Milltown legion team reaches region tourney
BY DOUG McKENZIE
Staff Writer

The 8-7 loss to Father & Son in the Middlesex County finals must have left a bad taste in the mouths of the ballplayers on the Milltown Post 25 Senior American Legion Team.

Since the loss, the team has put on a display of power and perseverance that is frightening teams across the state, and beyond.

Following that loss to Father & Son, the Milltown team has gone 7-1 and has earned a spot in next week’s regional tournament by advancing to the state finals.

They were scheduled to take on unbeaten Riverdale yesterday, needing a pair of wins to earn the state title. But with a depleted pitching staff, weary after playing four games in three days, head coach Glenn Fredericks entered yesterday’s action with a realistic approach.

“It’s gravy time,” he said. “We’ve already advanced to the regions, which is what we were really concerned with. We’re not going to lay down by any means, but the state title would be icing on the cake at this point.”

And this cake could satisfy the heartiest of eaters.

Milltown, the 2005 District 3 Champions, opened the district tournament with an 11-1 win over Hightstown and its high-profile lefty Kyle Damm.

Milltown’s Matt Metsch out-dueled Damm to pitch a complete-game two-hitter over seven innings.

“Matt gave up a homer in the second inning, and that was the last hit he allowed in the entire game,” Milltown Post 25 head coach Glenn Frederick’s said. “He was great, and our offense wasn’t intimidated going up against a Division I prospect.”

Catcher Chris Affinito led the offense, going 3-for-4 with a pair of home runs and scoring four runs. Affinito’s performance was just the beginning of what would turn into a most impressive District tournament. In three games, Affinito went 8-for-11 with five home runs.

“Everything’s already been said about Chris Affinito,” Frederick’s said. “He went on a tear and just crushed balls in the District tournament.”

After topping Cresskill in a 14-11 slugfest in round two of the District tournament, Milltown earned a much-sought-after rematch with Edison’s Father & Son. Father & Son would learn why everyone says it is tough to beat a team three times in a season.

Father & Son went with starter Kevin Dalton, the hurler that beat Milltown in the two previous meetings. Things would not turn out so well for Dalton and Father & Son.

Milltown Post 25 slammed Dalton for five home runs en route to an 18-0 win and a trip to Breslin Field in Lyndhurst to compete for a state title.

“I kept telling my team that if we put up our best game, they couldn’t beat us,” Frederick’s said. “I just had to keep pounding it into their heads.”

Affinito went yard twice, while teammates Brian Dzuro (two), Metsch and Eric Hines added homers of their own as the team tallied six on the day.

“We made one little adjustment this time around against Dalton,” Frederick’s said. “In the other games, he beat us with hard stuff inside. He’s a good pitcher and he’s brave with his fastball, but I thought we could get good swings if we could get the ball off our thumbs.”

With this in mind, Frederick’s instructed his hitters to back up 6 inches from their usual positioning in the box. As a result, Milltown’s sluggers turned on the inside pitch and balls flew over the outfield fence.

As potent as the Milltown offense was, so was its starting pitcher, Nick Meyers. Meyers scattered three hits over seven innings to win the mercy-rule abbreviated final.

“He’s a winner,” Frederick’s said. “He’s done nothing but win for me and he always gets the job done, especially in big games.”

On Friday, Milltown kept the wins coming with an 8-4 win over Brooklawn Post 72 to start the state tournament. For the third straight year, Milltown defeated the storied program.

“Brooklawn is the epicenter of baseball in New Jersey,” Frederick’s said. “They are without a doubt the most tradition-rich American Legion program, with 23 state titles and two national championships.”

It was certainly a tough draw to meet Brooklawn in the opening game of the tournament, but Fredericks knew his team was up for it.

“I told my guys that it was a bad draw for Brooklawn,” Fredericks said. “Brooklawn has an edge over many teams because of their reputation, but because of our recent success against them, we felt we could get the job done.”

Milltown went up against pitcher Zach Braddock, a 23rd-round draft pick of the Philadelphia Phillies this year, and his lightning fastball.

“They jumped out to a 2-0 lead, but my guys didn’t even blink,” Fredericks said. “Braddock was rushing the ball up to the plate at over 90 mph, but we hung in there and pulled it off.”

Milltown advanced to play Wayne in the semifinals of the winners bracket on Sunday, and suffered their first hiccup of the tournament, losing 13-0.

“They got into our bullpen in the second inning, and I wound up throwing a bunch of young arms at them the rest of the way,” Fredericks said.

With the loss, Milltown entered Monday night’s action needing to win three games in a row to earn a spot in yesterday’s finals, and a guaranteed spot in the regional tournament.

“The key is to get to Wednesday,” the coach said. “It would have been nice to go into [Tuesday’s] doubleheader coming off a day off.”

Milltown faced Gibbsboro on Monday, and it was a battle from the start. With a weary Metsch giving Milltown eight solid innings on the hill, the offense kept pace, sending the game into extra innings

In the 11th, Justin Cappa led off with a single for Milltown, and advanced all the way to third on a botched pick-off attempt. Gibbsboro then intentionally walked the bases loaded to set up the double play, but on the first pitch to the next batter, a wild pitch plated the winning run.

A rematch was set up with Brooklawn in the first game of two for Milltown on Tuesday, and once again Fredericks’ team fell behind 2-0 before fighting back and posting a 4-2 win.

“They had us down 2-1 going into the sixth, but we tied that inning, and got the two go-ahead runs in the seventh,” Fredericks said.

In the seventh, Metsch led off with a walk, then immediately stole second and advanced to third when the throw went into center field. Andy Anderson then launched a sacrifice fly on the next pitch, plating the eventual winning run.

Milltown added an insurance run when James Corbett singled following back-to-back walks to Drew Silver and Scott Dykman.

With his pitching staff getting thinner with every inning, Fredericks was forced to use three hurlers in the win, getting three strong innings from Willie Beard, two from Nick Myers and a dominating four innings from Eric Hines to close it out.

The next obstacle for the Milltown team was the same Wayne team that had beaten them 13-0 just two days earlier.

This time around it was Milltown that put forth the dominant effort, blanking Wayne 8-0 to advance to the final.

“We came back, got a couple of pitchers ready to go, and shut them out using five guys,” Fredericks said. “Everybody said they were the best hitting team in the state. They had scored at least nine runs in every game they played, but we shut them out.

“At this point in the tournament, you have to go out-to-out, especially with a staff as tired as ours was,” the coach added.

But that tired staff was not about to give in.

Matt Merrigan started for Milltown, going three innings.

“He gutted it out for us,” the coach said. “He was in trouble every inning, but he found a way to wiggle out of it, and that was huge for the team.”

Next up, Willie Beard gave up just one hit over two innings, before Steve Curry pitched out of a jam in the sixth after surrendering a couple of two-out hits. He got Dan Albanese, Wayne’s hottest hitter, to ground out to second to end the threat.

“At this point we were really gassing with a third of the game to go,” Fredericks said. “I was looking up and down the bench and finally went to Justin Cappa. I asked him if he could go, and he said ‘If you put me out there, I’ll get you outs.’

“This is a guy who was the No. 3 pitcher on the East Brunswick High School team,

and hasn’t pitched all summer. And he goes out there and pitches the seventh and eighth, striking out four and walking just one guy. We needed someone to bridge the gap to Eric Hines, and he did it. That was a championship performance, just a great effort from a great kid.”

Hines pitched a perfect ninth to seal the win, and send Milltown to the finals.

Offensively, Milltown was led by Metsch (three walks and an RBI), Silver (2-for-3 with a double and a home run in the fifth that made it 4-0), Brian Dzuro (4-for-4 with two runs scored) and Dyckman (a two-run single in the ninth that made it 6-0).

And oh yeah, the Milltown team accomplished all this without its best hitter, Chris Affinito, who was hit in the hand with a pitch in the first game with Wayne, and suffered a serious bone bruise.

“Collectively we had a lot of work to do, missing his bat in the middle of the lineup,” Fredericks said. “The guys really wanted to get to the regions to give him another chance to play this summer, and they did it. It’s really been unbelievable to watch.

“We knew we could do it without him, but getting him back next week will make us deadly.”

Regardless of yesterday’s outcome, this is a Milltown Legion team that is on a special run, thriving in all three aspects of play.

They may be icing the cake at this point, but they’re obviously very hungry.

Shawn Layton contributed to

this story