• Congrats on your new commitment! What is it about Mesa Community College

that excites you the most?

Mesa has a winning culture; they have finished in the

top 10 the last 15 years and won the NJCAA National Championship in 2014.

They play in a highly competitive Arizona Community College Athletic

Conference (ACCAC). The biggest thing for me is they have a great player

development program and I was really impressed with how they compete every

day in practice on fundamentals that win games.

• I know that you are new to Top Tier, just joining the program in 2016. What affect

did that have on your recruitment?

The Top Tier program has been everything I thought it would be, we played against great competition, the tournaments provided exposure and everyone involved with the High School program at TT has been really helpful throughout the process. Griffin Phelps was advocating for me with Arizona Western after he saw me play at the Fall Notre Dame

tournament. Jorge Garza made connections for me with a few JUCOs and

Central Michigan coaching staff which turned out to be a real opportunity for me.

Matt Plante provided advice and guidance when schools reached out about

prospect camp invites.

• Talk a little bit about the recruiting process and how everything went down.

The recruiting process was an experience and really frustrating at times. I had a lot of

interest from D3 schools who thought I could be a two way player in their

programs but ultimately I want to go to a school in a larger campus setting. I had

some interest from three D1 programs, one of which brought up the idea of the

JUCO path for a year or two as a way to compete immediately for playing time,

get the reps needed to continue to get better s versus a likely red-shirt scenario

in their program. I visited three JUCO programs – a great one at Southeastern

Iowa CC, Paradise Valley CC and Mesa CC. All three really liked my tools and

what I had to offer. In the end, Mesa seemed like it would be the best fit for me.

• What were some of the priorities you looked at when deciding where to commit?

Priority one for me was the opportunity to compete immediately for playing time

in year one, next was an atmosphere with a winning tradition and team culture

with a proven player development program.

• What challenges do you see ahead of you before you get to campus?

Making the adjustment to college life living on my own in an apartment, cooking for

myself and balancing the class work with baseball.

• What are some of the goals you have set for yourself as a college baseball

player?

I want to win the job in CF coming out of fall season. I want to win a

NJCAA championship. And after Mesa I want to play at the highest level possible.

• Is there anybody you would like to give a shout-out or thanks to?

I’d like to thank my family for their support and dedication. All of my former

coaches, assistant coaches from in-house and travel ball, my high school varsity

coaching staff. John Cangelosi has been a big influence on my development and

skill as a player.

Finally, I’d like to say thank you to Coach Garza, Coach Plante and Coach

Phelps at Top Tier for advocating on my behalf during the recruiting process.

They were always willing to make a phone call to a school who had contacted me

and they really helped filter out what was real throughout the process.