Rafe Schlesinger
How Are the Local Players Performing in Pro Ball?
by Chris Donnelly and Vin Messana Logan O’Hoppe (Los Angeles Angels, MLB) O’Hoppe has emerged as an everyday catcher for the Los Angels Angels after being traded for Brandon Marsh in 2022. After starting off hot in March/April, slashing .270/.301/.551, he wasn’t able to get back to form, ending the season slashing .213/.258/.371. O’Hoppe still has the tools to be an All-Star catcher, as he ranks in the 72nd percentile in hard-hit rate and the 83rd percentile in barrel rate. O’Hoppe is a strong bounce-back candidate. Ramon Laureano (San Diego Padres, MLB) Laureano was able to put together his strongest season since 2019 as he posted a .854 OPS in 132 games. Starting the season with the Orioles Laureano was one of the biggest bats on the market at the deadline as he ended the season on the P...
Rafe Schlesinger Selected by Cleveland in the 4th Round of 2024 MLB Draft
Rafe Schlesinger became the first Sachem East alum in their 20-year history to be selected in the MLB Draft. The 2021 grad was selected in the 4th round by the Cleveland Guardians following his three-year career at the University of Miami where he became one of the top southpaws in the nation. The last Sachem alum to get selected was Alec Sole in 2014 by Tampa Bay out of St. Louis University. Rafe has been a high-profile name in the Long Island baseball community for several years. We first profiled back in early 2019 before he stepped foot on a varsity field. His pitching coach at the time, Neal Heaton, stated that he was ahead of where Steven Matz was at the same age. Matz, of course, went on to get selected by the New York Mets in 2009 and has been in the big leagues since 2015. Schlesi...
Sachem East Prepared For Challenge of Loaded League II
Special thanks to Metamorphosis Landscape Design for sponsoring this year’s season preview series. Sachem East 17, William Floyd 8 WP: Joe Rondinella Jake Acker: 4-for-5, 2 doubles, triple, HR, 4 RBIs Patrick Krempasky: HR Joe Riccheti: 3-for-4, 4 runs pic.twitter.com/4w62PZORXh — Axcess Baseball LI (@axcessbaseball) May 3, 2023 Sachem East is coming off a season in which they were Co-League Champs along with Pat-Med and Longwood as all three teams finished with a 14-6 league record. The Arrows has the misfortune of facing a 1st round draft pick in the first round, however, and they lost 2-0 to Pat-Med. “It was a cool experience but not something you want to face in the playoffs,” Kevin Schnupp said in regards to facing Josh Knoth. He put on quite a show for the scouts as...
Saturday College Recap (2/24) Powered by Orlin & Cohen
By Mike Merolle A dramatic upset win for LIU over Miami, a mercy-ruled game, and hot win streaks highlight Saturday’s NCAA baseball. Division-I LIU 4 — Miami 2 First collegiate hit? How about a game-deciding ninth-inning homer at Miami? @NoahSorensen13 pic.twitter.com/b921ncfHxq — LIU Baseball (@LIU_Baseball) February 25, 2024 It was a stunning ninth inning for the LIU Sharks as Noah Sorensen broke the tie with a solo home run. The Sharks defeated Miami in an upset 4-2 win on Saturday at Alex Rodriguez Park in Coral Gables, Fla. for their first victory of the season. It was a pitcher duel for most of the game. On the bump for LIU was Dominic Pieto who pitched five innings striking out three and allowing two earned runs on four hits. For the Hurricanes, Rafe Schlesinger (Sachem East 20...
College Recruiting 101: Asking the Dads That Have Experienced It
The college recruiting process can be very overwhelming. To make matters more difficult, it’s constantly changing over the years. So if you played baseball and you think it’ll be easier for you to help navigate through your son’s process – think again, since the recruiting calendar and the entire landscape has likely completely changed since you went through it 25 years earlier. To make it easier, I reached out to some dads that I know would have great insight and advice on the process. They are: Brian Schlesinger, Christian Eiring, Eladio Exposito, Vito Friscia and Bob Johnson. All of these gentlemen have sons that recently played Division-I baseball and they know exactly what the process entails. I asked a series of questions and here’s what they had to say&...
Coming Off County Finals Appearance, Sachem East Hungry to Take Next Step
By Michael Malaszczyk Coach Kevin Schnupp is ready for the 2022 season, and while proud of his team’s 2021 season, isn’t going to settle for second best. Sachem East had a great year in 2021, coming off of a season cut short in 2020. They finished with a 16-4 overall record and came just short of glory against Commack in the Suffolk County Championship. “Obviously we were disappointed that we didn’t finish what one of our preseason goals was,” said Schnupp. “But all in all it was a great season and the boys performed really well in a tough league. We faced several top pitching prospects throughout the year. To look back on 2021 positively, Schnupp feels that what led his team to success last year was its blend of upperclassmen and rookies. Evan Fisher with his second HR of the game ...
League MVPs Announced
It’s always an exciting day when the League/Conference MVPs are announced because after the Long Island Championships, you’re expecting a slow news day and then the list drops and it’s another hit of news. To be fair, the list didn’t actually drop but I was able to find out the winners and here they are. Quick note: Nassau opted to award a Most Valuable Position Player as well as Most Valuable Pitcher, whereas Suffolk just named one player. Naturally, many players in Suffolk will feel slighted if they felt they had a case to win. The next big announcement will be the two Diamond Award winners as well as the Carl Yastrzemski Award, Paul Gibson Award and Silver Slugger. Nassau County: I- Vin Mallon (Massapequa), Liam Carroll (Massapequa) II- Co-Winners: Patrick Sanche...
Craig Pihlkar Fires Gem, Commack Defeats Schlesinger & Sachem East 5-3
Final: Commack 5, Sachem East 3 WP: Craig Pihlkar S: Jack Cascone pic.twitter.com/o2Q4uLSgXM — Axcess Baseball LI (@axcessbaseball) May 13, 2021 On a difficulty scale, it doesn’t get much tougher than winning a road game against a lefty flamethrower that’s a likely MLB Draft pick. But when it comes to being afraid or intimidated, that’s just simply not going to happen to Commack. The Cougars pulled off a wildly-impressive 5-3 win against Sachem East with Miami-commit Rafe Schlesinger on the bump throwing gas. Commack, who captured the 2017 County Championship in a similarly difficult match up at West Islip, had their own ace on the mound. With 6’5 RHP UCONN-commit Craig Pihlkar, they can play with anyone. The big righty earned the win, throwing 6 IP, allowing six hi...
Observations From Friday Night’s Bullpen at Prospect
The high school season might be more than two months away but the preparation is in full swing. Last night, I went to Prospect Sports in Farmingdale to watch two of the brightest young stars on Long Island get a bullpen in, as well as one college arm that has worked extremely hard to reclaim his status as a phenom. Prospect is the home of many of the top players in the region. On any given day, you can see players that will likely compete for the Diamond Award and Carl Yastrzemski Award as well as college players that will compete for All-Conference selections. Rafe Schlesinger (Sachem East 2021) has been a recognizable name for the past two years. Since that time, he has only continued to progress and since then, committed to Miami, appeared in the Area Code Games, East Coast Pro and has ...
Who Is JT Raab?
Raab topping at 88 MPH today pic.twitter.com/PVdE6H91mx — Axcess Baseball LI (@axcessbaseball) October 18, 2020 When you are pitching on the same staff as other established arms like Rafe Schlesinger, Tommy Ventimiglia, Dylan Johnson and Jacob Steinmetz, it can be hard to garner all the attention. But 6’5 RHP J.T. Raab (MacArthur 2021) has certainly turned heads with his performance this summer and fall for the Long Island Titans-Quattrini. The No. 1 ranked 2021 team in the region had an outstanding summer, and finished off with a bang at the Northeast Elite Tournament. For the year, Raab posted an unblemished record of 9-0 with a 0.49 ERA. As if that’s not impressive enough, his peripheral numbers were even more astounding. He struck out 12.7 batters per 9, allowed 2.6 hits pe...
Who Are The Top Pitchers in the 2021 Class?
It feels like we should still be getting ready for the 2020 season rather than tying a ribbon on it. It feels like yesterday I was at Stony Brook covering their game against Iona. The next week was supposed to kick off the high school baseball season. As we know, that never happened. The next several months we were forced to watch old highlights and hope for better days. July 5 finally featured real live baseball games and since that time, it’s been a sprint to the finish line of the season. Last night was the Northeast Elite 18U tournament which is an annual tournament at Baseball Heaven hosted by Phillies Director of International Scouting, Sal Agostinelli, which features the top teams from the region and it’s always a treat. This tournament began in 2007 when I was just a ju...
Highlights of IG Live With Rafe Schlesinger
Rafe Schlesinger (Sachem East 2021) is a Miami-commit that is among the top pitchers in the region. He helped Sachem East to the postseason in 2019 as a sophomore and was slated to be their ace this season. Here’s what he had to say on last night’s IG Live… -He has been long-tossing weekly as well as throwing bullpen sessions. He likes to long-toss up to 100 yards on a football field to stretch it out because it’s tough to ease back on the effort. -Throws weekly bullpens with Neal Heaton, he has been going to him for several years and is comfortable with his style of coaching. -Developing a change up has been important because you can’t blow fastballs past every hitter so harness a good feel for it to progress in the game. -He feels that he struggles more agai...
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