Hart High School baseball head coach Jim Ozella has seen quite a few ball players wear a Hart jersey in his 20 plus years coaching, but none much better than the four Hart alumni who are currently playing in MLB Spring Training.
Mike Montgomery(‘08), Trevor Bauer(‘08), Pat Valaika(‘10), and Tyler Glasnow(‘11) all started their careers in Santa Clarita and now find themselves playing baseball at the highest level in the world.
Montgomery entered the Big Leagues in 2015 with the Seattle Mariners, and has also played for the Chicago Cubs and Kansas City Royals, including winning the World Series with the Cubs in 2016. During the Cubs postseason run, Montgomery appeared in 11 games and posted a 3.12 ERA. Last year Montgomery’s season with the Royals was cut short due to a late injury and appeared in only three games. In the offseason he signed a minor league contract with the New York Mets and thus far has pitched in one Spring Training game, giving up no earned runs and striking out one.
Valaika hit for a career best .277 batting average in 2020, his first season with the Baltimore Orioles. The Valencia, California native is one of the best utility defensive players in the league. Even in a 60-game season last year, he managed to play every defensive position except for pitcher and catcher. Valaika has played in five Spring Training games so far and has tallied two hits including a home run. He has also walked twice.
Related Sports To Resume In The Hart District With Limited Fans Allowed
With star pitcher Blake Snell’s departure from the Tampa Bay Rays, Glasnow now becomes the unquestioned number one of the staff. The 27 year old has already started 8 postseason games in his young career, including two in last year’s World Series against the Los Angeles Dodgers. Glasnow is looking to bounce back from a 2020 season that saw him regress from his stellar 2019 season. In 2019, his season was cut short due to injury, however was able to record a 1.78 ERA in his 12 starts. In 2020, Glasnow’s ERA increased to 4.08. This can partially be chalked up to him giving up 11 home runs in 11 starts compared to only 4 in 12 starts in 2019. Glasnow did increase his strikeout totals last season, posting a career high 14.28 strikeouts per 9 innings. Glasnow has appeared in only one Spring Training game this year in which he pitched 1.2 innings, giving up two runs and striking out three batters.
Trevor Bauer is returning home. After graduating from Hart, the star pitcher stayed close to home, playing his college ball at UCLA before being drafted third overall by the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2011. Bauer, the 2020 National League Cy Young Award winner, signed a contract worth $102 million over the next three seasons with the Dodgers. Bauer will only bolster a Dodgers pitching staff that had the best ERA in baseball last season. Bauer has proven himself in limited time thus far in Spring Training. He has pitched five shutout innings while also striking out five batters. There’s no doubt that the Santa Clarita native will be a key role in the Dodgers success this season as they look to become the first team to win back to back World Series championships since the New York Yankees won three straight from 1998 to 2000.
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