AZUSA, Calif. -- Azusa Pacific baseball head coach Paul Svagdis has announced the incoming recruiting class for the 2010 campaign, a 13-player group led by Devon Zenn, the 27th-round selection of the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim in this week’s 2009 Major League Baseball first-year player draft. In addition, 6 of the Cougar recruits participated in area high school all-star games earlier this week.
Zenn, a 5-foot-11 ,190-pound centerfielder from Benicia High School in Northern California, was the draft’s 831st overall selection. The left-handed 5-tool outfielder led Benicia to back-to-back CIF Sac-Joaquin Section Division III title games in each of his final 2 seasons and was named the Solana County Athletic Conference co-MVP.
Zenn is 1 of the 11 recruits joining Azusa Pacific straight out of high school, and 2 others will become Cougars after 2 years of junior college.
“I’m very excited about this year’s recruiting class,” Svagdis said. “This class has depth and quality, and I think it addresses a lot of our losses from last year. We’re losing a good chunk of our lineup offensively, and I’m really excited about this incoming group’s ability and skill set. In terms of the quality and quantity of the groups we’ve had in the past, I think this is one of the better total groups we’ve had. I thought we did a good job addressing some needs pitching-wise, and we also have some young hitters who are going to have an opportunity to come in and compete.”
Jason Plowman and Ryan Henley prepped for local baseball power Bonita High School, where Plowman was the Bearcats’ 2-time home run and slugging percentage leader on a team that also featured a 2009 first-round MLB draft pick, shortstop Jiovanni Mier. Plowman hit 9 home runs in 2009, batting .342 with a team-high 33 RBIs, and second baseman Henley was a .316 hitter the past 2 years, scoring 47 runs with 12 stolen bases over his final 2 prep campaigns. Plowman also pitched for the 21-6 Bearcats, notching a 6-2 mark with a 2.03 ERA and a pair of complete-games.
Both Plowman and Henley drove in runs in Monday’s San Gabriel Valley Senior All-Star game, and Plowman claimed the game’s MVP honors. Arcadia High School pitcher Bryce Rutherford threw a scoreless inning in the exhibition contest, earning his San Gabriel Valley All-Star selection following a standout senior campaign in which he led the Apaches to a 21-5 overall record and a Pacific League title. Rutherford went 8-1 with a 2.11 ERA as a 2009 senior, striking out 75 with 35 walks in 53 innings. As a 2008 junior, the righthander was 7-2 with a 1.44 ERA, recording 100 strikeouts and 29 walks in 63 innings.
Plowman also represented Bonita in the Inland Valley High School All-Star Game, where he was joined on the North squad by fellow future Cougar Matt Page of Rancho Cucamonga High School, which also produced Cougar great and 2007 Oakland A’s sixth-round draft pick Scott Hodsdon. Page is a left-handed hitting catcher who led the Cougars in every major offensive category as a 2009 senior, batting .435 (37-for-85) with 11 doubles, 5 home runs, 32 RBIs and 29 runs.
Danny Gonzales is a 5-foot-9, 220-pound first baseman from Sonora High School, where he was a 2-time All-Freeway League first baseman and a participant in the Rotary Club of Whittier’s High School All-Star Classic on June 10. Gonzales batted .388 (33-for-85) with 9 doubles, 2 home runs and 24 RBIs in 2009, and he hit .478 in Freeway League play.
Shortstop Tyler Putjenter, a Riverside County All-Star, batted .365 at Temescal Canyon High School, where he was a 2-time All-Southwestern League first team pick. Putjenter holds several Titans season and career school records, including single-season hits (37 in 2007), single-season steals (12 in 2008), single-season runs (24 in 2008), single-season triples (3 in 2009), as well as Temescal Canyon’s career hits mark of 104.
Two-time All-South Coast Conference infielder Trevor Costin led the league with 21 doubles in 2009 for Long Beach City College, where he was his team’s doubles and batting leader each of the past 2 seasons. Costin batted .333 (65-for-195) with 21 doubles, 4 home runs, 38 runs and 47 RBIs as a 2009 sophomore, leading the Vikings to a 30-18 campaign and the South Coast League title.
“The type of programs these players come from is important,” Svagdis said. “A lot of these players come from programs that compete at the CIF level and expect to win championships, so I think those players come in right away and recognize the value of playing in a competitive program in a little bigger environment. When you look at the whole package of the recruit class, along with the high school and junior college programs they’re coming from, they expect to be competitive and win baseball games. The overall individual quality of the players is also very important to us, from their academic strengths to the way they fit into the university, and we think this class also does a good job in that regard.”
Outfielder Josh Leite is the other junior-college transfer for the Cougars, joining the program after 2 seasons at Saddleback College. The 6-foot, 215-point lefthander redshirted his 2007 freshman season at NCAA Division I UC Davis. Leite batted .309 (29-for-94) as a 2009 sophomore, tying for the Orange Empire Conference lead in triples with 3.
Brendan Casey traverses the country from Milford, Mass., joining Azusa Pacific after batting .511 (24-for-47) with 10 doubles to lead his league in hitting as a 2009 senior. Casey, an athletic corner infielder, could also see time on the mound. Another potential contributor to an Azusa Pacific pitching staff that graduated 4 of its 5 leaders in innings pitched in 2009 is 6-foot-2 righthander Phillip Gonzalez, who registered a 1-2 record with 1 save for a 2.79 ERA in 32.2 innings as a 2009 senior at Claremont High School.
Jordan Calloway is an athletic outfielder from Maranatha High School in Pasadena, and he led the Minutemen to the 2009 Alpha League title with a 26-5 campaign. Calloway, a 3-year starter, batted .395 (32-for-81) with 10 doubles, 5 triples, 26 RBIs, 29 runs and 8 stolen bases as a 2009 senior. Also joining Azusa Pacific is Fallbrook High shortstop Sam Murphy, a 2-time All-Avocado League selection.
“We’re hoping this fall is going to be competitive, that the new guys and the transfers will feel like they have the opportunity to come in and compete for positions,” Svagdis said. “We were very excited about the depth we had last year, and we have some returners that understand the system, but this class is definitely going to have an opportunity in the fall to show that they can impact the program in a positive way.”
Azusa Pacific has posted 3 of the program’s top 8 single-season win totals the past 3 seasons, and the Cougars have produced 5 MLB Draft selections during that time. In 2009, Azusa Pacific was the only collegiate baseball program at any level (NCAA Division I, II, III, NAIA, and junior college) to have 2 players with at least 25 home runs each, led by NAIA All-American first team junior first baseman Brice Cutspec, who shattered the Cougars’ single-season (30) and career (61) home run records in 2009.
