The Cape Cod Baseball League is an elite amateur association that serves as a gateway to the professional ranks.
When an undergraduate college baseball player signs on with one of the 10 CCBL teams, he is tendered a contract, gets immersed in a professional regimen, and is expected to conduct himself accordingly while still enjoying summer on the Cape.
What better way to feel like a pro than to conduct batting practice and infield in a Major League ballpark?
The 10 teams of the CCBL, which was founded in 1885 and stretches from Wareham to Orleans, gathered at Fenway Park on Monday for the annual Fenway Workout Day.
“I think it is cool for these guys to be here, to be in this atmosphere and when you watch infield, they play with a little bit more energy here because it is Fenway Park,” said CCBL Commissioner John Castleberry.
“You watch BP and they are trying to go deep because of the wall which is fine. But they are in a big league park, an historical park. A lot of these kids are from the West Coast or the Midwest or the South and have never been here before so they are having a lot of fun with it.”
The pro/am system that has been in place for decades obviously works from a transitional standpoint. There were 388 Cape League alumni playing in MLB in 2023 and over 1,600 all-time.
The Cape League is a starting place for aspiring Major Leaguers and often the last stop before being drafted and signing a pro contract. Exposure to the dozens of pro scouts that occupy the backstop area with notepads and JUGS radar guns is a big selling point.
“There is BP, infield and you play a game every day,” said Castleberry. “What coaches try to create is an atmosphere that this is a microcosm of professional baseball. At the same time, there are about 85 scouts here and they bear down and identify guys for when they get into the (Cape) league.”
Harwich Mariners right fielder Cam Maldonado was one of the four Northeastern players to be tendered a CCBL contract in 2024.
Maldonado was seated with his Harwich teammates in the right field grandstands watching the Dennis-Yarmouth Red Sox take BP. When asked if he was going yard on the Green Monster, Maldonado replied “oh yeah.”
Maldonado, a junior from Walcott, Conn., delivered on his promise when he jacked one over the wall and had a second blast veer just wide of the Fisk Pole.
Maldonado became a Huskies mainstay his first season, breaking the school’s rookie home run record and earning Freshman All-America status. Maldonado got off to a slow start in 2024 and finished with a disappointing .265 batting average.
He saved his best for last, hitting .425 in May with 19 runs scored with five home runs and 13 RBI. He went 5-for-7 in the CAA tournament. What made Maldonado an attractive CCBL prospect was his speed on the basepaths and the ability to cover large swaths of territory in right. He stole 29 bases on 34 attempts this season for NU. Maldonado has played in 10 CCBL games and has nine hits in 34 at-bats with five runs and four RBI.
“This is my first season on the Cape and so far, it has been a blast and I have been loving every second of it because it is the Cape and you should enjoy every second of it,” said Maldonado. “You are facing the best players in the country and it’s the start of being a pro.”
Harwich left-hander Jack Bowery worked his way into the rotation after transferring to Northeastern from Marist. Bowery, a senior from North Haven, Conn., started out of the bullpen before Huskies’ coach Mike Glavine slotted him into the weekend rotation.
Bowery adjusted by going 4-1 over 52.2 inning with a 4.96 ERA, 39 strikeouts and 12 walks. With the Mariners congested schedule, Bowery is looking to fill a regular slot in Harwich field manager Steve Englert’s rotation. Bowery, who played for Wareham in 2023, is 1-1 in two starts for Harwich with a 5.63 ERA, four strikeouts and four walks.
“I really like the playing every day type feel to summer league,” said Bowery. “You get to the field early, you get your work in and you are on a schedule where you are there every day and showing up with that game-day mentality.
“I really like that … it’s awesome. The biggest switch is the bats that are getting used, going from metal to wood. You can pitch more aggressively knowing that not everything is going to get hit as well.”
The other Mariner from a Beanpot program is Boston College shortstop Sam McNulty. He started all 53 games and finished with 50 hits and a .281 batting average. McNulty is a 6-1, 200-pound, senior right-handed hitter from Cambridge who played scholastically at Milton Academy. McNulty was a Milton Academy teammate of Harvard pitcher Tanner Smith, who competes for the Falmouth Commodores.
