Jan. 11, 2009 — With a shot at their dream of playing Major League Baseball in sight, about 20 of the territory's elite baseball players took the field on St. Thomas Friday, hoping to impress one of the four Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim scouts who made the trip to the Virgin Islands.
This is the fifth year the Angels, in conjunction with the Department of Housing, Parks and Recreation, have sponsored a series of workshops on St. Thomas and St. Croix for both older and younger players. On Friday and Sunday, the scouts — regulars Arnold Braithwaite, Ron Marigny and Kevin Ham, along with Leo Perez, who made his first trip this year — held professional tryout camps for players 14 and older. They also turned out at Emile Griffith Stadium on St. Thomas and D.C. Canegata Ballpark on St. Croix Saturday for youth camps, where students 9 to 13 years old learned the fundamentals of the game.
"This is the fifth year that the Angels have been coming to the territory, and even though everything is basically the same as we've been doing regularly, I do see that a lot the older athletes are coming out and partaking in the event more so than they were previously," said Stanley Smith, assistant commissioner of Housing, Parks and Recreation. "I'm also really excited because this weekend the 13-and-under kids come out and they really had a blast, and the instructional efforts that the guys give them really are tremendous."
The increase in player turnout has given the scouts more of a talent pool to chose from, Smith said.
"If we're looking at the talent level, I think the pool is getting much larger," he said. "I think baseball has grown immensely, and in the last year or two I think we have had five news guys that have gotten into the college level and that's something that hasn't been done quite some time in the Virgin Islands, at least on St. Thomas. So I think we're getting much better and I think we have a lot of class athletes now that within the next two years or so we think we should be knocking on some doors really soon. I'm really impressed with the things these guys are doing — you can see that the players' skill level has risen immensely."
Housing, Parks and Recreation will work on getting the Angels back down this summer, since the scouts have been "looking at the talent, and charting the progress of the players" they have monitored for the past five years, Smith said.
But the workshops are not all about getting the kids to go pro, said Brathwaite and Marigny.
"We do this in two stages — first we have a professional tryout camp, and that's basically for these kids to showcase their skills," Marigny said. "We're looking for guys who have Major League
Baseball ability and also offer the kids, if they're not Major League talented, to give their information to some colleges. That way they'll be able to further themselves — continue to play baseball and get a college education."
Teaching the fundamentals of the game to younger, up and coming players is also important, he said.
"The second phase is that we also, and which is very important to us, is to address the younger kids, and we just have a fundamental camp to teach them the fundamentals of throwing or hitting the baseball and that way we catch them at a younger age and develop the 'base' in the game of baseball, so that as they mature, the fundamentals will be strong in their game," Marigny said.
The continuous program between the Angels and Housing, Parks and Recreation has helped the organization track players they might be interested in, said Brathwaite, a V.I. native.
"Over the last several years, obviously we've built a follow list based on the players that were here and the pool here and keeping track of those players," he said. "There are several players of interest whoare no longer here in the territory, which is fine, they're all doing their thing, they're all doing better, which is also good. But sometime anticipating those guys getting better is what entices us to come back. And not to only come back for that purpose, but knowing that some of those players may have the ability to come out and play for the Angels is really encouraging."
Scouts are always looking for prospects, Braithwaite said.
"We know we're not going to find a magnitude of prospects when we're talking about the territory, but you know there might be one or two guys of interest," he said. "And obviously with the guys that we have here starting from 14, its gives us the gauge to go and track them so then when they get to that age where they're a senior in high school, then we say we okay, well this guy is ready to go out and play. It's really a good feeling to know that I could come home and there would be kids out here playing, and I'm happy to do what I can do to really revive baseball in the territory."
One such prospect is Causton Merchant Jr., a college sophomore who was a product of the Future Stars Baseball program. (See "Four Future Stars Set Sights On Big League Careers.")
"I'm out here to showcase for the Angels and to really show off my skills," Merchant said. "I think my chances are pretty good — the scouts were talking about the five tools they look for, and I think I have four out of the five. I really want to show them my hitting, my fielding ability and throwing ability, and I really want to make it to the next level. And I know the scouts are also going to be out here doing things for the young children, and I just want to say that they should really come out and show what they've got, so the scouts know that we've got talent in the Virgin Islands."
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