2023

The 2023 season was the first time I really noticed other players getting bigger and stronger while I had not started growing yet. It was clear that I was falling behind physically simply because I was a late bloomer. I played club baseball with Elevate 13U during the spring and early summer, and one of the highlights was finally beating New Level, a team we had a longtime rivalry with, in the championship of the Art Wright tournament. We had lost to them a lot over the previous year or two, so winning that game was especially fun.

The most memorable part of the season, though, was playing Little League Seniors and then Juniors All-Stars with a group of my eighth-grade classmates, many of whom would soon become my high-school teammates. We made it through districts and state pretty easily, traveling to Spokane for the state tournament and Bend, Oregon, for regionals. A lot of us stayed near each other in the same resort, and some of my favorite memories from that tournament were biking to my teammates' house or meeting everyone at the pool between games. We eventually lost to Hawaii and Northern California and did not advance past regionals, but making that run and traveling with so many of my classmates was the highlight of my 2023 season. That experience helped build team chemistry that I hope will be important as we try to make a state-title run next spring.