LYNNFIELD — With the number of players lost to graduation, it’s going to be tough to repeat the year that the Lynnfield baseball team had in 2017. The Pioneers went 18-2 in the regular season, winning the Cape Ann League and earning a No. 3 seed in the Division 3 North tournament before rolling all the way to the sectional final. Lynnfield’s season ended there with a loss to Austin Prep, but the season was still a success.
The problem for the Pioneers now is that the 2017 team was a senior-laden team, and after 10 seniors left the program to graduation there’s not much coming back in 2018.
“We’re going to have a very young team this year, there’s no way around it,” said Lynnfield coach John O’Brien, who’s entering his 14th year as the head coach and 18th year with the program. “We had a lot of seniors on last year’s team and most of them were key contributors as well as great leaders, so it’ll be tough to replace those guys.”
On the bright side, of those 10 seniors who left the program in 2017, O’Brien says that seven of them are now playing at the college level, which bodes well for the program.
“It’s definitely a great sign for our program, kids can see that they can make it to the next level playing for our team,” O’Brien said. “It works out great for everybody, because the schools get great athletes, the kids get a great education and our program gets noticed, which in turn helps future players get a shot to do the same thing.”
On the not-so-bright side, losing 10 seniors means there will be plenty of holes to fill on the Pioneers’ roster. So many players, in fact, that O’Brien isn’t quite sure what the team will look like at this point so early in the preseason. What he is sure of is who his captains will be for the 2018 campaign: senior left fielder Cooper Marengi, senior catcher Nick Giammarco and junior shortstop Jonathan Luders.
Each player will contribute to the team’s success in his own way, with Marengi as the experienced voice in the outfield and Giammarco as the experienced veteran leading a younger Lynnfield pitching staff. But the toughest job might belong to Luders, who will be replacing two-time CAL All-Star (2017 CAL MVP) and 2017 Agganis All-Star Justin Juliano, who’s now playing college baseball at St. Joseph’s College in Maine as the full-time shortstop.
“I think the transition will be okay, Jonathan got a decent amount of experience playing there when Justin pitched last year,” O’Brien said. “He was also our leadoff hitter and he might be again this year, but we’ve got a lot of options with him.”
As with many of the area teams, the Pioneers have not yet gotten outside thus far in the preseason. But there’s some hope that they’ll get outside this weekend, as there’s a tentative scrimmage scheduled on the road against North Andover on Saturday.
“It’s been tough so far, but it’s been the same thing with every team,” O’Brien said of the weather issues. “We’re hoping to get out on the field Saturday, but it all depends on if North Andover gets its field cleaned off and if the weather cooperates. But once we get out on the field and get these guys in some game action, we’ll really be able to see how this team will start to take its form.”
Lynnfield opens up the regular season April 9 against North Reading.