Michael Gajewski is of the belief that success leads to even more success. The Nutley East Little League Junior League (14U) team he coached this summer is just an example of that.
While some of the faces have changed from last year and the summers before that, the victories continued. One year after the Junior team made it all the way to the state finals, Nutley East had another strong tournament section as it won the District 2 title and made it all the way to the Region 2 final before falling to Fort Lee in the final on July 6.
“I never want to say that you expect to win. They expect to play their best, and they know that due to their success in the past, they know that if they play Nutley baseball that we have a very good chance to advance,” Gajewski said. “We have a really good group of kids. They’re fundamentally sound and what is that old saying, ‘Success breeds more success’? I think that is the case.”
That success means being able to win in different ways and according to Gajewski this was a team that relied more on pitching and defense and less on slugging than past versions.
“They definitely played complimentary baseball,” said Gajewski. “We pride ourselves on our pitching staff, playing defense and timely hitting. We didn’t have a lot of home run hitters, so we definitely took advantage of when we were on offense, putting the ball in play, stealing bases, hitting and running, and producing clutch hits. On defense, we didn’t make any errors behind our pitchers. We didn’t give any extra outs and our pitchers were great all year. They threw strikes and they kept batters off-balanced.”
Leading the pitching staff was Kevin Gallagher, a hard-thrower who had a big playoff run.
“He was our ace, he’s a throw thrower,” Gajewski said. “He put the team on his back on a number of occasions and gave us some big victories.”
Slotting in behind Gallagher was a fine collection of arms in Nick Benenato, Brandon Gajewski, Aedan Kupinewicz and Will Diaz. Adding to the depth were relievers Bryce Barrera and Ryan Puleo.
Behind the plate was Leo Fernandez, who Michael Gajewski said is one of the best catchers he’s ever coached.
“He’s a fantastic catcher, probably one of the best catchers I’ve seen come along in a long time,” said Gajewski. “He controlled the game from behind the plate and he was definitely one of our leaders this year.”
Kupinewicz and Brandon Gajewski also saw time behind the plate.
Benenato and Devin Telcide shared the first base position, while Andrew Clinton was at second base. Gajewski was the primary starter at third base and Puleo at shortstop with Kupinewicz and Gallagher also seeing action on the left side of the infield depending on who was pitching.
Gallagher’s primary position was center field, a spot that Billy Rodriquez also saw time at.
Barrera started in left field with Ethan Hudson and Sam Malinga splitting time in right field. Brian Dolaghan also saw time in the outfield and had some key at-bats.
More challenges await for this group, most notably freshman baseball at Nutley in the spring and the 15-16U Senior League in the summer. Majewski is hopeful that they continue to stay together and with it, continue its already long run of success.
“A lot of these kids that played on this All-Star team have been playing for years,” said Majewski, who was joined by fellow coaches Craig Clinton and Gil Rodriquez. “They’ll all be freshmen in high school next year, but I’m hoping that all of them will come back for the 15-16U. And I’m hoping that some of the kids that we missed this year (from last year’s team) will also come back and take and turn at it to see how far we can go.”
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Jason Bernstein | Observer Sports Writer
Jason Bernstein joined The Observer as its sports writer in March 2022, following the retirement of Jim Hague. He has a wealth of sports-writing experience, including for NJ Advance Media (nj.com, The Jersey Journal, The Star-Ledger.)