Baseball: Young Kiwis impress US scouts

Five young players caught the eye of American scouts at the first Oceania Baseball Academy, which finished in Auckland yesterday.

Twenty-four players, aged between 13 and 19, were invited to attend the 10-day camp run by former Kansas City Royal pitcher Ray Brown who is the Oceania region development officer.

Throughout the 10 days the players competed in games and hitting, pitching and fielding clinics.

The academy also ran sessions for coaches, umpires and scorers.

Among the interested spectators at the academy were scouts from the Seattle Mariners and San Diego Padres.

Brown, who also recruits for the Mariners, said his club was particularly interested in 13-year-old Auckland catcher Daniel Devonshire.

"You can see from the things he does that if he continues improving then he could have a chance at maybe playing professional baseball."

Brown said the Mariners had also noted Aucklanders Jason Proctor, Sam Nash, John Lee and Mark Harbott of Christchurch.

While the club will have no direct contact with the players at this stage, they will keep an eye on them through New Zealand Baseball Federation development officer Greg Wolfe.

"All those players will hopefully stay involved at the national level and continue to follow the all-year programme Greg has for them," Brown said.

Ted Heid, who is the Mariners director of Pacific Rim scouting, said he was impressed with the academy and had high praise for Baseball Oceania and the New Zealand Baseball Federation which organised it, and the players.

"The New Zealand players have improved a lot," he said.

Baseball has been played in Auckland only since 1989 and at youth level since 1994. But in the last two years, New Zealand Baseball has secured scholarships in American universities for four players, allowing them the potential of entering into the professional leagues.

New Zealand's most successful baseball player to date has been Cantabrian Travis Wilson, who was signed by the Atlanta Braves and played in their minor league organisation.

"On the first day, I looked at some of the kids who are 13 and 14 years old and after we did our testing I mentioned to Greg [Wolfe] I don't think these young kids should be here," Brown said.

"Today I can see these young kids have done a pretty good job. We can put them on the field and they can compete with these guys. The standard of play would be equal to a US high school."