From Little League to Varsity: West Orange baseball seniors ready for a storybook ending

Having chemistry and trust are some of the most surefire ways for a team to develop a winning culture. Those elements push players to give their all for the teammate standing next to them, allow honest and constructive criticism, and provide a second-nature type understanding of how to play off one another.

However, developing chemistry and trust is tricky. It’s not like heating up a frozen dinner in the microwave. To get a team to develop the real thing, it’s much more like slow-cooking barbecue on a smoker. It takes some serious time and effort.

That’s exactly what makes West Orange High baseball’s senior class so special. Not only has almost all of this group of 13 seniors played together since their freshman year, but also 11 of them have been sharing the diamond going back about a decade as Winter Garden Little Leaguers. 

“It’s kind of crazy to think about the whole journey from Little League to right now at our Senior Night,” pitcher Sims McClusky said before the Warriors’ 9-2 win over Dr. Phillips High. “Except for a couple of us, we’ve all been playing on the same field together since we were 6 years old. It’s really been an awesome experience to play our whole lives together and get to this point as seniors, where we are in position to finish it off together, fighting for a state title.”

Thanks in large part to the slow-cooked chemistry and trust these seniors have built over their baseball lives and the leadership that they’ve provided to the rest of the team, the Warriors currently sit at 18-4 — as of press time Tuesday, April 8 — on the season, which is tied for the most wins the program has had since 2017. 

With a few more games left in the regular season before the Warriors’ hunt for postseason glory begins, this band of former Winter Garden Little Leaguers and now West Orange seniors is ready to write a storybook ending nearly a decade in the making.

“I’ve been saying it since we started fall ball, this is a special group of boys,” Warriors coach Mike Scudero said. “With them growing up and playing together and as seniors taking over as the leaders of this team, there’s been just some special type of aura this year that’s felt a lot different than in the past. If we keep playing the same kind of baseball, the West Orange baseball we’ve been playing, we have a good shot to make a deep run in the playoffs.”

Baseball family

Despite only taking over the West Orange baseball program a couple of years ago, growing up on Long Island, New York, Scudero saw the type of impact that playing together over the course of a lifetime can have on a team.

“Growing up in Massapequa, I basically was part of a team that was like our group of seniors here,” Scudero said. “Since I was 5, 6 years old, I played on the same baseball team with all my best friends. We played Little League together, played in middle school together, travel ball and in high school. And in our senior year, we ended up winning a state championship together. I just think when you play together for that long it just forms a special bond, whereas if guys come from other places, it can feel more like playing for a travel team instead of with your brothers. I think me bringing that experience of playing on a championship team that felt like a family to this group has helped us a lot. It’s easy, too, considering how long these guys have been together. They just want to have fun and enjoy themselves and win some baseball games.”

This type of connection and experience among these seniors does two vital things to help develop championship-level traits in a team, the first is knowing they can push each other to the next level. 

“We’re like a big family that’s always spending time together,” pitcher Wrigley Bates said. “Every day during the season, we go to the cages and hit together. These last two years, during the offseason in the winter, we would all do morning workouts together on the football field in the freezing cold at five in the morning. When you have the kind of bond we have, we’re able to get the most out of each other because we know that it’s coming from a place of love. … Having put in that type of work together, we know that as long as we’re together we can accomplish anything. We know that on the field everyone’s got your back and if we fall, there’s going to be someone there to help you back up.”

The other key championship trait a team develops because of this type of chemistry from spending so much time together is the lifelong bond they share — the battle scars they’ve earned, the lessons they’ve learned and the trust they’ve developed by going through countless experiences together.

“It’s been great playing with the guys from Little League, for the most part,” pitcher Ryan Steinman said. “Having the same consistent group together as seniors that went through all the fights and battles on the field together, and in life really, since we were kids, makes it really easy for us to trust (one another). ... We’re a team that really knows one another. We know our strengths and our weaknesses, and that really helps on the field in big situations because we know what to do in any scenario.”

‘We need to be dogs’

As the regular season is nearing its end and the district playoffs set to kick off in the coming weeks, the Warriors seniors will look to close their story with an ending that’s worthy of this lifelong baseball journey. 

If you ask Scudero, with its three-headed senior pitching monster of McClusky, Parker Hohnstock and Nick Caso leading a deep group of arms, the Warriors have what it takes to write their dream ending.

“With our pitchers … we can win with pretty much anyone we put out on the mound,” Scudero said. “They’re a good group of guys that play like a bunch of bulldogs out there. They just want to win games, and they’re always pulling for each other to be the best that they can possibly be. Ultimately, I think having so many good arms on our team can help us go on a deep playoff run. We have a shot at it with this group. This team has put in the work since they walked in the door this year and I think they will take us as far as they want to go.”

Of course, at the beginning of any team’s season, the goal is always to win a state championship. That goal is no different for the Warriors at this point of their journey, but for this group, which has been through so much together, they know not to get too far ahead of themselves and focus on how they play the game.

“We all … have the dream to end our final season as state champions,” Steinman said. “But really, when it’s all said and done, I want to look back at this group and be able to say we went out battling. We can win it all, we have a really talented and strong team, so there’s a chance. All we have to do is believe in each other, pick (one another) up and compete. We need to be dogs. ... That’s the goal to me: to go out fighting next to my guys.”