Baseball Strives for Sixth Consecutive League Title

VINCENT LIN

Co-Sports Editor

As the springtime feeling makes its way into our bloodstreams and refreshes our spirits, excitement surges through the Moor athletics fandom as its baseball team sets foot on the diamond again. Reaching a 5-peat championship last year, the celebrated varsity baseball team seeks to further its record with a sixth consecutive Almont League title for the 2010 season.

Varsity has a fair amount of new players, including a few sophomores, but returning players see them as strong additions to their batting. According to Assistant Coach Chris Cosbey, of the last five years, this has the potential to be their best offensive team.

“The new players are young, but really talented. They know the game, they’re really aggressive and they’re very mature mentally,” said returning center fielder and starting batter Jonathan Beltran.

After establishing an early lead with a 6-1 preseason, the Moors are now in the middle of their season. The Arcadia Elks tournament proved an early success for the team, pulling in four victories before losing to St. Francis in the last round. A few days later, the players had the first-time honor of playing against an out-of-state team, the Kanani Falcons of Hawaii, at Moor Field and winning 11-3 and 12-2. The Moors have since won their first six League games.

Although starting off well, the biggest potential impediment the boys could face this year is a flaw in mental attitude. With five consecutive championships so far, it would only be natural for the players to develop an overtly-smug bout of self-assuredness. Nothing can be guaranteed, so overconfidence is an issue that the team is being very keen on curbing, both at practice and games.

“Our players have come into every season with the expectation and understanding of what it takes to win a championship. We can’t cut corners in practice, we can’t cut corners in the classroom. Each player and coach is accountable,” said Cosbey.

Having won so many, there comes a lot of motivation from other teams to knock them off the top, especially from their rivals, the Montebello Oilers. Regardless, the team endeavors to make the CIF playoffs second round, where they were defeated last year, and possibly qualify for state finals.

In striving for such large-scale goals, the players express their attentiveness in maintaining mental focus for seven innings each game.

“We just [need to] try to stay focused for the whole season [so that] we can go as far as possible in season and win League again,” said Beltran.