Bobby Meacham has been in baseball too long to go for the dramatics, or stage a moment for social media engagement.
He simply called his 21-year-old infielder, Adael Amador, into the visiting manager’s office in Somerset, N.J., on June 7 to deliver the news. The Rockies were calling Amador to the major leagues.
“I was walking down the hallway trying to find him,” Meacham said. “He has different phone numbers. Finally we met in the hall and I had him come up into the room and I told him right away and he had a big smile on his face. And he immediately dropped to a knee and thanked God for the call up, and got up and gave me a big hug. Then he pulled out his phone and called his mom and dad to fill them in. That was great for me to see, the first reaction.”
‘Can you believe it?’ CT’s Joe Castiglione, voice of the Red Sox, is taking his place in Cooperstown
These are moments that have kept Meacham, 63, in baseball more than 41 years, since the day he was first called to the major leagues to join Billy Martin’s Yankees in 1983.
In his first season as Yard Goats manager, Meacham has already sent three of his Double A players up to the majors, including pitchers Angel Chivilli and Austin Kitchen, for at least the proverbial cup of coffee. Amador, called up to replace an injured player, got in 10 games and had six hits in 36 at bats, then got hurt and has since rejoined the Goats to continue his development.
And what is happening at Dunkin’ Park in 2024 is individual player development, amid a culture of winning baseball, which (unfortunately for many players) is not often how it works in the modern-day minor leagues.
Meacham has the Goats focused on both. They won the Eastern League’s Northeast Division first-half title with a 38-30 record, locking it down with four wins in the last five games at Harrisburg and securing playoff baseball for Hartford for the first time since the franchise relocated from New Britain. Overall, the Yard Goats are 44-33, tied with Erie for the best record in the league.
“The biggest thing I’ve seen from these guys is the excitement about getting better,” Meacham said. “My coaches have done a great job trying to teach, making sure these guys are getting better every day. And in the process of winning ballgames, it makes it easier to teach and help these guys grow. They’re learning about the little things that make a winning ballplayer.”
Dom Amore: Meet the Yard Goats’ Adael Amador, top prospect, master of the strike zone
The Yard Goats have a 4.14 staff ERA, fifth in the league, and it’s trending in the right direction, with a 3.16 ERA, best in the EL, in the month of June. The Rockies always have a need to develop pitching. Hartford’s relievers have been particularly solid, except for a blown lead Friday night, they’re 32-2 when leading after seven innings. Carson Palmquist threw seven scoreless innings Friday, striking out a franchise-record 13 against Binghamton
“I see a bullpen full of guys (who have improved), and I see the starters, the pitching side of it,” Meacham said. “We talk to them about what the big-league staff wants, pitchers who throw strikes and challenge hitters and that’s what we’re seeing them do because they’re believing in that.”
Shortstop Ryan Ritter (.283) and outfielder Yanquiel Fernandez (.274, eight homers, 42 RBI) have been among the most improved position players.
“Fernandez, a guy who is very talented, but a little timid in how he does things, not really sure,” Meacham said. “But now, knowing what is necessary to be a really great player and not just a good player, I see him going about his job in a tenacious fashion. … You see Ritter, who started out not to good at the plate, but he has turned the page over and over to get better. It’s fun to watch as a manager.”
Warming Bernabel, who hit a big grand slam in a win at Binghamton last week, leads the team with 46 RBI, Zach Kokoska has 12 homers and 44 RBI.
The Goats lead the league with 132 stolen bases, caught only 14 times. Amador, one of the top prospects in all baseball, leads the team with 22 in 25 tries.
The Goats began July with three straight wins in Binghamton, including a game in which they were being no-hit until the seventh inning, but rallied to win 6-1.
“There is no questioning the guys really care about their craft as a baseball player and as a team, how we do,” Meacham said. “There’s a lot of those guys that fill our locker room, and now there’s a smell in place. ‘I like what I do, but that winning stuff smells pretty good.’
“I feel like we’ve harped on that in a way that maybe is new to them; they haven’t heard a lot of that. Once you taste winning and really understand how you got to that part, once you taste that you just want more. These guys come back in games because they realize, ‘We’re winners here.'”
More for your Sunday Read:
Alexis Holmes, who trains in Fayetteville, talks about placing third in 400m final at U.S. Olympic Team Trials to make Team USA for the Paris Olympics pic.twitter.com/6S7avNQplq
— Arkansas Track & Field (@RazorbackTF) June 24, 2024
Hamden’s Alexis Holmes sprints to Paris
Hamden’s Alexis Holmes, 24, who starred in track at Cheshire Academy and later at Penn State and Kentucky, came up with with a huge performance in the Olympic Trials to make the U.S. contingent for the 400-meter race.
“I just wanted to run the best race of my life and whatever that was going to be, hopefully it would be enough to make the team,” Holmes told reporters in Eugene, Ore. “Coming off the last turn, I told myself, ‘This is it, this is your opportunity.'”
Holmes ran her personal best time, 49.78 seconds, just back of Kendall Ellis (49.46) and Aaliyah Butler (49.71). She blazed the last 100 meters to come from back in the pack and take that precious third and final spot, breaking 50 seconds for the first time.
“I just had to believe in myself, that this moment was mine as well,” Holmes said. “Everything I had, I just gave the last 100.”
Holmes, who runs professionally for Nike, has been running track since joining the New Haven Age Group Track Club when she was about 7. Her mother, Dawn Stanton-Holmes, was an All-American at SCSU.
“It’s something you think about since you’re a little kid,” Holmes said. “It means everything. … Everything happens at the right time. this is where I’m meant to be right now.”
Holmes could run with the U.S. 4×400 relay team in Paris as well.
Sunday short takes
*Met an impressive young man, Beau Root, at the National Sports Media Association awards in North Carolina. Root, an outfielder from Washington, Conn., and Taft School, hit .374 with 61 steals during his career at Middlebury and is part of the next wave of Division III transfers coming to play for UConn. Root was there to honor his late grandfather, the great Tim McCarver, who was inducted into the NSMA broadcasters’ Hall of Fame.
*Trey McLoughlin, a righty pitcher from Shelton High and Fairfield, is pitching effectively for the Mets’ Double A affiliate, Binghamton. He has a 2.74 ERA in 19 games, with 28 strikeouts in 28 innings.
Dom Amore: Kemba Walker gave CT, UConn a gift that keeps on giving
*Back on June 2, I made a wisecrack in this space about the U.S getting even with Britain for the War of 1812 by sending the Mets to play in London. The Mets, 24-35 that day, are 18-9 since, so let’s just tap the brakes on all talk of the Grimace turning things around in Flushing. You’re welcome, Mets fans.
*The Hartford Public Athletic Hall of Fame’s 2024 induction class will be honored Oct. 20, 1-5 p.m., at Dunkin Park.
The class includes: Kenneth Bailey, 1971; Coach Harry Bellucci, Doriel Fertado, 1976; Charles Gallagher, 2006, Mariela Gonzalez, 2001; Hiram Harrington, 1990; Richard Holewa, 1964; DeShawn Jennings, 1994, Richard Jernigan, 2014; Andre Lawrence, 1999 and James LaJoy, 1969
Also, Joe Lombardo, Coach; Richard Martinez, 1995; Nelida Morales, 2000; Richard Moran, 1997; Matt Noble, 2009; Nick Oliver, 1972; Devon Torres, 2006; Pedro Vega, 1990; and Kijuan Ware, 1993 will be enshrined this year, along with the 1993 and 94 boys basketball teams, which included Marcus Camby and Kendrick Moore, and won back to back CIAC LL titles.
Visit www.hphsathletichof.com for details on the induction ceremony and the annual golf outing Sept. 28. Or contact Mike Forrest at forrest.mike.r@gmail.com.
*Fun baseball fact you might not know. Joe DiMaggio is well known for his low strikeout rate, with 361 homers and just 369 Ks, or one strikeout every 18.5 at-bats. But his older brother, Vince DiMaggio, led the NL in strikeouts in four of his 10 seasons (1937-46), had 125 homers, 837 strikeouts, one every 4.6 at-bats. Vince was a two-time All-Star who knocked in 100 runs for the Pirates in 1941, the year of Joe’s hitting streak. Younger brother, Dom DiMaggio, had 87 homers, 571 Ks, or one every 9.9 at-bats.
*Nkwa Asonye, who has worked for Fox61 and WFSB-TV, and has done solid work, carrying himself like a true pro at events across the state, is leaving Connecticut. Wishing Nkwa, who shared state sportscaster of the year honors with UConn women’s play-by-play announcer Bob Joyce, the best of luck with what’s next.
*Programming note: I’ll be taking some vacation time. The Sunday Read will return July 28.
Last word
Maybe these national anthem “stand-offs” are fun for high school or college kids, or might be funnier if the teams involved were playing well, but with the Reds well under .500 and the Yankees playing poorly, they just looked like buffoons holding up the July 4 game in New York.
Hopefully this a passing fad that has passed. During the Yankees’ 4-14 stretch, we’ve seen oft-injured players clowning around with standoffs, veterans throwing tantrums on the mound (not to say Marcus Stroman’s message was wrong) and in the dugout, lollygagging in the field and on the bases, excused by the manager … so whatever happened to the Yankees’ trademark professionalism?
