GOODYEAR, Ariz. – Second verse, same as the first.
For the second straight year, Scottsdale-based AZ T-Rex Easton proved difficult to keep up with Monday afternoon, claiming a 4-1 victory over Las Vegas-based LVR in the championship game at the PG WWBA 18u West Memorial Day Classic. The game was played under perfect weather conditions on the Reds’ side of the Goodyear Ball Park MLB spring training complex.
GLENDALE, Ariz. – It’s the same story at just about every high-profile Perfect Game WWBA tournament, but it’s a tale where the telling never gets tired.
Sitting in one dugout is the seasoned pro, the program that has hauled off PG championship trophies, hung PG championship banners and been fitted for PG championship rings. In the other sits the unknown up-and-comer, the upstart, if you will, a program that no one knows a whole heck of a lot about because, truth be told, they’ve never been down this path before.
GLENDALE, Ariz. – When the day dawned in the West Valley Sunday morning, the prominent AZ T-Rex Baseball Club program found itself in a very good place.
After two days of play at the 14u, 16u and 18u Perfect Game WWBA West Memorial Day Classics, program founder/head coach Rex Gonzalez was able to find satisfaction in the fact that the three T-Rex Easton teams – AZ T-Rex Easton 18u, AZ T-Rex Easton 16u and AZ T-Rex Easton 14u – were unbeaten in pool-play and in excellent position to secure their respective bracket-play berths.
Before any baseball player makes it to the big leagues, he starts as a kid with a dream. The T-Rex Baseball Club in Phoenix prides itself on helping kids take their game to the next level.
Rex Gonzalez runs T-Rex Baseball. He has 12 teams, ranging in age from 9 years old to 18.
Arizona State’s first-year pitching coach Mike Cather recently met freshman pitcher Boyd Vander Kooi.
“Do you trust me?” Cather said.
A hesitant Vander Kooi responded: “Yes.”
What seemed like a rhetorical question was anything but. Cather was intent on making a point.
“Trust is something that has to be built, and that’s what I tell him.” Cather said. “I said, ‘I don’t trust you and you don’t trust me. Let’s learn how to trust each other,’”
No-hitter lifts AZ T-Rex Baseball Club to 18u WMD championship
GOODYEAR, Ariz. – At a tournament when both of the top playoff seeds used elite-level pitching to advance to the championship game, it was only fitting that the game itself would produce the top performance of the four-day event.
Little known and lightly regarded 2018 right-hander Jacob Stark was unexpectedly handed the ball to make the start for No. 2-seed AZ T-Rex Baseball Club in the title tilt at the 18u Perfect Game WWBA West Memorial Day Classic at Goodyear Ballpark, and promptly threw a six-inning no-hitter at No. 1 All Star Baseball Academy 17u in a 9-0 rout stopped an inning early by the tournament run-rule.
