(Editor’s Note: This is the third installment of the ‘Where Are They Now’ series in which we highlight standout players from the past. Previously, we featured Mike Ambort and Kraig Binick. Thanks to Complete Sports Performance for sponsoring this year’s series.)
There was no local indoor training facility to do winter workouts. There wasn’t even a batting cage in the school. Legendary coach Doug Robins was resourceful, though.
He found an area in the boiler room to hang tarp and he used tennis balls that were donated to the team. That was all they needed. They swung until their hands bled. That is the grittiness that separated Levittown Division from just about every other program. During their peak years in the 1990s, they won 47 consecutive games, back-to-back Class B Long Island Championships and their players were the recipients of the Diamond Award in 1991, 1995, 1996 & 1997. One of those players, Shawn Fagan, is widely regarded as one of the best players to ever come through Nassau County and played five seasons in affiliated ball with the Toronto Blue Jays. Today, while he has no connection to the game of baseball, it would be impossible to ignore the impact he had on Division’s program when Levittown was at the epicenter of Long Island baseball.
The Early Days
Shawn was born in Syosset but raised in Levittown. He was the only child in his family.
Fagan was always athletic; he played soccer, baseball and football. He distinctly remembers the moment that started his baseball journey.
While walking with his mother, they came across a little league field and he told her that he would like to start playing. His mother obliged and when they got home she gave him a check to sign up for the local league.
Fast forward to when he was 12 and playing for the Levittown West Little League. Their team, which ultimately would become the future New York State Champions, won their district and sectional championship before losing in the single elimination NYS tournament.
Fagan recalls Doug Robins always being at the games and keeping an eye on the future of the Division program.
“He was very active with the little league,” said Fagan. “He’d watch us closely and even went to the state tournament. I remember the joke was that he told his wife they were going to Rome and she thought they were going to Italy, but the state tournament was in Rome, NY. Baseball was his life.”
Prior to heading to high school, Fagan was recruited by some of the Catholic League schools. His mother immediately put an end to those discussions.
“She told me, ‘you’re out of your mind, you’re playing for Doug Robins.”
Levittown Division
The decision proved to be a great one. Fagan’s class was exceptionally talented – they went undefeated in both 7th and 8th grade. Fagan was the most advanced of the bunch and was called up to varsity as a freshman.
“Even though Robins had a plan for me, he was always very careful because he didn’t want the older guys to be jealous. He’d drop little breadcrumbs and he had me play with the varsity team the summer before freshman year. They weren’t going to give me any special treatment and I remember showing up in an Expos hat because it was the closest shade of blue to Division and I wasn’t going to wear a Dodgers hat. One of the coaches said, ‘what kind of hat is that?’ and they got me a Division one.”
Initially he played outfield, before moving to 2nd base alongside double play partner Joe DiMatteo.
Overall, it was a rare “down” season for Division, who finished with a record of 17-5. It was their first time not winning the league in about 15 years, according to Fagan. Individually, he performed extremely well; batting over .460 and being named All-County as a freshman.
“After that, we were driven to get better.”
They did not disappoint, as they wound up going 22-3 during his sophomore season. That was 1994, the year in which their rivals MacArthur ran the table and went undefeated. They played an epic County Championship series during Memorial Day Weekend in which there was close to 2,000 people in attendance. Division gave MacArthur all they could handle, loading the bases in the last inning but ultimately coming up one-run short.
The Blue Dragons came back with a vengeance in 1995, getting retribution and beating MacArthur in the County Championship. They lost only 2 games that year – one coming in a non-league game against Locust Valley (5-4) who had Peter Terrana on the mound who would attend Rice University.
“Teams used to treat the non-conference games against us like their World Series. Locust Valley held back their ace to face us. They won in the last inning on a walk-off bunt. When we got back on the bus, I remember Robins being pissed off and made us run the rest of the day. He wasn’t mad that we lost, but that it was usually us that applied pressure to teams and it was the first time that we were in that situation where we didn’t handle it so he was annoyed that we weren’t prepared.”
Their next loss didn’t come until the state finals that year. They defeated East Hampton in the LIC before losing to Corning East.
That summer the calls came flooding in from colleges. Fagan had established himself as one of the top players in the region and was named All-County for the third straight year.
“Looking back I was definitely naive about the process. I was the first one in my family to go to college and I think I was too reliant on Coach Robins. I wanted to play in the south because of the weather. At that time, Long Island didn’t have the best reputation about sending playing to the south. I got a lot of offers – Arizona State, Clemson, LSU, Old Dominion. I’m happy with how it ended but I should’ve engaged more with the coaches. Early on, they want to send out feelers and see how you respond. I didn’t go to any camps.”
Fagan noted that the moment that really got things going for him was in the Empire State Games when he homered off Ron Marietta, a pitcher from Brooklyn that would go to Arizona State. Pat Murphy, who is now the manager for the Milwaukee Brewers, was in attendance to scout Marietta.
He called it “an emotional rollercoaster” because some weeks the phone would be ringing off the hook from schools, and other weeks there was very little. Penn State ultimately was the most aggressive, checking in on Fagan every week during the season.
He added that he didn’t want to stay local, although he had received plenty of interest from schools like NY Tech, Fordham, St. John’s, Seton Hall, CW Post. Seton Hall coach Ed Blankmeyer had left for St. John’s that year so he received interest from both schools.
He also played in the first of two NABF World Series that summer. He played for the LI Tigers for Don Whiston & Tom Abruscato – which was the premier travel organization in the area along with the Bayside Yankees.
“He was one of the best all-around athletes I ever coached,” said Abruscato. “He threw 90, played short and covered all green out in center. After every summer game, he would immediately run poles!”
The school that really impressed him was Penn State, who would go on to win the Big 10 during his senior year of high school.
“I went on my visit there and committed on the spot. What I really liked was that it wasn’t that far away but it felt like the type of college you saw on movies – that’s what a college was supposed to feel like. It also felt like a community – it kind of reminded me of Levittown in that way. They gave me a 90% scholarship and I later learned that Coach Robins played a pivotal role in that. When I was on my way, they had called him and he advocated for me, telling the coach that I had a single mother and they better take care of me. They upped their offer from 75% to 90% after that.”
Entering his senior year, there was only one thing on his mind and that was winning a state title. He quit football, which he had played as a freshman, sophomore and junior – going All-County as a sophomore during 1993.
“At that point, the guys on the team had played together since they were 12-years-old. We were undefeated 7th and 8th grade. When I was in 10th grade, the JV team went undefeated. So they hadn’t lost a game in years. We were all just hungry. They carried that standard of excellence. Going to the states wasn’t something we spoke about, we all just knew. What made Coach Robins so great was every single guy had a role and every guy knew he was important. Tom Rock used to joke that he made him feel like he was the best third string first baseman around. ”
That takes us back to the opener of the story regarding the makeshift hitting lab created by Robins.
“It was dark, there was no lights, it was hot as hell. We had no batting gloves so we’d swing until our hands bled. That’s what propelled me into being so successful. Guys would see me going down there, and that work we put in helped us. That season was special. We faced Garden City in the County Championship, we blew them out Game 1, I pitched game two, I didn’t have my best stuff but there was a lot of key plays behind me. Then I pitched Game 1 of the states and James Bailin pitched game 2 against Queensbury.”
That concluded their 29-0 season in which they peaked as the No. 4 ranked team in the nation and finished No. 10, according to Collegiate Baseball.
Following the season, Fagan was named All-County for the fourth straight season. He became the first player to be a four-time All-County recipient. His batting averages over his four seasons were .466, .437, .438 and .481. Additionally, he went 8-0 on the mound with a 25-1 career record. For his success, he was named the recipient of the Diamond Award for the top position player in Nassau County while Bailin was the recipient of the top pitcher in Nassau County (11-0 with 7 shutouts, 4 no-hitters and 122 Ks).
All told, Fagan lost 10 games in his 4-year HS career. Half of those came in 1993.
Penn State
It was off to Penn State to begin his collegiate career.
“That was the first time that I faced adversity. I never had to look at the lineup card before a game. I was picked as the Big 10 Preseason Freshman of the Year. It took a little bit of adjusting – it was the first time that I didn’t know if I’m playing today. I hit like .237 in 100 ABs. After the season I had some doubts, is this the right place for me? Penn State was very ahead of the curve in terms of providing assistance to students-athletes. They hooked me up with a sports psychologist. I came back for my sophomore year and had an amazing year. I hit over .400 (.415) and was All-Big 10, hit like 12 home runs and from there I took off.”
Fagan noted that in an attempt to appease the scouts that wanted him to show more power, he ended up hitting one more homer (13), but was not drafted following his junior season. He batted .344 with a strong 1.132 OPS. He waited around the phone all weekend to see who drafted him but it did not come.
He went on to play in the prestigious Cape Cod League with the Hyannis Mets. He recalled playing with many future big leaguers such as Chase Utley and future Rays manager Kevin Cash. He joked that he was the only one that didn’t make it to the big leagues from the league.
“I really re-dedicated myself that summer and it paid dividends the next season,” said Fagan.
Penn State went on to set the program record for most wins in a season (45), and captured the Rutgers regional. Ultimately, they drew a rough matchup at Texas for the Super Regional where they lost in two.
“There’s 8,500 people at the University of Texas screaming at you. You look across the dugout and there’s Augie Garrido – a legend. They had maybe one guy with double-digit homers but they put pressure on you.”
It was a stellar season for Fagan who batted .377 with 15 homers and a school-record 80 RBIs. He drew more walks (39) than times he struck out (35) and stole 11 bases on 14 attempts.
Following the season, Fagan was selected by the Toronto Blue Jays in the 13th round of the 2000 MLB Draft. He wound up finishing in first or second in many career statistics. His teammate, Mike Campo, finished first in many of them as well. Campo wound up being named Big 10 Freshman of the Year in 1997 when Fagan was picked to win it preseason.
Pro Ball
It was a quick turnaround as Penn State had just ended their season in the Super Regional when Fagan had to move out of his apartment and head to Dunedin, FL for his physical and to begin workouts.
As luck would have it, Fagan’s first team was the Queens Kings of the New York Penn League. As the team was building their new stadium, they played their home games at St. John’s University. After 25 games, he was promoted to the Hagerstown Suns of the South Atlantic League.
Overall, he played 70 pro games in 2000 in addition to the 64 games at Penn State.
He was promoted to High-A in 2001, and the team planned to convert him to catcher. Additionally, they wanted him to change his approach to take more walks. That resulted in him drawing a career-high 86 walks. He swung the bat well too, slashing .301/.407/.423 over 132 games so they scrapped the plans to move him off third. His team, the Dunedin Blue Jays, went 71-64 and had several future big leaguers including Jayson Werth, DeWayne Wise, Homer Bush, Kevin Cash and Jeff Frye.
In the Florida State League, Fagan said that while the travel isn’t bad, the Florida heat in July and August can be rough.
Fagan was promoted to Double-A Tennessee in the Southern League for the 2002 season. That coincided with the Blue Jays hiring J.P. Ricciardi to be their new General Manage – who was a part of the “Moneyball” front office in Oakland. This appeared like great news for Fagan, who was a high OBP player without a natural defensive spot at that point.
He performed well again, batting .268 with an .822 OBP playing first base and third base. Incredibly, he drew 102 walks against 87 strikeouts. With 2002 being the very early days of analytics, that didn’t jump off the stat sheet in the way it would in 2025. It’s not hard to imagine that Fagan would’ve been in the big leagues had he posted those numbers a decade or so later. Additionally, the Blue Jays had the presence of some talented corner infielders Carlos Delgado (33 HRs, 108 RBIs, .955 OPS in 2002) and Eric Hinske (24 HRs, 84 RBIs, .845 OPS).
Following the season, he was invited to the Arizona Fall League which is for the organization’s top prospects. He played on the same team with several future stars.
Once 2003 began, Fagan received a great opportunity to play in big league Spring Training when Carlos Delgado was coming off an injury and was rehabbing.
In his first at bat, he faced Oceanside native John Frascatore and hit a double.
“I was so excited that the next guy hit a grounder between short and third and I got thrown out at third,” he said.
Fagan hit over .300 in Spring Training, but was sent to Triple-A Syracuse. He noted the weather was very bad and they got snowed out for the first week. He struggled out of the gate, batting .207 through 17 games and was sent back down to Double-A where he played in 115 games for New Haven, batting .314 with 50 RBIs.
His final professional season was in 2004 where he played exclusively in Triple-A. At that point, he was at a career crossroads.
“Having played in Triple-A it felt like I made it. But I had to ask myself, do I still love it? That started to fade away. Some of the things about Triple-A go against my fabric. For example, in Triple-A if guys are doing bad but the team is winning, they are miserable. They are like independent contractors – 9 guys playing independently. At that point, I was contemplating retiring.”
Fagan was released in September 2004. He compiled a very respectable .281 career AVG over 556 professional games.
The Next Chapter
When Fagan was drafted in June 2000, he was one semester away from graduating from Penn State since his major required 9 semesters.
“Baseball overlapped with the internship I had, and they told me to pursue my dreams and they would hold the spot until I was ready to come back.”
Fagan spent the rest of 2004 thinking about his future. He had an opportunity to become a co-owner of an indoor baseball training center, but he turned it down. That would be the closest he would get to being involved in baseball again.
He decided that he would go back to finish his degree and internship, which he did in the 2005. He did the internship in the student-athletic support department.
At that time, he began applying for full-time jobs. He applied, and was accepted, for a job at Vanderbilt University as an academic coordinator. He got married in July 2006 and moved to Nashville.
He expressed his excitement to meet head coach Tim Corbin, who had recruited him to play at Clemson a decade earlier.
Fagan worked in that role for 4 years, and had his first child there in 2008. He wound up accepting a role at Temple University in Philadelphia, PA in the fall of 2009. He switched roles to academia and about 18 months ago he became the assistant provost for the university, which is on the administrative side.
He has since completed two masters and his doctorate.
Additionally, he had his second child, a boy, in 2011. His daughter recently committed to Temple University and his son is a freshman in high school, he plays soccer and lacrosse.
“I can actually be a spectator at his games, it’s nice to be able to enjoy,” he said.
