Thursday, June 07, 2012

ACBL Catz proving to be pipeline to pros; three alumni, one current player drafted

http://blogs.mcall.com/groller/ FROM KEITH GROLLER Patrick O'Connell, the general manager of the Easton-based Lehigh Valley Catz in the Atlantic Collegiate Baseball League, is beaming. He sent out a release late Wednesday night making sure everyone knows that if you want to see future pro baseball players, you might want to see the Catz. One current player and three former Catz players were taken this week in the Major League Baseball Amateur Draft. The current player is Chris Nichols, the son of the only pitching coach the IronPigs have had, Rod Nichols. He was taken by the Phillies in the 31st round. Among the former Catz taken were Lee Sosa, a pitcher from Binghamton University who played with the Catz last year. He was a 26th-round choice of the Oakland A's. Zach Kirksey from the University of Mississippi, a 2009 member of the Cataz, was taken in the 29th round by the Tigers, and Stroudsburg High School's and Temple University's Steve Nikorak, a Catz player in 2008, was taken by the White Sox in the 32nd round. The ACBL has had 92 of its alumni reach the big leagues, including Catz alum Drew Sutton, who is currently a member of the Tampa Bay Rays. Sutton has moved around quite a bit in his brief career. Tampa is his seventh organization, and third this year, since he was drafted in the 15th round by Houston in 2004. Among the most famous ACBL alums are probably Jamie Moyer, Terry Mulholland and Ryan Vogelsong. Moyer and Mulholland played for the Allentown Wings in the early 1980s. Vogelsong, a Kutztown University product, pitched for Quakertown before he was drafted by the Giants in the fifth round in 1998.

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