By Rich Bevensee
Outside of his considerable natural talent, tall right-hander Austin Sweeney has two factors working in his favor when he starts for the Surge Legacy 13’s.
The first is chemistry. Sweeney throws to one of his longest tenured teammates in catcher Jack Figliolino, one of seven Surge players who have shared the same dugout for the last five years.
The second is that Sweeney is unafraid to go away from his strength, which is an upper-70s fastball. In fact, he rather enjoys tormenting batters with his offspeed offerings.
Both chemistry and pitch selection worked in Sweeney’s favor on Sunday afternoon. He authored a three-hitter, his teammates manufactured a game-clinching, four-run rally in the fifth, and top-seeded Surge rolled to a 9-1, five-inning victory over the third-seeded Anderson Monarchs in the 14U Spring Classic championship game at Diamond Nation in Flemington.
Sweeney, named the tournament’s Most Valuable Player, allowed one earned run on three hits over his five innings of work, walked one and struck out six. He also went 2-for-3 with an RBI in the final and batted a team-leading .571 in Surge’s four-game sweep to the title.
Sweeney was masterful through his latter four innings, in which only one batter reached second base. His only hiccup came in the top of the first when Anderson scored its only run. Aaron Johnson walked, stole second, moved to third on a groundout and scored on a Kai Kenefick single.
Sweeney said he was using a solid dose of his slider and curveball to complement his four-seam and two-seam fastballs.
“He was down in the zone, 77-78 miles an hour the whole game,” Surge coach Brian Patterson said. “Austin’s a little different. He has no problem going to the offspeed stuff. Everybody’s sitting there hunting fastballs and they start bat-waving, and we know we’re having a good day.”
Displaying his maturity, the 6-3 Sweeney said he doesn’t mind backing off his power pitch because he’d rather get the outs and get his defense off the field.
“Everyone sits fastball, especially when I’m this tall and I throw pretty hard,” he said. “No one is expecting a nice slider. Watching them wave at pitches, it’s pretty fun. To see all the reactions is pretty good.”
Austin Sweeney pitched a three-hitter in the final and batted .571 to earn 14U Spring Classic MVP.
Helping with pitch selection was Figliolino, one of seven players Surge coach Brian Patterson has been fortunate to keep on his roster for the last five years. The others are Sweeney, the coach’s son, Aiden Patterson, as well as Chris DeFino, Jagger Junio, Mason Dondero and Jonathan Kim.
“My catcher Jack Figs, I’ve been pitching to him for years,” Sweeney said. “I can throw anything. I know he’ll block it.”
Figliolino went 2-for-3 with a double in the final. Dondero had a two-run double, Junio drove in a run, and DeFino drove in two runs, the second when he was hit by a pitch with the bases loaded in the bottom of the fifth to secure the mercy-rule conclusion.
“We’re off to a good start,” Patterson said, “and a big reason for that is our core seven.”
The Surge caught and passed Anderson in the bottom of the second. Parker DeCarlo singled home a run and Dondero doubled home two more runs for a 3-1 Surge lead.
In the fourth, Surge moved ahead 5-1 on an infield throwing error and DeFino’s RBI single.
Surge manufactured its final rally in the fifth. Junio had a fielder’s choice RBI, Sweeney rapped an RBI single, Jack Lamendola had a pinch-hit RBI single. And DeFino was plunked with the bases loaded to end the game.