18
Two MVPs (Down from football’s 7) and 16 all-conference players. It’s official: Being an All-conference player in the Merrimack Valley means nothing. It’s so watered down, the honor is simply an after-thought now.
18 players? Last time I looked we played with nine. Add in a DH, a second starting pitcher or two and you’re looking at 12, 13 tops.
That said, the coaches delivered some truly “interesting” choices, at least if my sources are correct.
Word out of the league meeting is that Tewksbury’s Scott Oberg is the league’s Player of the Year.
Watch the wording here, folks. MVP … Oberg is a hands down, no contest choice.
But POY? Hillie coach Chip Dunn makes a pretty compelling case for his senior Sean Hayden, who is 5-0 with an ERA around 1. All five wins are in the league.
Oberg’s lone loss ia 1-0 one-hitter. There’s no shame there.
And that said, he led his team to the title. Enough said.
That brings to the large.
Somewhere, in school, at home, somewhere, Central’s Ryan Kemp and Andrew Guyer, and Andover’s John Hennessy for that matter have to be wondering what it takes to win an MVP.
The large MVP (POY) went to Zac Roy of Lowell, a nice, nice, nice player.
Think of the choice here. Roy plays for the team that was the preseason consensus choice to win it all in the large, only to come up five games short.Roy has been a great player over his career but didn’t scratch the leaders in pitching or hitting.
Central’s Guyer was a rock behind the plate,
For the year, he’s hit .375 with 32 RBIs, a huge campaign for the large school champs.
But let’s take away all the non-league softies (Martha’s Vineyard, Amesbury, etc.).
Guyer was 17 for 43 in the league (.395) with 20 RBIs in 12 league games. He had at least one RBI in all 12. So which coaches weren’t impressed?
OK, you don’t like Guyer. All Kemp has done is hit an amazing .587. overall, .581 in the league, again for the champs.
Both were consistent and deadly, yet drew little attention, about the same as Andover’s Hennessy.
By the time the Warrior sophomore is done, he might re-write all the school records.
And there was nothing wrong with his sophomore spring.
He led Andover back to the top for the fifth straight year, despite a huge loss of talent to graduation.
The Warriors can still grab a share of the title if Central falls to Tewksbury Monday, and Hennessy is a huge reason why.
Hennessy is hitting a cool .509 overall, .521 in the league. He plays a superb shortstop, runs and hits for power.
Again, Andover, against the thoughts of many, went 10-3 in the league, sweeping Central.
For the record, here’s one man’s 12-man all-league team with one league MVP included:
Hennessy and P.J. Farnham, Andover
Oberg and Pat Devlin, Tewksbury
Ruben Sosa, Lawrence
Roy, Lowell
Hayden and Ronny Rosario, Haverhill
Justin Dietz, Dracut
Andrew Guyer, Ryan Kemp, Brendan Walsh, Central
As for an MVP, I’d decide that on Monday, if Guyer and Central can beat Tewksbury and lay their claim as something special.
