the Miami Dynasty Elite, who had loaded up with several new players for this tournament and were determined to knock us out.  Their pitcher threw an outstanding game and they hit the ball hard all game.  We hit the ball hard as well, but several right at players and they also made several diving catches and great plays on defense.  Our 3rd day of the road trip finally caught up with us and we could not match the Dynasty's intensity and lost 6-0.

This was a fantastic trip for us again.  All the boys had a great time and we played tremendous baseball.  Going on a trip like this to a very different environment that what we are used to and facing tough new teams is not easy.  But we did it because it is not easy.  We have made great strides just in the past month, and are looking forward to a big Spring!

We rolled into the 13U AAU State Championship with 26 other teams at Chain O Lakes Park in Winter Haven this week. 

We opened up with our first game in the Cleveland Indians stadium where so many major league Hall of Famers played.  What a thrill it was for the boys to be in a big league dugout and to get the opportunity to play on that field.  We opened up with the Tampa Terror, and we came out smoking with the bats and baserunning to take an early 7-0 lead after 3 innings.  After we got deep into our pitching staff, a couple of errors led to tight game as we had to hold on for a 7-6 win.

In our second pool game, we took on the Ocala Blaze, a perennially strong and well-coached Ice team in the 13U division.  We came out battling and took a 2-0 and held on.  We made some mistakes, but the pitchers dug deep and we made plays when we had to.  The Blaze, who were much bigger and stronger than us, kept fighting and eventually took a 3-2 lead into the 7th.  We came back with a big run in the top of the inning to tie the game, but the Blaze scored the winning run in the bottom of the inning on a suicide squeeze.  We almost won our pool, but had to settle for 2nd out of the four teams and the #1 seed in the Fire division.

In our quarterfinal game we faced the Golden Gate Hammerheads, who jumped on us early and took a 5-0 lead.  Our boys did not rattle and we battled hard every single inning - never giving up despite the deficit and the odds against us.  We forced the opposing pitcher to throw 131 pitches in less than 5 innings of work, but left runners in scoring position every inning and lost 9-4.

We were all extremely proud of the boys this weekend.  We were shorthanded, underage and underseasoned on the big fields, but the guys battled every inning and were in every game.  This experience against quality 13U teams on the real baseball fields was invaluable.  We will continue our progress on these fields at the 13U IBC Fall State Tournament, then we will return to the "Land of Make Believe" (small fields) when we head down to Miami to battle the top 12U programs in South Florida.

Dustin is Exhibit A why baseball is the best sport for a young man to play.  Dustin is 5'9" tall and weighs 170 lbs.  Here is what he said yesterday:

"I'm not the biggest guy in the world.  I don't have that many tools.  If you saw me walking down the street, you wouldn't even think I'm a baseball player.  This is unbelievable!"

The Sunshine League Points Title is awarded to the team in the State that had the most consistently outstanding season from beginning to end.  To contend for the league title, you typically have to finish in the Final Four of every AAU tournament during that season.  We accomplished this, and after finish 2nd each of the last two seasons, we took home the Gold!  Each player will receive two beautiful trophies at the AAU Awards Banquet this January - one for 2nd place last spring and one for 1st place this Fall.  Here were the final standings:

1.  METEORS BASEBALL

2.  SOUTH FLORIDA XTREME

3.  FLORIDA HIT AND RUN

4.  SCORPIONS BASEBALL

5.  INVERNESS CRACKERS

6.  TAMPA THUNDER

7.  POLK COUNTY GATORS

8.  GULF COAST MUSTANGS

9.  SEMINOLES BLACK

10. BULLETS BLACK

CLICK ON THE HEADLINE ABOVE TO SEE ALL THE LEAGUE CHAMPIONS!

As we have said before, when we make our schedule we find the event each week that will offer our players the best competition possible, and that is where we go.  That is the best way to prepare to play high school ball at the highest level.  This week, 32 teams showed up in Winter Haven for the AAU Fall State Championship.  The weather was perfect, the format and competition were great, and we could not have asked for a better weekend of baseball.

Our first pool game was against the Lakeland Thunder.  The Thunder were certainly overmatched for a talent standpoint, and we just wanted to get this game over as quickly as possible and move on with a win.  Tyler hit a big double in the 2nd to give us a 5-1 lead and Danny followed with a big bomb of his own in the 3rd and we never looked back behind the excellent pitching of Michael and Daniel en route to a 9-1 win.

Game 2 looked like it was going to be a tougher game as we squared off against the Flager Bulldogs, who came into the tournament with an excellent doubleheader record.  It proved not to be the case as we came out swinging in the first.  Tyler singled, Victor and Brett walked, then Michael blasted a bases-clearing triple.  Donovan and Brandon walked, then Danny and Cory followed with RBI singles and it was 8-0 after one inning.  Victor, Brett and Donovan later followed with big blasts and Daniel and Andrew singled in the 3rd and we cruised to a 14-1 win.

The 10 pool winners moved into the Ice tournament and there were no real surprises in pool play.  We faced the Bullets Black in our quarterfinal game, and they were determined to pull the upset and take us out.  The game was tight in the early innings.  After back to back strikeouts to open the game, Brett walked and was driven in by Michael.  The Black tied the game in the bottom of the inning 1-1 when a costly error cost us a run.  We broke through for another run in the 2nd when Tyler was hit by a pitch and Victor blasted a monster triple into the gap.  Meanwhile, Cody settled down on the mound and held the Black to just one more run over the next two innings, but the Black opened up the 4th with two more runs and suddenly it was only a 5-4 game.  Michael then came on with the bases loaded and one out and struck out the next two batters to get us out of the jam.  The offense finally came to life and exploded for 7 runs in the 5th and we held on for a 12-7 win.

In the Final Four we faced the Gulf Coast Mustangs, a hot team that had won 15 games in a row and had a 25-3 season record.  The Mustangs jumped on us for 2 runs in the first to get us concerned.  But we answered right back with 4 in the bottom of the inning.  Both teams went to the bullpen and the scoring stopped for a while.  Daniel was excellent for us, throwing two shutout innings.  The hammer finally fell on the Mustangs in the 4th when Andrew walked and Tyler, Victor, Michael, Donovan and Daniel followed with singles for a 12-3 mercy-rule win and a spot in the State Championship Game.

The faced our good friends the Diamondbacks in the semis.  The D'Backs are a program with a similar philosophy and approach to our program, and it is always fun to play them.  Their bats came out hot against Michael in the 1st, but Michael shut them down for the next three innings.  Brett answered with a two-run blast for us and we took a very tight game into the 5th until the D'Backs scored three.  We threatened nearly every inning, and got things going in the 6th when Brandon homered and we got a couple of guys on, but they snuffed out the rally and we lost 7-3.

This was a good tournament for us as a measuring stick to see where we are at as a program and where we have come from.  The Meteors, Florida Fire and Diamondbacks are the three programs that travel throughout the State and play all the top events - Triple Crown, USSSA, AAU and others.  When you face the best competition for an extended period of time, it makes you step up your level of play to another level.  We have played the toughest schedule in the State this fall.  Now we went back and played teams with great records who have not been doing what we have.  The difference from the last time we saw some of these teams is great.  It certainly validates what we have been doing. 

We will never be a team with a big winning percentage because of the schedule we play.  However, we are a team of players who have been tested on the big stage against the very best in the country.  This is the foundation of our program, and the gap will continue to widen between us and the teams who are not doing what we are.   

We now move to the big fields for the next three months.  We are built and designed for these fields, and we will take on the 13U division and see what we can do.  We will start off with the 13U AAU State Championship in two weeks. 

What a tournament!  All the top programs in Florida - and just about every single team loaded up with top players from teams who were not there.  Every game out there was a war as no team was safe whenever they weren't on the very top of their games.  We saw a display on every field of youth baseball at its very highest level.  It was one of those events that is difficult to describe for those who were not there to experience it.  One weekend at a tournament like this is more valuable to each player than 100 doubleheaders.  These are the kinds of experiences you will draw upon down the road both in travel baseball and in high school.

We had a great run, but our injuries and a few costly mistakes finally caught up with us.  We will learn from them and get better - much better.  We survived pool play after defeating the Pembroke Lakes Cobras 9-5 and losing to the Miami Angels 9-4.  Our goal was to advance to the Final 16 with all our pitching in tact, and we did that.  9 outstanding teams were eliminated on Saturday.  We ended up with the 15th seed though and had to play the Tamiami Outlaws who had the #2 seed.  We played an awesome game and advanced to the Elite 8 with a 4-2 win.  We then came 1 inning away from the Final 4 as we had the Miami Enforcers down 3-0 going to the bottom of the 6th.  A couple of costly mistakes and the game went to extras tied 3-3, only to see us drop a thrilling contest 4-3 in 8 innings.

It was another phenomenal weekend for our team and our program.  We know where we need to get better.  Also, we had some players really step up big in key spots.  I wanted to single out Michael Campoamor this week.  We have brought him along slowly on the mound and not asked him to pitch against a top team in a critical spot up until this weekend.  We felt it was time to take the training wheels off and see what he could do.  All he did was throw 6 shutout innings total against the Cobras, Outlaws and Enforcers.  He has proven to us that he is a big game pitcher and joins always-reliable Cody at the top of our rotation.

We will continue to be handicapped by the fact that we are a big-field team playing on small fields.  Our best days are yet to come - next fall we will see our team go to an entirely different level.  In the meantime we will continue to develop and continue to play more 13U events.  See you at USSSA States next weekend!

Last week, Rick Knapp was named the pitching coach for the Detroit Tigers.  Rick has toiled in the minor leagues for 25 years, most recently serving as the Pitching Coordinator for the Minnesota Twins system.  After all this time, he finally won a spot in the Show, becoming Jim Leyland's right hand man. 

Rick's son Ricky played for the Meteors in 2006 and 2007 and was an outstanding pitcher and solid hitter.  His pitching mechanics are flawless (wonder why) and he is now a Junior at Charlotte High.

Congrats to Rick and the whole Knapp family.  The Tigers had the worst pitching staff in the majors last year, so there is only one direction to go!

The Meteors showed that they are going to be a dominating team when we hit 13U and play real baseball on the big fields.  This weekend we entered the 13U Slug a Rama - just walked out on the big fields in mid-season for the very first time and finished in the Final Four of the Fire.

In our first game we faced the #4 Sebring Streaks and played extremely well for our very first game.  The timing was off for the hitters and we left runners in scoring position several times to lose 6-1.

In the second pool game we dominated the Bullets White 16-4 as we started hitting on all cylindars after making the adjustment to the fields.  In our first bracket game, yet another dominating performance as we shut down the Sarasota Sharks 9-1 in a game that was not as close as the score.  In the Final Four we faced Hit, Run, Score.  We jumped all over them and kept on our roll, leading 10-1 heading into the final inning when it began to downpour, causing a long delay.  We were forced to change pitchers, lost all momentum and made some key errors on a sloppy field and lost the game 11-10.

We were clearly the talk of the tournament.  A 12U team turning in a performance like that is unheard of.  We proved what we have been saying all along - our entire program and the style of players we have is totally designed for the big fields.  We are handicapped playing on small fields against teams designed for those fields.  We saw, from some of the teams we played, how ineffective these small-field heroes can be when they step onto a real baseball field.

We will start playing a lot more 13U ball from this point forward.  The sooner we leave the "Land of Make Believe" of 200' fences the better.  It will be a lot of fun to see some of our fellow 12U teams come out and join us next August!

The Sunshine League (points) title is awarded each season to the team that had the most consistently outstanding season from beginning to end.  Since one of our priorities is to be consistent, this has always a team goal.  We are playing on the big fields in the 13U division for the Slug a Rama, so points will be very hard to come by next week in that one.  Therefore, we went into the AAU Bullets Bash tournament needing to pad our lead significantly with at least a Top 3 finish.

We opened up with the Hitting Academy Titans, a team of good guys that we had played once before and they had given us a tough battle.  However, since that time they lost some very good players and our roster has been strengthened substantially.  It was bombs away right from the start.  Tyler opened with a walk and stole 2nd and 3rd.  Donovan walked and Brandon hit a massive three-run bomb.  Victor then singled and Danny hit a bomb even further than Brandon's.  Robert S. got hit by a pitch, Jonathan singled, Tyler walked again, Donovan got drilled and Brandon singled and it was 9-0 before the 1st inning was over.  Danny and Brandon both hit HRs again in the 2nd and 3rd and the Meteors cruised to a 13-3 win behind the pitching of Brandon, Andrew and Scott.

In our second pool game we faced the South Florida Xtreme.  Tyler continued to single-handedly produce runs in a variety of ways as he reached on a strikeout, stole 2nd and 3rd and was singled in by Brandon to give us a 1-0 lead in the first.  It was not a pretty game, but the Meteors cashed in when needed and snuffed out scoring threats.  In the 3rd inning Tyler singled and again stole 2nd and 3rd.  Donovan then walked and Brandon hit another bomb to give us a 4-0 lead.  The pitching was outstanding in this game as Danny, Cody, Donovan, and Michael combined for a two-hit shutout and a 5-0 win.

In the quarterfinals, we squared off against the Sarasota Sharks.  The Sharks are built around a hard-throwing ace and were looking to him to shut down to powerful Meteors offense.  He started off wild, walking Tyler and Victor, but he settled down to get the next two batters.  Danny came up and then hit a clutch two-RBI double to give us the early lead.  Meanwhile, Michael pitched a fantastic game, aided by spectacular defensive plays by Robert L. and Victor.  In his four innings of work, Mike only allowed three hits and one run.  We broke the game open in the 3rd when Brandon was hit by a pitch, Donovan walked and Danny also got drilled.  Robert L. then came up and smoked a huge two-run double down the line in left and it was 5-0.  The party raged on in the 4th when Jonathan and Tyler singled and Victor hit an RBI double to chase the Sharks pitcher from the mound.  More runs would come later in the inning and in the 5th, capped by a big fly by Mike to give us an 11-1 lead en route to an 11-4 final.

In the semis we again faced the Xtreme, who had beaten the Bullets White in their quarterfinal game.  This was a game similar to the other two this season where we took command early and held the lead throughout.  Victor singled in the first and Brandon hit yet another bomb.  Daniel then doubled and Mike drove him in slicing a triple down the right field line.  We continued to batter the Xtreme starter in the 2nd.  Scott singled, Victor walked and Brandon, Danny and Donovan each singled ahead of a big Grand Slam by Michael to give us a commanding 8-2 lead. 

On the mound there were signs of problems which would get worse as the night went on.  We had played our first three games at Thonotasassa, where the mounds were firm and high.  In this game and the next, we moved over to Dover where the mounds were soft and flat.  It also started raining in the afternoon and they got worse as the night wore on.  Our pitchers, who had been sharp all weekend, struggled mightily with their command on the Dover mounds.  Cody looked like a completely different pitcher, repeatedly falling behind the hitters, but digging deep and battling out of jams.  With the Meteors clinging to an 8-4 lead heading into the final inning, Brandon added a big insurance run by stealing home.  The final was 10-4.

In the Championship Game against the Bullets, it was a very late, rainy, surreal game where we just could not throw a strike.  Danny had been lights-out on the mound all year, but could not get out of the 1st, and for our next four pitchers it was more of the same as 11 walks in 3 innings led to a disaster.  It was just one of those train wreck games that all baseball teams have from time to time.  One we will just forget and move on.

On the positive side, this weekend we accomplished our primary goal for the week by taking a commanding lead for the Sunshine League Title.  This week we prepare for our debut on the big fields in 13U AAU Slug a Rama.

Just for fun, I printed out the stats from the last Fall 12U Meteors team (Fall 2005).  That team played a total of 44 games that season.  Here were the team leaders:

INNINGS PLAYED:  BRANDON HAARER  249, JOEY MILLER  236, PEDRO SANTANA  229

PLATE APPEARANCES:  BRANDON HAARER  147, JOEY MILLER 123,  CHRIS VAN BRANDT  120

ON BASE %:  BRANDON HAARER  .497, MIKE STOKES  .458,  KEVIN SCHUBERT  .453

BATTING AVG:  BRANDON HAARER  .435, MIKE STOKES  .408, JOEY MILLER  .402

RUNS:  BRANDON HAARER  46, JOEY MILLER  36, CHRIS VAN BRANDT  34

RBI:  PEDRO SANTANA  36, BRANDON HAARER  31,  MIKE STOKES  28

STOLEN BASES:  JOEY MILLER  37, CHRIS VAN BRANDT  35, BRANDON HAARER 33

PITCHING WINS:  BRANDON HAARER 9, NICK MOLINA 7, BRYAN VOELKL

PITCHING ERA:  NICK MOLINA  2.09,  BRANDON HAARER 2.61,  BRYAN VOELKL  3.11

Can you beat their records? 

Where are they now?  Brandon Haarer, Joey Miller, Chris Van Brandt, Nick Molina and Kevin Schubert are playing at Sarasota High.  Mike Stokes at Cardinal Mooney, Pedro Santana at Braden River High and Bryan Voelkl at Manatee High.

Players who most remind me of....

BRANDON HAARER - TYLER TYSON

JOEY MILLER - DONOVAN PETREY

CHRIS VAN BRANDT - JONATHAN GARCIA

NICK MOLINA - NO MATCH, THERE'S NOBODY LIKE NICK!

BRYAN VOELKL - DANIEL SCHROEDER

PEDRO SANTANA - VICTOR MARRERO

Check these guys out on the other Meteors website - click on the headline above.

This weekend we wanted to set up the most difficult possible non-tournament event.  We travelled to Orlando to play a doubleheader against the Florida Fire on Saturday night, then a doubleheader against the Central Florida Diamondbacks on Sunday morning.  Four games against two teams ranked in the Top 15 in the Nation in less than 24 hours.  These kinds of tests are what the Meteors program is all about.

Our goals were developmental and experimental in nature.  We continue to work on developing a complete and deep pitching staff, and so we used 8 different pitchers.  We also continue to spread around the playing time to give everybody opportunity to develop.  Every player on the roster sat out a total of 6 innings and played 18.  That meant of course that we never had our top lineup in the batting order or our top defense on the field.  However, it meant that all players would get a chance to show what they could do at a variety of positions.

After the long drive to Longwood the pitching was not good in Game 1 against the Fire.  Brandon started on the mound and could not get out of the first inning, walking 5, giving up 2 hits and surrendering 6 runs.  We battled back in the 2nd when Mike singled, Cody reached on an error, Cory and Tyler walked then Robert L. hit a big two-RBI double.  Danny followed that up with a 2-run HR in the 3rd, but the Meteors pitchers continued to fall behind in counts and could not keep the Fire from scoring and we lost 13-5.  

Game 2 was a much different story as the pitching was much better and it was a tight game throughout.  Cody started on the mound and Fire hitters did a good job going with the pitches and jumped out to a 3-0 lead.  We struck back in the 3rd when Tyler was hit by a pitch and Victor and Donovan singled to cut the lead to 4-3.  We had several opportunities in this game to break through and take the lead, but we left runners in scoring position every inning and lost 5-4.

The following morning against the Diamondbacks we got off to a slow start, giving up 2 runs in the first.  Donovan got himself out of the jam with a couple of strikeouts and settled down to pitch a 1-2-3 second inning.  The Meteors broke through for a run in the 2nd when Mike singled and scored on a passed ball.  Robert L. came in to pitch and was outstanding for two innings, shutting out the DBacks hitters.  We were able to tie the game 2-2 in the 4th when Cody walked and scored on a double steal.  However, the DBacks hit two solo bombs in the final inning to go back on top.  We answered back with a run in the 6th, but left the winning runs in scoring position to drop the game 4-3.

In the final game of the weekend we put most of our starting lineup on the field for the first time all weekend.  Robert L. opened the game by getting hit by a pitch.  Brandon then walked and Donovan singled.  Victor then drove them in with a double in the gap.  Another walk to Mike and back to back singles by Danny and Cory chased the DBacks starter from the hill and gave us an early 4-0 lead.  With Danny and Cody on the mound, that would be more than enough as the pitching and the defense was outstanding throughout.  Danny threw four innings, giving up just 1 run and Cody followed that up with 2 shutout innings.  The Meteors scored insurance runs in each of the final three innings.  Victor hit another RBI double, Tyler had an RBI single and Mike had a sac fly to score Donovan to cap off a 7-1 win.

This was another fantastic weekend as we continue to build our program and learn.  The Meteors system of playing with great players against great players, week in and week out, was never more evident than this weekend.  We look forward to facing the DBacks and Fire many times again in the future in the Finals of major tournaments! 

In a word, WOW!  Four games.  Four, three-inning, 10-run mercy rule wins en route to the championship.  It was an awesome display of dominance by this incredibly talented team.  We came out of great two weeks of practice where we worked extremely hard and continued to jell as a unit. 

Ten teams showed up to compete in the 12U division, with the 5 pool game winners going to the Ice bracket and the five losers going to Fire.  We opened with the Bradenton Dirt Dogs, which gave us an opportunity to experiment and try some new things.  Victor opened the game with a single and Donovan drove him in with a double.  Danny then had an RBI single, Cody walked and Cory and Robert S. had back to back hits.  Scott then walked and was driven in on a RBI single by Andrew.  Mike later went deep for a HR and the game was never in doubt 15-0.  Scott, Andrew, Donovan and Jonathan combined for the shutout.

In the first bracket game we squared off against the St. Pete Hurricanes, who were undefeated on the young season after blowing through the recent IBC tournament.  They had given us trouble in the past, but this is a completely different Meteors team.  The hits came early and kept coming.  Donovan singled in the 2nd and Victor hit a big bomb out to right.  Mike followed with another blast to center.  Daniel and Cody then walked and Robert S. had a bunt single to load the bases.  Tyler's great speed then forced a throwing error, Robert L. got hit by a pitch and Brandon droven them in with an RBI single.  More bombs and blasts in the third led to more runs and a 12-0 win.  Brandon and Cody combined for the one-hit shutout.

In the semis we faced an improved Venice Pythons team that had upset the South Florida Xtreme.  It was more of the same in this game though as Tyler and Robert L. opened the game with singles, Brandon walked and Victor hit another big bomb for a 3-run homer.  Daniel then doubled and was singled in by Cory.  The blast contined in the second and third, highlighted by a big grand slam by Brandon to deep left.  Mike did an excellent job on the mound - after giving up a run in the first he settled down and retired the side in order in the 2nd and 3rd for the win. 

The Hurricanes entered the Championship Game looking to prove that the previous game was a fluke.  They had a new pitcher on the mound, but the result was the same as the Meteors Fireworks Festival continued.  Tyson opened up the game with a double, stole 3rd and scored on a sac fly by Robert L.  The Canes threatened in the second, but a great double play by Victor snuffed out their rally.  In the 3rd inning, Tyler singled then Robert L. went yard with a big fly to center.  After Brandon and Donovan walked, Victor then hit ANOTHER bomb, maybe the hardest hit one of the tournament, to right center to plate three more runs.  Cody then hit his first ever bomb, a no-doubter three run shot to left.  Meanwhile, Cody was as sharp as ever on the hill, spinning a complete-game three hit shutout against his former team.

The Meteors hit 9 home runs in just 12 innings of baseball.  We outscored our opponents by a combined score of 51-1.  Tyson (7-9, 2 doubles, HR), Victor (7-9, 2 HRs, double) and Mike (4-7, 2 HRs) paced the offense.

This is a completely new and explosive Meteors team unlike any that has taken the field before.  It is a lot of fun to coach and I know it is a blast to watch from the stands!

The final national rankings for the 2008 11U year have just come out, and we were ranked #22 in the United States.  Travel Ball Select is the most highly respected organization for travel ball and it is an organization that has a staff that takes weeks of research before putting out their rankings.  The main criteria for these rankings is strength of schedule and results against top programs in major events. 

The incredible strength of schedule we played last year is the reason for our ranking.  It is also the reason why our players have inproved exponentially.  We look forward to more of the same in our 12U year, and also to move up in the rankings as our team continues to improve.  This is a fantastic accomplishment - everyone associated with our organization should be very proud!

Click on the headline above to see the national rankings and read the write-up on each team.

The new 12U Meteors showed this past weekend that they have the talent to beat and even dominate any team out there. Tyler Tyson (8-12, 6 R, 5 SB), Jonathan Garcia (slick glove and pitching) and Michael Campoamor (6-11 OB) made their Meteors debut and each one showed that they are going to help make this by far out best season yet. We played great baseball for three games, advancing to the Final Four of the Ice Division, but several costly errors resulted in a 4th place finish.

Twenty teams showed up for the First Pitch tournament. Several teams appeared to be new, but were in fact loaded with experienced players that had come together from pieces of other teams. It made for some tough sledding and what appeared to be several upsets all weekend.

Our first game was against the Tampa Titans, formerly the Tampa Blades. The Blades had upset us last time we played them in the Slug a Rama, but the game was really never close in the rematch. The Meteors opened the scoring in the 2nd when Mike singled and scored on an RBI groundout by Donovan. In the 3rd, Tyler singled, stole second and was driven in by Robert L.. Robert then stole second and scored on a grounder by Victor. Cody started on the mound and pitched three outstanding no-hit, shutout innings. We then broke the game open in the 4th when Mike, Daniel and Donovan hit three straight singles and the Meteors took a commanding 7-0 lead. The Meteors added two more insurance runs in the 5th when Tyler (3-3) singled and was driven in when Jonathan reached on an error. Mike and Jonathan then came on to pitch and combined with Cody for the no-hitter and a 9-1 win.

The Meteors then faced the South Florida Xtreme, formerly the SW Florida Yarddogs. This was a tough draw for us because their name change resulted in them being seeded much lower than they should have. They won their game against the Titans 14-3, setting up a showdown where the winner would advance to the Ice division. The Meteors bats came out smoking right away when Tyler doubled and was singled in by Robert L.. Donovan was then hit by a pitch then Victor ripped a triple down the right field line to plate two. Daniel then drove in Victor with an RBI groundout to stake us to a 4-0 lead. In the 3rd the Meteors added another run when Brandon hit a monster 290' triple and was singled in by Donovan. Brandon had started on the mound and looked dominating at times, striking out 4 in a scoreless first two frames. After recording an out in the 3rd he tired, giving up a run on a couple of hits. However, Mr. Reliable Daniel came out to quickly snuff out the rally. The Meteors then broke the back of the Xtreme in the 5th when Andrew walked, Robert L. got hit by a pitch, Brandon doubled and Donovan and Victor hit back to back RBI singles for a 9-1 lead. Daniel then pitched on into the final inning, but Mike came on and got the final out to preserve a 9-3 win and another berth in the Ice Division for bracket play.

In our first bracket game, we faced a very good hitting Seminole Black team. We again had a big first inning when Tyler singled, stole second and scored all the way from second on an overthrow. Robert L. then hit a monster 280' triple to center and was singled in by Donovan. Mike then drove in Dovovan and it looked like to was going to be another rout for the Meteors. However, the Seminole team had some outstanding hitters, and we had not seen them before so were unsure how to pitch to them. Mike started on the mound and once again showed that he had three very good pitches. However, he did not locate them well and the good hitting Seminoles made us pay with four runs in the first two innings. The Meteors scored a run in the 2nd when Robert S. singled and scored on a double by Tyler. It looked like it was going to be a slugfest with the game tied at 4-4 going to the 3rd. Brandon opened the 3rd with a double and then Victor smoked a double to score him. Mike then got hit by a pitch and Cody singled him in. Daniel then came on in relief and was totally outstanding, quieting the Seminole bats with great location and change of speed, throwing three scoreless innings with four strikeouts to lead us to an 8-4 win and another Final Four appearance.

In the Final Four we squared off against the new Hit, Run Score team, which had several veteran AAU players from other teams and had their ace ready to go. Tyler again got us going in the first when he singled and stole second and was singled in by Brandon. Our ace Cody took the mound and was outstanding as usual (we had been 6-0 in games he started), but in a theme that would continue throughout the game our defense made two costly mistakes in the first and the game was tied at 1-1. We took the lead in the 3rd when Andrew walked, Tyler singled and Robert L. was hit by a pitch and the Meteors led 3-1. However, more mistakes led to three more unearned runs and the Meteors fell behind for the first time in the tournament. We answered back with a run in the 4th when Daniel singled and Cory singled him in, but the air went out of our balloon when two more errors led to more unearned runs in the 5th. We dropped the game 8-4, and 7 of the runs were unearned on five costly errors.

Overall, this was a very good tournament for our team. We saw the unlimited potential of this team - all we need to do is keep this group together and keep working hard in practice and in games. The sky is the limit.  In 7 years of Meteors baseball, this is the most talented Meteors team ever put together - and that is saying a whole lot! The athletic explosiveness of this squad is unparalelled. It will not truly show up until we hit the big fields next year. Right now, to some extent, our speed and athleticism is caged-in by the field dimensions. These allow teams with lesser athletic ability to compete, but those days will soon be over. We are all very excited about this team.

The Meteors defeated teams from California, Hawaii, Indiana, Puerto Rico and Georgia en route to a fantastic 4th place finish at the Division I AAU National Championship.  The Meteors were the highest placing Florida team in the tournament - a fantastic accomplishment and a week we will never forget.

Full story and stats tomorrow...

7 former Meteors will lead a squad favored to be a contender for a State and possibly National Championship this summer in 15U Babe Ruth All-Stars.

Former Meteors on the team are: Ronald Filipkowski, Mitch Martinez, Joey Miller, Nick Molina, Kevin Schubert, Eric Skoglund, Chris Van Brandt.

UPDATE!!! - All-Star team has been rolling, taking the district and South Florida title. The team moves on to the Southeast Region tournament next week.

This was a five week stretch where we hoped to really come together as team, learn a ton, and get a lot better by playing the best. We certainly accomplished all three goals. The Slug a Rama, the Battle in the South, the Bullets Bash, AAU States, and the USSSA Super NIT. What a 5 week stretch it has been!

We opened with the Central Florida Patriots, a tough, scrappy club that plays fundamentally solid baseball. The pool games in this tournament meant absolutely nothing, so we saw them as an opportunity to play guys who have sat the most to play all the time, try some new pitchers, and take a look at guys at some new positions. The Patriots jumped out to a 4-0 lead early as Victor started but got knocked around early. Daniel came on, however, and was sensational, holding the bats at bay for four innings. The Meteors chipped away at the lead, but could never overcome the early deficit and lost 9-4.

In Game 2 against the West Boynton Tornadoes we continued to experiment with our pitching and defense. We took an early 2-1 lead on a sac bunt by Nick and an RBI single by Andrew, but the Tornadoes answered back with 4 runs in the 3rd. The Meteors then cut the lead to 6-5 in the 5th, but a costly error led to 3 Tornado runs and the Meteors dropped the game 9-5.

We then came out with our game faces on and recharged batteries on Sunday. We got a rematch with the Tornadoes, and their ace was on the mound ready for us. But Sunday is a different story and the Meteors jumped on them early and kept battering the Tornadoes pitching. Wes, Brandon, Cory, Nick and Robert L. all had multiple hits and Zak reached base in all 4 of his plate appearances. Meanwhile, Zak was brilliant on the mound in a 17-3 thrashing of the Boynton team.

In the semis we squared off against the Central Florida Diamondbacks with their rested ace on the mound. The last time we faced him, he threw a complete game shutout against us in November. However, this is a much different, battle-tested Meteors team. The Dbacks bats were hot early with runs off Wes in the first, but Wes settled down to pitch extremely well from that point on. We trailed 5-1 heading into the bottom of the 4th when Daniel, Zak, Cory, Nick, Robert S, Robert L. and Wes hit 7 straight singles with 2 outs to tie the game. The Dbacks scored single unearned runs on a pair of costly errors in the 5th and 6th and we headed into the final frame down 7-5. With two outs, Wes singled, Dean and Victor walked and the bases were loaded. Brandon hit a screaming liner at the second baseman, who snagged the ball just off the ground to kill the rally. It was a great baseball game between two evenly matched teams who battled every pitch.

Congrats to the Florida Fire, who beat the Dbacks 2-0 in the Championship. The Fire will represent Florida well in the Elite 24 World Series.

Former Meteors SS Casey Turgeon helped Dunedin High win the Florida State High School 5A Championship at Ed Smith Stadium on Thursday.  The Dunedin team started 8 seniors and 1 freshman - and that freshman was Turgeon.  Casey hit .420 this season and was the starting second baseman on the varsity all year.  He will be their starting SS for the next three years.  The sky is the limit for the player we called "The Natural."

What a weekend of baseball! We played tremendous ball all weekend showing, at times, flashes of the great team we are becoming. Although we continue to make mistakes as all 11U teams will, they are become fewer and our great athletic ability and skill is coming to the forefront more and more.

We opened with the North Florida Hurricanes, the best team from north Florida and probably the only elite program in the State we have not played. We jumped on the Canes early as Wes reached on an error and Victor drove him in with a double in the gap. Brandon then hit a massive two-run bomb to give us a three run lead. The Canes are an excellent offensive club, and they answered with a run in the bottom of the inning. We then exploded in the 3rd when Victor doubled, Brandon walked and Zak and Cory hit back to back singles. Nick then reached on an error, Scott walked and then executed an excellent 1/3rd baserunning play to end the inning with an 8-1 lead. Unfortunely, we couldnt hold the lead as the Canes bats got hot and they answered right back with seven runs of their own to tie the game. Neither team was able to score in the 4th and the game ended in an 8-8 tie.

The Meteors headed into our second pool game with the Tampa Blades needing a win and needing to hold the runs down to win the pool. It was also a revenge game for us as we felt we really underachieved in a 6-5 loss to the Blades in the Slug a Rama tournament. The Blades started the same pitcher that gave us trouble then, but this time it was a very different story. Wes, Victor and Danny each singled to open the game, then Brandon smoked a big triple. Zak then crushed a ball to left and huffed and puffed around the bases for a big HR! Cory then walked and Robert S. ripped a double into the gap to score him. Andrew then singled in Robert and the rout was on. Nick got his first start on the mound as was sensational, throwing a shutout with a little help from Wes who got the last out. We ended up winning our pool and advancing to the quarterfinals with an 11-0 win.

We then took on the St. Pete Hurricanes, who had flown in the family of a player from Miami who started on the mound. It is common in travel baseball for elite teams to add a player or two for a big tournament. There is nothing wrong with that and it happens on almost every top program. However, what was unusual in this case is a youth travel team playing for the travel expenses and accomodations of that player. That is something that would forfeit the eligibility of a high school or college player, and is a little odd to say the least for an 11 year old kid. Nevertheless, we certainly had no trouble with him as we ripped the ball off him for 6 runs in the first two innings on big hits by Wes, Victor, Daniel, Brandon and Cory. Daniel started on the mound and was outstanding. The defense let him down when an error led to two unearned runs in the first, but he kept us in the game in his 3+ innings of work. Wes came on in relief and pitched his guts out against a very tough lineup, allowing just two runs in his first three innings of work. However, the Meteors still trailed 7-6 going into the sixth inning. Nick opened with a bunt single and stole second, Wes then came up and hit a big single up the middle to tie the game. Both teams went down in order in a scoreless 7th, and the Meteors could not score in the 8th. A misplayed ball into the wind by the Canes Miami player and another blooper to the opposite field ended the game 8-7. It was a great game played a bunch of great players. Everyone who participated in this game will benefit greatly from the experience.

Several players had big weekends, but try these numbers on for size:

BRANDON: 5-7, HR, TRIPLE, DOUBLE, 4 RBIs

WES: 6-9, 4 RUNS, 4 RBIs

It was another fun weekend and another weekend of improvement. We had a great time with the Hurricanes at Mike's pizza on Saturday and want to thank him for the dinner and hospitaltity. We now head into our final event of the Spring season - the USSSA Super NIT. We will take our shot at a berth in the USSSA Elite 24 World Series. We congratulate our friends the Bullets Gold, who defeated the St. Pete Hurricanes in the Championship Game. They are a great team and a great group of players and coaches and we were very happy to see them win. In a testiment to the difficulty of our schedule, and the kind of season we have had, this season we have beaten every single team that made the Final Four of the 2008 State Tournament. That is truly a great accomplishment!

The Meteors had a great time, and our hosts the 12U Bullets Gold were awesome this weekend at the Bullets Bash tournament.

11 teams gathered to get in some final work before States.  We went into the tournament with only 10 players, but it gave those 10 a great opportunity to play a lot and a chance for us to look at some new pitchers. 

We opened with the Bullets Black, who came in very determined to beat us.  It really was a game where two teams obviously had different goals, as the Black starter went 6 innings and the Meteors pitched Brandon, Victor, Andrew and Danny.  Brandon got off to a shaky start and the Black jumped out to a 6-0 lead after just two innings.  Andrew came on and had another solid outing with two scoreless innings of relief.  Danny then came in and pitched another scoreless inning, but the Meteors still trailed 6-0 as the Black starter was on top of his game.  Wes led off the sixth reaching on an error and Victor singled.  Danny was then hit by a pitch and Brandon reached on another error.  Cory then hit a big double to drive in two.  Robert L. singled in Cory and Robert S. followed that up with a sac fly, but the Black finally snuffed out the rally and the Meteors fell 6-5.

In the second pool game we played the Brandon Panthers.  The Meteors jumped on them early when Wes singled and Nick reached on an error.  Danny (Mr. Clutch) followed with a monster two-run HR bomb to deep center.  Brandon then made it back to back jacks with a shot to left.  Robert S. then smoked a double but was thrown out making a good agressive steal attempt at third.  It looked like the game was well in hand as Scott pitched extremely well into the 3rd.  However, three errors and a couple walks later and the Panthers tied the game at 5-5.  The Meteors then answered back, exploding for 10 runs in the 4th.  Robert L. came on in relief and was outstanding to pick up the win.

The first bracket game was against the Bullets Blue, who were a very solid club that has not played many tournaments.  We sent Wes to the mound, not taking any chances, and he was outstanding as usual, allowing just one run in his 5 innings of work.  On offense, we had runners in scoring position every inning and were able to steal at will.  Brandon had a big HR to start the scoring and Danny also had a big RBI double.  Robert L. pitched a scoreless 6th to preserve a 7-2 win and a berth in the Final Four.

In the semis we faced the Polk County Gators, who had pulled off a stunning upset of the Tampa Thunder.  This was a game where we started hot and stayed hot.  Daniel had a HR and a single, Brandon had two doubles and a single, and Robert L. and Nick both had two doubles a piece.  Victor spun a gem on the mound, throwing a 3-hit shutout and also threw just 27 pitches in his 4 innings of work!

The Championship Game was another classic Meteors/Bullets Gold affair.  We jumped out to a 4-0 lead when Wes doubled and Victor hit a HR.  Nick later singled in a run after a couple of walks.  Danny started on the mound and pitched OK but was not as sharp as he was on Friday night.  The Bullets answered back with 3 runs in the next two innings and rang up Danny's pitch count on a very hot day.  Brandon and Cory then hit back to back HRs in the 3rd to put us back up 6-3.  But the 3rd inning was a disaster for us as the Bullets scored six runs and took a 9-6 lead.  The Meteors never quit and battled every pitch as we continued to score runs.  However, we could not stop the Bullets as our shorthanded pitching staff ran out of gas and we lost 11-10 when the Bullets second baseman robbed Robert S. on a great play up the middle as the tying run was coming home.

This tournament was a lot of fun and hopefully a good learning experience for us.  The more we play together the better our chemistry will get.  The talent level of our roster is off the charts, it is just a matter of it all coming together.  We get closer every week.  This weekend's State Championship should be a lot of fun!

The League Championship points are all in and the Meteors finished #2 for the second consecutive season. The League Championship is similar to the NASCAR format where teams acquire points, primarily through tournaments, and the top 3 teams receive awesome awards at the Banquet in January.

We played 5 AAU tournaments this season, finishing 1st in the President's Day, 2nd in the Super Regional and Bullets Bash, 3rd in the Tournament of Champions and 5th in the Slug a Rama. It was a great AAU season overall for our team.

The Bullets Gold won their second consecutive league title. We congratulate our friends the Gold who finished their season very strong after a slow start. The Tampa Thunder took home the 3rd place trophies.

What could be a better motto for the best tournament in the country?  As it says on the back of the T-Shirts every year:

Battle in the South, Where Only The Best Are Invited...  Where Were You?

What a great experience this was for the boys - the entire four-day weekend was so much fun for everybody!  We continue to come together as a team and develop great chemistry.  Each week we keep getting better and better. 

Several years ago, I heard a veteran travel baseball coach say, "You are who you play."  That has always guided the way we make our schedule.  Each week we seek out the event where the best competition is.  This season we have travelled to Plantation, Leesburg, Winter Haven, and Knoxville, Tennessee. 

Our strength of schedule has been brutal.  But it is something that will serve our players very, very well as we move forward.  Here are the teams we have played in just the last three tournaments:  East Cobb (GA) Astros, Raleigh (NC) Wildcats, Westchester (OH) Sluggers, Florida Fire, St. Pete Hurricanes, Bullets Gold, W. Boynton Tornadoes, Weston Rattlers, Frozen Ropes, Hammertime Bulls, Tampa Blades.  Not a bad three weeks!

At the Battle in South we saw and competed against the very best in the country.  We joined the Florida Fire, Miami Brawlers and N. Florida Hurricanes as the Florida teams who received invitations.  Ten of the top 20 teams in the country were there. 

We opened with the East Cobb Astros, the top team in Georgia and the #5 ranked team in the country.  We did not play poorly, but the Astros bats came out hot and hit line drives to all parts of the field from the top of the lineup to the bottom.  We hung in there, but couldnt get much going and lost 9-1.

In the second game, we dominated throughout as our bats came to life against the Raleigh Wildcats in a 12-3 win.  The Meteors pounded out several doubles and triples on the 300' fields.  In the final game, the Meteors needed a win to survive and the bats stayed hot against the #1 team from Ohio, the Westchester Sluggers.  The Sluggers finished 2007 with a 30-2 record and were an outstanding club.  We jumped on them early and led 8-3 heading into the final inning.  However, our pitching faltered and the Ohio team mounted a great comeback to take the win 9-8.

This was just a great weekend.  We are in the middle of a five-tournament stretch that will test the mettle of our team and players.  You are who you play.  Our schedule shows we take that very seriously and expect great things in the future - especially when we get to play real baseball!

It was a fun weekend and a sad one as the Meteors at times showed flashes of great baseball to come, but suffered an injury to our hottest hitter.

The Meteors travelled to Sanford, where all the top teams from every part of the State showed up to do battle in a tournament hosted by the Florida Fire.  It was an opportunity to crank things up after three weeks off and play some new and outstanding teams.

We opened with the Frozen Ropes on Friday night, where walks and errors led to a 5-1 deficit after two innings.  We finally woke up in the 4th when Victor and Zak drew walks, Brandon singled and we cut the deficit to 5-3.  We put up another run in the 5th, but baserunning mistakes cost us dearly throughout the game and we lost 5-4.

That loss put us in a hole and we needed a big win in our second game to stay out of the consolation bracket.  We took on a tough W. Boynton Tornadoes team from West Palm Beach.  The Meteors got on the board first when Nick led off the 2nd with a single, Robert L. walked, and Robert S. smoked a huge double in drive in both.  Brandon started on the mound and was very sharp, only giving up 2 runs in his 3 innings of work on a home run.  The Meteors answered right back after that blast when Victor smoked a double, Nick bunted him to 3rd and Brandon and Robert S. hit RBI singles.  The Meteors added a couple of insurance runs in the 6th.  Cory singled and Victor hit another big bomb to drive him in.  Brandon and Robert L. then hit singles to wrap up the scoring.  Donovan took the mound in relief and pitched exceptionally well, and was also helped out by two great double plays turned by Nick.  The Meteors were able to advance with a 6-3 win.

In the first bracket game, we faced the Weston Rattlers, which is a great program from Broward County.  It was a see-saw game that went back and forth with both teams hitting the ball hard all over the park.  Donovan, Victor and Robert S. all had multihit games, but the star of the show was Scott, who hit his first travelball HR with a deep bomb that easily cleared the 225' fence in centerfield.  Scott also make a great play in right to snuff a Rattlers' rally.  Wes pitched four innings, and although he was not sharp and the defense made several mistakes, he pitched well enough to win.  Victor retired the side in the final inning on just 3 pitches. 

Unfortunately, a great win was tempered by the loss of Donovan, who fractured his leg on a play at the plate.  It was a clean, hard play where the Rattlers' catcher blocked the plate well and Donovan made a hard slide and just got caught the wrong way.  It was very disheartening to all of us to have that happen to such a great player and an even better kid.  It looks like he is out for 6 weeks, and we are all very bummed about that.  We all wish him a very speedy recovery so he can get back on the field for the summer events.

Our semifinal game with the Hammerheads from West Palm Beach was rained out, but it was a very good weekend of baseball for our program.  We continue to come together as a team, and we worked on the style of offensive baseball we want to play from this point forward.  We are looking forward to even bigger events the rest of this month.

It was a nice two weeks off to recharge the batteries, now we head into some of the biggest events of the season.

The philosophy of our program:  Each week go to the event that offers the best competition.  We have stuck to that every week of our existence.  Next week we play in the Florida Fire's 12-team invitation-only event.  The top teams from every part of the State will be there to square off.  Click on the headline above for more info on this tournament.

The month of April also features the big AAU Slug a Rama as well as the big-enchilada - the Elite Battle in the South in Knoxville, TN.  Doesnt get any better than this one - the Top 50 teams in the country.  We got one of the 4 Florida spots.  This is going to be a great month of baseball!

We continue to follow our formula - seeking out the best competition in a tournament setting week in and week out.  This week we travelled to Leesburg for the 25-team USSSA Shootout at Sleepy Hollow.

It was a star-studded affair in Leesburg as almost all of the top teams in Central Florida showed up to duke it out.  We squared off in our first pool game against a solid Lakeland Tigers team, who had just come off a win in their first pool game and looked sluggish against us.

We jumped on the Tigers in the 2nd when Brandon tripled and Nick and Robert followed with RBI singles.  The Meteors exploded in the 3rd when Wes led off with a single, Donovan and Victor walked and Cory drove in a run with a base hit.  Good baserunning led to more runs and the Meteors took a 7-1 lead into the 4th.  Brandon pitched the first three innings and was outstanding to earn the win.  Andrew then came on to close out the game and retired the Tigers in order to preserve a 9-1 win.

In Game 2, we faced another new team - the Central Florida Patriots, who had also won their first pool game.  Once again the offense came out smoking when Zak led off the 2nd with a walk and Nick stroked a double down the line.  Robert walked and Andrew singled, followed by an RBI hit by Donovan and we were rolling.  Victor started on the mound and threw three shutout innings and we cruised to a 9-2 win.

The tournament was then broken into three divisions, and the Meteors earned the #2 overall seed in the majors division.  We ended up with a rematch against the Tigers, and this time they were rested and ready to put their best foot forward against us.  Their pitcher threw an excellent game and held us scoreless until the 4th inning.  Cory and Brandon got things going with singles in the 4th and Zak drove in a run with an RBI single up the middle.  Nick followed with a bunt hit and Robert hit an RBI groundout to put the Meteors up 3-1.  Wes then really bore down on the Tigers hitters, retiring them in order in the 4th, 5th and 6th to preserve a 5-1 lead and a berth in the semifinals.

In the semis we squared off for the 5th time against the Florida Fire, who are unquestionably the best 11U team in the State.  The Fire was anxious to avenge their loss to the Meteors in the AAU President's Day tournament and came out swinging.  It was a game where we did not play poorly, and certainly had our opportunities to score runs, but we could not cash in.  Meanwhile, the Fire had a number of big two-out hits and they made all the plays in the field.  In the end, it was a good learning experience, and win or lose these are the games that make you better.  We lost to a better team, but playing teams like the Fire will certainly benefit us in the long run.

We now take two weeks off, and look forward to playing in the Fire's invitation-only elite event in three weeks where we will see teams from every part of the state - including all the top programs in South Florida.

The Meteors had another great weekend, taking 2nd Place in the AAU Super Regional Tournament.

The first pool game was against the Bullets Black, who always seem to give us a tough time.  The bats came out smoking early when Victor reached on an error, Cory singled and Robert L. walked to load the bases.  Brandon then had an RBI single and Zak drove in another with a base hit.  Brandon and Victor combined to hold the Black to just one run in four innings.  The Meteors finally broke the game open in the 5th when Victor walked, Robert singled and Brandon hit a monster triple.  Zak drove in Brandon for an 8-1 lead.  Then Andrew made hit pitching debut, giving up just one run to close the game.

The Meteors then faced the Longhorns, and decided to go for the 1st round bye.  We jumped out to a 2-0 lead when Wes singled and Cory and Brandon followed with RBI singles.  We added another run in the 3rd when Wes singled, stole 2nd and 3rd, and Donovan singled him in.  Meanwhile, Wes was stellar on the mound, shutting out the Longhorns with four no-hit innings.  The Longhorns broke through in the 5th when a costly error led to two runs and the lead was cut to 3-2.  The Meteors responded in a big way when Donovan led off the 6th with a huge triple, Victor reached on an error and scored on a sac fly by Cory.  Zak came on in the 5th and didnt allow a run to pick up the save.  Robert L. was spectacular at shortstop, making several incredible plays to help out the pitchers.

The Meteors clinched the #1 seed and advanced directly to the semi-finals.  We faced off against our good friends the Tampa Thunder.  The Thunder were determined to finally take us out, scoring 4 runs in the first.  The Thunder took a 5-1 lead into the 4th inning when the Meteors bats finally came to life.  Robert L. led off with a single.  Dylan then had a bunt single and Cody got hit by a pitch.  Scott then had an RBI groundout and Wes then smoked a 3-run HR to centerfield to tie the game.  Cory then drove in Wes and the Meteors had the lead.  Zak came on to close out the game in the 4th, and he mowed down the Thunder hitters in order.  However, in the bottom of the 6th, two very costly errors led to the tying run, and we were forced to go extra innings.  This would prove to be VERY costly later.  Although we got the win in extra innings when Brandon drove in Cory, we had to burn up Zak who was slated to pitch the championship.

In the Championship we faced the Bullets Gold.  The Meteors started hot jumping out to a 4-0 lead after 3 innings led by Wes, Donovan and Victor.  Donovan was able to shut out the Gold until he tired in the 4th, then everything fell apart.  The next three pitchers we tried got lit up and the game got out of hand quickly as we lost 12-4.  It was a valiant effort for us, as we were shorthanded going in and just ran out of energy and pitching.  Hopefully, we will learn from this and start turning some of our 2nds and 3rds into 1st place finishes.

Overall, it was another great and fun weekend.  We welcomed another great player into our program in Robert Lopez.  The biggest tournaments still lie ahead, and we are playing well enough to contend in all of them.

In the St. Pete Times.  "I've been coaching a very long time and he's the best freshman I've ever had." - Coach Frank Vitale.

Click on headline to go to Sports section.  Do a search on Brett's name and you will find the article.  That is why we do what we do.

To read up on other former Meteors in high school, check out the other website at:

www.eteamz.com/manasotameteors 

We welcomed 41 teams to Lakewood Ranch park and experimented with a new format that meant a lot of games for a lot of teams in what turned out to be an endurance contest in many of the Sunday brackets.

The Meteors parents, coaches and friends worked extremely hard to be good hosts and would like to thank all of the teams that participated and made this weekend a lot of fun.  Our tournament has grown from 29 teams to 36 teams to now 41 teams and we continue to build it for the future.

As for our games, this weekend featured some of the greatest moments in Meteors history, with three consecutive come-from-behind victories against excellent teams.  This is the kind of tournament that brings out the best in great teams - a stong field with excellent teams from top to bottom.  Daniel was a monster the entire tournament, hitting a two-run game-winning bomb against the St. Pete Hurricanes and a walk-off grand slam in the bottom of the 6th to knock out the Thunder.  He followed that up with ANOTHER two-run jack to lead us to a thrilling 10-9 over the Bullets Gold! 

Our boys showed a lot of heart and character this weekend and never got down no matter what happened.  Even when they werent playing, the boys rooted for their friends on other teams and had a great time.  We were very pleased with our 3rd Place finish under difficult circumstances and we are so happy to have Victor playing full time for us now.  We continue to improve with each passing month and look forward to even tougher tournaments to come!

The Meteors got off to a great start, but then fizzled in the Triple Crown President's Day tournament in Plantation.  The Florida Fire, Bullets Gold, and Meteors travelled to South Florida to take on the top 17 teams down there in a brutally-tough 20-team event.

In our opening pool game on Friday night, we faced Broward County powerhouse Coral Springs Panthers, who had won the Howl at the Moon tournament as well as several others.  We came from behind twice behind big RBI hits from Nick and Victor and excellent pitching from six combined pitchers, and pulled out a great win for our program 6-3.

In the second pool game on Saturday against the Boca Stars, the Meteors looked very flat and lifeless, sleepwalking through a 12-7 win.  We then had to wait around for several hours only to find out that our first round opponent was the Miami Brawlers, who was the defending champion and reining Triple Crown National Champion.  Well, we went to South Florida to face great competition, and that is certainly what we got this weekend!

On Saturday night against the Brawlers, the Meteors defense was uncharacteristically porous, committing multiple errors each inning and not giving our pitchers a chance.  It was a bad game from beginning to end.  Sometimes baseball teams, even the best ones, have games like this one.  We will learn from it and move forward.  I know all of us look forward to someday getting a rematch with the Brawlers.

It was another weekend of great fun.  The boys had a game of "Manhunt" with the Bullets Gold and Florida Fire at the hotel on Saturday night.  Most of us met for a fun dinner on Friday, and we look forward to a great time hosting our tournament in two weeks!

Here is the latest update on Meteors players who made VARSITY (not JV) as freshman:

BRYAN VOELKL

TAYLOR LESCH

CASEY TURGEON

CHRIS FREY

BRADY ANDERSON

HUDSON BOYD

DANNY SAEZ

BRETT MAGGARD

WENDELL SOTO

This list would be longer, but some of our best players (five) are on the JV at Sarasota High where freshman hardly ever make varsity.

The Meteors played incredible baseball all weekend, coming out on top of the 27-team field at the AAU President's Day Tournament. The Meteors defeated the Bullets Black and Tampa Tarpons in pool games, then shutout the Clermont Outlaws and the Florida Fire in the quarters and semis. In the Championship Game, the Meteors squared off against the always-tough Central Florida Diamondbacks and took home the gold with a 3-2 win.

Just like in golf, travel baseball has it "majors." In Florida, there are 6 major tournament championships in the Spring - the AAU President's Day, Triple Crown Plantation, the Slug a Rama, the USSSA Super NIT and the AAU and USSSA State Championships. Only a handful of teams at each age group can say that they have won one of these. They are the crown jewels of travel baseball in Florida. The reason why they are so difficult to win are that they always have 16-30 teams, and at least 7-8 of the Top 10 teams in the State are there. There are no meaningless "seeding games" either - you have to run the gauntlet where each team can take you out of the tournament with a single loss.

When we got our draw for the President's Day, it sure did not look like this was going to be our first major. Our pool was tough, and the pools we were matched up with in the quarters and semis had great teams in them. Also, we were missing three of our top players. We focused on doing our best to keep our Final Four streak alive, then get home in time to watch the Superbowl. We accomplished the first, but fortunately not the second!

Friday night we opened with a veteran Bullets Black squad that was determined to take us out early with their top pitchers on the mound. Zak was not sharp on the mound and the Meteors trailed 3-1 going into the 4th inning. But then the Bullets starter tired when a walk and two hit batters loaded the bases. Danny then singled in a run and Cody drew a walk to tie the game. Andrew then executed a great squeeze bunt to give us the lead, and it was no looking back from that point. Meanwhile, Wes relieved Zak and shut down the Bullets until Danny and Donovan combined to close the game out for an 8-3 win.

In Game 2 we faced a 1-0 Tampa Tarpons team in a game that would decide the pool. Donovan started on the mound and continued to show improvement as a pitcher, giving up three runs in his three innings of work. With the Meteors clinging to a 4-3 lead in the 5th, the bats finally came to life when Cody, Wes and Donovan singled and Brandon drove in a pair with a shot to left. Dylan later followed with a two-RBI single to close out the scoring and the game as the Meteors clinched the pool with a 10-3 win.

The quarterfinal game was a cause of great concern. The Clermont Outlaws were a well-coached team that had not played much AAU but had done very well in USSSA. They had scored 23 runs in their two pool games, including 12 against the Yarddogs. They also had a well-rested ace ready to go the distance. The Outlaws ace threw gas, but Donovan set the tone early with a single to right. Cory, who was red-hot all weekend, singled in Donovan to give us the early lead. Scott then led off the 2nd with a single, Wes doubled and Donovan (who was also hot all weekend) drove both of them in with a sharp single to right to give us a four run lead. That was all the Meteors would need, because Wes was dominant, blanking the Outlaws on 77 pitches, allowing just two hits. Dylan pitched a scoreless 6th for seal a 7-0 win and our 9th straight Final Four.

The Meteors then faced the Florida Fire. The Fire are unquestionably the #1 team in Florida. They are talented, experienced and well-coached. We have played them three times, and lost all three - the last two by the mercy rule. It turned out to be an awesome game featuring incredible pitching and defense. Zak was unbelievable on the mound, turning in a 70 pitch, complete-game shutout, allowing 4 hits and 0 walks. The defense helped him throughout, including the play of the tournament by Brandon to throw out the tying run at 2nd in the bottom of the 6th. The only run of the game was Dylan reaching base on a passed ball strikeout, Scott singled him to second and he scored on a error. The Meteors achieved a great victory for our program with a 1-0 win.

We got no break in the finals as we faced an outstanding Cenral Florida Diamondbacks team. We had lost to the DBacks in a USSSA tournament a couple of months ago, and they might be the best defensive team we have seen. This turned out to be another great, tight game, as both teams used multiple pitchers to try and stitch the game together and keep it close. Wes, Danny, Donovan and Dylan combined to hold the D'Backs to two runs. Robert singled in the winning run in the 4th to score Danny and the Meteors won their first major 3-2.

Our dynamic duo of Wes and Zak give us the ability to shut down even the best hitting teams in the State. Wes pitched 9 scoreless innings in the tournament. Zak gave up just 2 runs in his 8 innings of work. Both had very low pitch counts. Meanwhile the "Killer Ds" - Donovan, Danny and Dylan - continue to impress on the mound, giving us the pitching depth we lacked last season. We now move on to Plantation to take on the top teams in South Florida!

The Meteors outscored their opponents by a combined 61-14 and went 5-1 en route to a second place finish in the first tournament of the season.

The Meteors offense exploded into the tournament with 8 runs in the top of the 1st inning off the Top Prospects.  Brandon and Cory led the offense with multi-hit and multi-RBI performances.  Wes started on the mound and picked up the win with two innings of shutout ball.  The game was ended after three innings with a 17-1 win.

In the second pool game, the Meteors faced the Hitting Academy Titans.  This game was considerably tougher as the Titans were a scrappy and solid team new to AAU from Dunedin.  The Titans held the lead for most of the game, and the Meteors trailed 4-1 heading into the 4th inning.  Victor led off with a single, Derek walked and Nick reached on an error.  Zak then came up and hit a monster triple to center to tie the game.  The Meteors offense then exploded in the last inning when Scott led off with a huge double in the gap, Wes reached on an error and Andrew drove in the winning run.  The hits kept coming and the Meteors finished in style with an 11-4 win.  Victor picked up the win on the mound with two solid innings of relief.

The Meteors headed into bracket play seeded #3 overall out of 14 and faced the Gulf Coast Mustangs.  The Meteors played focused ball thoughout the game.  Wes led off with a single and Donovan ripped a triple to drive him in.  Cory then followed that up with a 270' double to center to give the Meteors a 3-0 lead.  Donovan started on the mound and turned in his best outing as a Meteor, holding the Mustangs to one run in his three innings of work.  The Meteors opened things up in the third when Victor singled, Derek walked.  Cory hit a sac fly to score Victor and Zak and Nick ripped big doubles to pad the lead for a 10-2 win.

We then faced the Bullets Gold in the quarterfinals, and it was one of those games where everything went right for the Meteors and everything went wrong for the Bullets.  Wes and Donovan opened the game with sharp singled off Heinrich, who we had not beaten in five tries.  Victor then hit a monstrous triple to center to drive in two and the Meteors believed they could make it happen.  Zak inspired further confidence, shutting out the Bullets in the first two innings with three strikeouts.  Meanwhile, the Meteors bats continued to pour it on in the second when Zak, Cory and Nick hit three straight singles, Wes and Victor reached on errors and Brandon and Derek hit bombs to drive in runs.  But the story of the game was Zak, who threw a complete-game one-hitter for a 10-2 win.

In the quarters, Wes looked to match Zak on the mound and did just that, throwing a complete-game four-hitter.  Donovan (3-3), Scott (2-2) and Daniel (2-3) led the offense to another 10-2 win.

In the Championship Game, the Meteors faced the Longhorns, who also came into the game 5-0.  It was a great game played by both teams.  The Meteors loaded the bases in the first inning with nobody out but could not score as we went down looking at strike three twice.  The Meteors broke through in the second when Zak doubled and was driven in on a sac bunt by Robert.  Daniel started on the mound and was awesome, allowing just 1 earned run in his four innings of work.  However, a costly error in the 2nd led to two runs and the Longhorns entered the final inning with a 3-2 lead.  Three walks led to the bases being loaded up for the Meteors with two outs, but the Longhorns pitcher make some great pitches to pick up a strikeout and preserve the win. 

This was a game where the Meteors crushed the ball all game, but the Longhorns made every single play.  The Longhorns countered that with very timely clutch hitting, and that was the difference in the game.  It was a great championship game and was an example of youth baseball played at the highest level by two outstanding groups of players.

The pitching of Zak, Wes, Donovan and Daniel gives us a lot of confidence going into this spring season.  Our defense is dramatically improved because of Nick's sorcery with the leather and Robert's consistently outstanding play in the middle infield.  We are looking forward to another great performance in the AAU President's Day!

Over 90% of the players from the 14U Meteors of team of last year made their high school teams.  Only one player did not make it, and he was the final player cut from the powerhouse Sarasota High team.

Sean Hurley, Joey Miller, Brandon Haarer and Kevin Schubert all made the team at Sarasota High.  Bryan Voelkl and Danny Beeman made the Manatee High team.  Mike Stokes made Cardinal Mooney.  Pedro Santana at Braden River.  Taylor Lesch and Casey Turgeon made Dunedin.  Brett Maggard made Hernando.  The remaining two players are still in 8th grade.  Four of these Meteors skipped over JV and made the Varsity teams at their schools. 

This is why we do what we do!!!

The Meteors played great baseball and had a fantastic time together at the USSSA Winter Classic in Leesburg.  The Meteors took 3rd Place out of 25 teams at the tournament to extend their streak of consecutive tournament Final Fours to 7.

Our first pool game was against the Naples Mavericks.  We walked 4 batters, gave up 2 hits and made an error to fall behind 6-0 in the first.  However, the Meteors struck right back in the bottom of the inning behind singles by Donovan, Brandon, Zak, Nick and Cody and the Meteors took an 8-6 lead.  The Mavs struck back in the 3rd and 4th for four runs and the Meteors trailed 10-8 with time expired heading into our final at bat in the 5th.  Victor led off with a walk and Zak bombed a huge triple over the centerfielder's head.  Nick followed with a clutch single to right to tie the game, but a baserunning error ended the game in a 10-10 tie.

We headed into our second pool game needing a win to advance to the Final 10 and a berth in the Majors division.  We faced a tough Team Combat team from the East Coast.  The Meteors started hot when Donovan singled, Brandon smashed a long double and Vic drove in Brandon for a 2-0 lead.  Zak made his Meteors debut on the mound and was dominating, giving up 1 hit and striking out 3 in two shutout innings.  The Meteors broke the game open in the 3rd when Wes singled, Donovan walked and Brandon drove them in with another shot to the fence.  Victor then singled in Brandon for a 7-0 lead.  We tacked on another run in the 6th when Andrew singled and scored on an RBI groundout by Donovan.  Meanwhile, Wes and Donovan combined to shut out the Combat in the final four innings for a 8-0 win.

The Meteors earned the #5 seed in the majors and squared off against the undefeated #4 seed Viera Suntree Stingrays.  The Stingrays won the 9/10 State Championship in Little League All-Stars and defeated the Bullets Gold the week before in winning the AAU Member Appreciation tournament.  The Meteors jumped on the Stingrays ace in the first when Wes and Donovan singled and Victor followed with a monstrous home run to stake us to a 3-0 lead.  Wes turned in another dominating performance on the mound, mesmerizing a tough Stingray lineup, allowing 0 earned runs and 2 hits in a 74-pitch, complete-game 6-1 win.

The Meteors then faced the Central Florida Diamondbacks, who have one of the best infields in the State and have an ace pitcher who may be the best in the State.  The D'backs ace had shut out the Bullets Gold at the AAU State Tournament, and we knew we had our hands full.  When we got a good look at him we saw that he had a devastating changeup and his fastball was really more like a hard slider.  The Meteors hitters hit some balls hard, but each rally was snuffed out by spectacular defense by the D'backs infield.  The great part about this game was that our new pitcher, Zak Wilson, matched him pitch for pitch in a fantastic complete-game outing, striking out 7 batters and giving up just 1 earned run and 2 hits against a tough lineup.  However, a few costly errors and we came up short 4-0.

It was another great week of baseball for the Meteors.  We faced some outstanding pitching and good competition all week.  These are the events that will make us stronger in the future.  We also added another great player to the team.  I don't think any of us have ever felt better about the team than we do after this weekend.  The Spring 2008 season should be incredible!

Today we received an invitation to the Battle in the South - the most difficult tournament of the year for the entire country.  Only 5 teams from Florida are awarded berths, and we had to lobby very hard over the past three months to get in.  The selection committee spends a lot of time evaluating teams to determine that they are good enough to compete.  Our body of work this season enabled us to secure the 5th and final Florida berth. 

The parents and players will be blown away by this event.  This is the kind of tournament that really prepares you to play this game at the highest level.  You will truly face the best of the best - the best players from the best teams from California, Texas, Georgia, the midwest, the northeast and every part of the country.  We are going to have to work very hard between now and then to prepare for this tournament.

The Battle in the South will be in Knoxville, Tennessee, April 25-27, 2008.  It will be our only trip out of state next year.  The Spring schedule is coming together and should be finished in a few weeks.  Most of the events will be in the usual places like Clearwater, Tampa, Bradenton, and Winterhaven.  We will also play a couple of events in Kissimmee and we will also play one tournament in Plantation.  The schedule will be a lot of fun and will be back-loaded (lighter during the spring, heavier during the summer) so that players can play little league if they choose.  It should be a great year!

The winners of the Fall Sunshine League (Florida AAU) were announced today, and we were awarded second place.  The Bullets Gold finished 1st and the North Florida Hurricanes finished 3rd.

The league title is the most prestigious award in AAU.  It is based upon the results of THE ENTIRE SEASON - all tournaments, doubleheaders, and the State Championship.  Chet, Gigi and Marcus Lemon look at the overall seasons each of the top teams had to determine who were the most consistently outstanding. 

We had a 2nd place finish in the Renegade Rumble and a 4th in the September Shootout.  We took 4th at the Slug a Rama and the State Tournament.  Only the Bullets Gold could claim a better tournament record over the course of the entire AAU season.

What this means is that our entire team will be attending the AAU Awards banquet at the Rosen Shingle Creek in January.  It will be the Saturday evening after the coaches' meeting.  All players will wear shirt and tie.  We will share a great dinner with the other awards winners, and will join the older Meteors team (who will accept the 1st place Spring 2007 awards).  Each player will receive a large trophy with his name on it and the team will receive a giant trophy.  This is a tremendous honor for our program and a remarkable achievement for our very first season!

The Meteors continue to follow our blueprint for long-term success.  We look to  identify the events around the State each week where the best competition will be.  This weekend that was the Triple Crown Disney tournament, with top teams from every part of the State present. 

The Meteors opened up with south Florida powerhouse Miami Enforcers.  It was a great game with solid pitching, great defensive plays and timely hits on both sides.  The Meteors struck first when Nick walked, stole third and scored on a passed ball.  Donovan started on the mound and pitched extremely well, but the powerful Enforcer lineup scored three runs in his two innings.  The Meteors struck back in the 2nd when Donovan singled and scored on a passed ball.  The game continued back and forth - the Meteors got big hits from Victor, Dylan and Brandon late, but left 5 runners in scoring position in the last two innings to come up short 6-4.

The tie breaker system in Triple Crown is run-differential, so the Meteors were in good shape with a tight loss heading into their final two pool games.  We then squared up against a solid Orlando Gators club, and the game was close throughout the early innings.  The player of the game was Victor, who pitched three-plus shutout innings and had three hits.  Wes, Cory and Scott also had multi-hit games to lead the offense to a 9-1 led heading into the bottom of the 6th.  However, the Gators rallied to score two runs and load the bases in the final inning.  Colton then came on in relief and struck out both batters he faced to end the threat and give the Meteors a 9-3 win.

The Meteors headed into the game against the South Beach Tigers needing a lopsided win and help in another game to get a bye on Sunday.  The offense made that happen early and often as the Meteors pounded 15 hits and 14 runs in just 4 innings.  Wes, Brandon, and Scott and multiple hits.  Colton, who we are looking to for quality innings on the mound in the future, continued to impress, picking up the win by allowing only two runs in three excellent innings of work.  Scott came on to strike out the side in the 4th for a 14-2 win.

The Meteors earned the #2 seed with a solid run-differential and got a first round bye heading into bracket play on Sunday.  We ended up facing a very tough Tallahassee Heat team in the semi-finals.  The Heat had won their pool along with 3 games in the tournament.  The Heat also surprised the Meteors early in the game with a small-ball style of baseball that we had not yet seen this season, and the Meteors soon trailed 4-1.  So many teams fold up and do not respond when things are going poorly, but Wes and Victor stepped into the breach and rallied the troops.

Wes got nasty on the mound, retiring six straight Heat batters on just 12 pitches.  The Meteors also made some defensive adjustments to negate the Heat offense.  Wes then stepped up and bombed a triple to right-center to rattle the Heat ace.  Victor and Brandon then smoked line drives and the Meteors came storming back.  It was like a fireworks show the rest of the way as Victor hit a 290' bomb that one-hopped the fence in center.  Wes crushed another triple, Donovan air-mailed the centerfielder and the hits kept coming on the shell-shocked Heat pitching staff.  Wes finished things off with a complete game, 67-pitch, 15-5 win.

The Meteors then got a rematch with the Miami Enforcers, who had continued to roll through the tournament.  It was another awesome battle, as the Meteors jumped out to an early lead behind great pitching by Donovan, but could not hold the lead when he tired.  The Miami crowd was loud with chants, songs, stomping and noisemakers, and the Meteors faithful answered them right back in what became an electric atmosphere at Disney for the Championship.  Some timely hits, some tough calls, and breaks went against us, and the Meteors came up short.

This tournament was just awesome for our team.  We played at the best facility in Florida and played four new teams from around the state in our five games.  Some of the players went to Universal together, some Downtown Disney, and others the FSU/UF game.  The ten players able to make the trip played a ton of innings and got a lot of at bats.  We saw the continued development of Donovan and Colton as pitchers, and saw Scott have a breakout tournament at the plate.  Wes continued to step up as the leader of our team.  Brandon Varitek continued his leadership-by-example lunchpail style of play.  Nick continued to solidify the defense with his hard-nosed style.  Victor showed that he is just a flat-out animal at the plate.  Dylan and Andrew continue to find ways to get on base and produce runs in a variety of different ways.  Our most consistent player Cory continues his rock-solid production driving in runs in the middle of the order and playing stellar defense at first base.

The Meteors now head into the IBC Fall State Tournament with a full roster for the very first time all season.  I know all of us are very excited to see what this great team is going to accomplish this coming weekend.  It should be a great show to watch!

The best example of why baseball is the best sport for a young man to play is Dustin Pedroia.  So many young athletes focus on football and basketball - then grow up to be 5'9" tall and 170 lbs. and realize that no matter how much talent they have, their physical stature ends their playing days prematurely.  Well, 5'8", 170 lb., Red Sox second baseman Dustin Pedroia just won the AL Rookie of the Year Award in a landslide.  Here is what he said when accepting the award:

"Everyone doubted me at every level I've been to, saying I'm too small, I'm not fast enough, my arm's not strong enough.  There's a lot of people that have stuck by me and knew knew deep down there's something about me that makes me a winning baseball player."

Our benchmark this season has to consistently make the Final Four of the upper division of each tournament.  We made it 5 out 7 with a 3rd place finish out of 19 teams in the USSSA State Tournament.

The Meteors had some bad luck and hit into three doubleplays in their semifinal game against the St. Pete Hurricanes to come up short.  New additions Nick and Victor were outstanding all weekend.   Nick pitched extremely well and made stellar plays at shortstop in every game.  Victor also played solid defense, pitched well, and hit a big walkoff 2-run homer in the quarterfinals.  Brandon pitched a complete game shutout in the quarters and hit probably the longest home run of the season.

The Meteors once again played two games against Top-5 caliber teams in a tournament.  Our brutally tough strength of schedule will serve us very well in the near future as we head into the AAU State Championship as the #3 overall seed.

Anyone who has been around youth travel baseball for any length of time on a national level will tell you that of all of the tournaments that are out there, the following three things are true:

1.  The most fun tournament is Cooperstown.

2.  The toughest tournament is the Elite Battle in the South.

3.  The most prestigious tournaments are AAU Nationals and the Elite 24 World Series.

COOPERSTOWN - (WE'RE IN !)It is extremely difficult to secure a berth in each of these tournaments.  For Cooperstown, a $1,000.00 must be in two years in advance.  We have taken the Moccasins spot there, and have put our own money in to cover it.  So the very exciting news is that WE HAVE A SPOT IN COOPERSTOWN FOR OUR 12U YEAR!  Also, we have requested dates that do not conflict with All-Stars.

AAU NATIONALS - (WE'RE IN!)  Our 4th Place Ice finish at the Slug a Rama has already qualified us for the Division I AAU Nationals this summer at Disney.  We will be playing there.  The team will rent two 5-bedroom houses, side by side, both with pools, to house the players, coaches and parent chaperones during that week!

ELITE BATTLE IN THE SOUTH - (WE'RE IN!) - this in an invitation-only tournament to the Top 50 teams in the Country in each age group that takes place at the end of May in Knoxville, TN.  This is truly the best of the best of the best.  The selection committee takes a great team of time choosing the teams and we made it in as Florida's 5th and final team! 

USSSA ELITE 24 WORLD SERIES - only 1 team from Florida with make it into this event - the Champion of the Florida Super NIT in April.  We will be going all out to make the berth ours!  This tournament is at Disney the first week of August.

Meteors teams in the past have played in each of the four major events.  We are continually looking to expose our kids to the very best competition is the top tournaments in the country.  The next year is going to be very exciting for our team!

The Meteors played awesome baseball all weekend, taking 2nd Place in the Ice Division at the Renegade Rumble in Lakeland.

The tournament had 10 teams in the 11U division, with 5 of the Top 10 teams in attendance.  The Meteors came out smoking on Friday night with a 16-0 drubbing of the overmatched Lakeland Thunder.

On Saturday, the Meteors defeated the always-tough Tampa Thunder 7-2 to advance to the Ice Division, and also capture the #1 seed and a 1st round bye on Sunday.

In the Ice bracket play, the Meteors faced the Thunder again - who had won their play-in game against the Renegades.  The Meteors fell behind early and it was a back and forth game throughout.  The Meteors rode the hot pitching of Wes and a big triple by Donovan to a thrilling 7-6 win.

In the Championship Game, the Meteors squared off against the perennial power Bullets Gold team.  The Bullets jumped out to an early 4-0 lead, but the Meteors battled back to tie the game.  The Bullets then built a 14-4 lead, but the Meteors showed heart and character by battling all the way back again over the final three innings, with Dylan shutting down the Bullets over the final three innings.  Unfortunately, the lead was just too big and the Meteors comeback fell short 14-10.

The Meteors continue to improve week after week by playing tough tournament competition.  We all are looking forward to great things in the big tournaments in November!

A central feature of our program is the number of tournament games we play on a regular basis against older players.  We decided to enter the 16U USSSA Winter States and ended up playing 3 great games.

In Game 1 we faced the Orlando Reds, a majors division 16U team.  Although it was a sloppy game on both sides, we battled extremely hard every inning, rallying from 8-2 and 11-6 deficits to to take a 12-11 lead into the last inning.  We couldn't hold it though as 2 walks and 2 hit batters led to a 12-12 tie.  Tyler reached base all 4 times he came to the plate with 3 runs scored, 2 doubles, a single, a triple, a steal and 3 RBIs.  Brandt also had a great game at the plate, going 2-2 with a walk and scoring 2 runs. 

In Game 2 we faced the Pasco Predators and played a solid game from start to finish.  Christian got us started driving in Cody and Donovan to give us an early 2-0 lead.  We then tacked on 4 more runs in the 4th when Donovan drove in a couple of runs on a hit.  We extended the lead in the 6th when Brandt doubled and Alex drove him in with a single, followed by a RBI hit from Matt.  Cody was brilliant on the mound, allowing no earned runs in a 10-4 win.  Jonathan made his Meteors pitching debut, striking out the final batter of the game.