Independents Preview: Trinity Savors Its International Flavor

Trinity Christian and Berean Christian are two of the county’s independent teams.

The Warriors feature an internationally flavored lineup that will pack some pop at the plate. The Bulldogs will be looking to continue last season’s solid year with a new coach who’s a familiar face.

Here’s a preview of what to expect from them this season…

TRINITY CHRISTIAN WARRIORS
2012 Record: 16-8
Head Coach: Miguel Cuello
Key Returners: Franco Guardascione (C/3B), Darren Seferina (SS)
Team Strengths: Hitting

Trinity Christian cares about its players futures after they leave the school.

“Our goal is to get seniors into a school somewhere,” Trinity Christian Manager Miguel Cuello said.

Trinity works extremely hard to make sure its students have an opportunity to further their education, but don’t let that take away the fact that the Warriors also have a winning program on their hands.  

Warriors work on fundamentals.

After returning from a great season, the Warriors are back and ready to prove they can compete with the best with five returning seniors and an arsenal of young talent.

Leading the charge will be catcher/third baseman Franco Guardascione, who has committed to Palm Beach State, and shortstop Darren Seferina, who has committed to Bethune-Cookman.

“We’re looking to come out with another good year and make an impact. We have a good squad,” Guardascione said. “We’re looking to play hard, win ballgames and have fun.”

The Warriors are a very diverse team in nationality, with players from Italy to Aruba, and the team focuses highly on having pride of ones nationality. Each player has the flag of their nationality stitched on the side of their hats.

The Warriors are looking to their bats to carry the team throughout most games. A lot of focus will be put into executing key hitting situations, such as hit-and-runs, bunting a runner over, and getting the run in, but there is still some pop in the bats if a pitcher makes a mistake. The pitching staff is fairly young this year, but are eager to show their stuff on the field.  With the bats producing runs, the Warriors’ pitching shouldn’t have an issue bringing in the victory.

BEREAN CHRISTIAN BULLDOGS
2012 Record: 10-6
Head Coach: Dave Lawler
Key Returners: Zachary Watson (Sr. RHP), Tony Giovannini (Sr. C)

The Bulldogs feature a mixture of youth and experience as they build for the future in their final year as an independent.

Leading the way is new manager Dave Lawler, who led Berean Christian for five seasons ending in 2006. He took a few years off and also coached at the middle school for a couple of years.

“This is the best team in my six years,” said Lawler.

Gabriel Mendez is one of the new players expected to provide a spark for the Bulldogs.

The Bulldogs are planning to rejoin the district next season, according to Lawler.

Lawler has selected senior right-hander Zachary Watson as the Opening Day starter, and he will play third base when not pitching.

Watson (5-8, 150) is also expected to be a middle-of-the-order hitter. So is senior catcher Tony Giovannini, who, along with Watson, have been part of the program since middle school.

“Both are very good baseball players, they love the game and they’re very excited about getting some more help around them,” said Lawler. “Both of them stuck with the program, (and) we’re really trying to honor their commitment so they’re our two team captains.”

Some of the help will be coming from sophomore Matthew Pena and junior Josh Stephens, who are expected to start in the outfield, as well as the double-play combination of brothers Orlando (shortstop) and Gabriel Mendez (second base).

“This year we have our better players returning and we have a great group of freshmen that moved up from middle school,” said Lawler, whose team plays at the Lake Lytal complex in West Palm Beach. “This is the first year in a long time that we had cuts so the level of expectation has gone way up.”

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