(Photo: Amanda Fewer)
OTTAWA- Baseball Canada announced today the names of 31 players invited to the Junior National Team’s annual Extended Spring Training camp at ESPN’s Wide World of Sports in Lake Buena Vista, Florida from April 20-29.
The team will hold daily practices at the complex and play an 8-game exhibition schedule against minor league prospects squads from the Atlanta Braves, Detroit Tigers and Toronto Blue Jays organizations.
All games will take place at ESPN Wide World of Sports, the spring training home of the Atlanta Braves, with the exception of the April 25th contest against the Toronto Blue Jays. That contest is scheduled to take place at the Bobby Mattick Complex in Dunedin.
The Extended Spring Training Camp comes follows the annual Spring Training Camp that took place in St. Petersburg, Florida in March. Both camps are integral components of the Junior National Team program and aid in the selection process of Canada’s roster for the upcoming WBSC U-18 Baseball World Cup in Thunder Bay, Ontario from September 1 – 10, 2017.
“We’re at the point in our program where we can get a sense of what our roster will look like in Thunder Bay,” said Head Coach and Director of National Teams, Greg Hamilton. “The Extended Spring Training Camp will offer our coaching staff an opportunity to evaluate players in a competitive environment, and at the same time, expose players to a level of competition that they will face at the next levels of the game.”
Hamilton leads the coaching staff that includes coaches Shawn Bowman, Hyung Cho and Mike Johnson. Guest coaches include former national team players and big leaguers Jeff Francis, Chris Robinson and Adam Stern.
Roster highlights:
-3B/1B Matthew Coutney (Wetaskiwin, AB) and RHP Tate Dearing (White Rock, BC) will make their Junior National Team debuts at Extended Spring Training.
-The other 29 players named to the roster all participated in the recent Spring Training Camp in St. Petersburg, Florida in March.
-Two players named to the roster were selected last June during the MLB First-Year Player Draft: OF Clayton Keyes (17th round, Blue Jays) and RHP William Sierra (28th round, Mets). Neither player signed and are therefore eligible for the 2017 draft.
-Two players (Cooper Davis and Adam Hall) named to the roster represented Canada at the 2015 WBSC U-18 Baseball World Cup in Osaka, Japan where the team finished in sixth.
Team Info:
Roster
Pitching Rotation
Schedule
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