JUPITER, Fla. – The Dulins Dodgers have undergone a bit of geographical remake over the last five years by sending the top teams from their base of operations in McKinney, Texas to the biggest Perfect Game tournaments as opposed to those from their original base in the Memphis, Tenn., area.
Other than that, nothing much has changed. Program founder Tim Dulin continues to send championship worthy entrants to the most prestigious events, like this week’s PG WWBA World Championship.
Most importantly, the coaching staff of Dulin, Scott McGarrh and Terry Bevington has remained unfailingly consistent with the message they convey to their players and that continuity continues to reap rewards.
“I’ve heard the same message whether it’s been 14u or now 18u from Tim (Dulin); it’s been consistent,” 2022 infielder Kolby Branch told PG on Sunday, speaking from the Marlins quad at the Roger Dean Complex. “The message is to play hard, enjoy yourself, have some fun; take care of business on and off the field. Just play hard through every pitch, basically.”
No one on PG’s panel of experts predicted pre-tournament that the Dodgers would win their pool, let alone emerge from pool-play as the playoffs’ No. 1 seed. But that’s exactly where they stand as they head into what could be a challenging Jupiter Championship Monday when the round-of-16, quarterfinal, semifinal and championship games will be played – all in a scheduled eight-hour span.
But hey, there is not a single one of the 100 teams that started play here on Thursday that wasn’t hoping to be in the position the Dodgers find themselves in.
“We’ve gotten great pitching since we’ve been down here, and the big thing is if you bring pitching and play good defense and you get some timely hitting you’ve got a shot,” Dulin said Sunday, “and it just worked out for us that we were able to do all that.”
Most of the fireworks were kept packed away until late Sunday afternoon when the No. 1 Dodgers took on the No. 32 CBA Marlins in a first-round playoff game that also happened to be a rematch of the pool-play opener the Dodgers won, 4-2.
This time around – and the time around that mattered most – the Marlins took a 2-0 lead into the fifth only to watch Dulins’ rally for a pair in the bottom of the fifth and a single run in the sixth and then hold on for a 3-2 victory. The Dodgers slapped seven singles in those two innings to chase home those three runs with a two-run safety from Andrew Mac Rose being a big difference maker in the fifth.
Once again the Dodgers got really fine pitching in the win, with ’23 right-hander Brad Pruett (t-500, Texas State) allowing just one hit and striking out four in five innings of stellar relief of ‘22 lefty Zach Erdman (t-500, Texas Tech).
Those seven singles – four in the fifth and three in the sixth – came off the bats of Mac Rose, ’22 Cade McGarrh (No. 130, Texas Tech), ‘ 22 Kolby Branch (t-500, Baylor) , ’23 Lane Allen (No. 369, Texas), ’23 Aidan Smith ( No. 253, Mississippi State), ’22 Austin Wallace, and ’23 Jacob Nelson (t-500). A total team effort.
The Dodgers didn’t exactly blow anyone out of the water on their way to grabbing the No. 1 seed, beating the CBA Marlins 4-2; Team Elite/Atlanta Braves Scout Team 1-0; and the Baseball U Prospect 6-0.
The biggest came in that 1-0 win over pool favorite Team Elite/Atlanta Braves Scout Team, a game in which unranked, uncommitted 2023 left-hander Kyle Bader threw five shutout innings of three-hit, seven-strikeout ball at the Elites, and ’22 righty Tyler Bogusz was nearly perfect over the last two frames to pick up the save.
“Obviously, you look at all the teams here – and there are some great teams here – they’ve got a roster of 28 guys and all of them have committed to the big schools and Team Elite is one of those teams,” Dulin said. “We just happened to be able to throw a little left-handed pitcher (Bade) that pitched really, really well … and he just carved them up.”
In the shutout of the Baseball U Prospects, 2023 righties Barrett Kent (No.335, Arkansas) and Carson Priebe (t-500, uncommitted) combined on a 14-strikeout two-hitter with Kent throwing the first four no-hit innings and striking out seven.
The roster Dulin and his coaches brought here this weekend is made up 100 percent of Texas 2023s and 2022s, 10 of whom are committed to D-I schools largely from the SEC and Big 12. The Dulins Dodgers organization has grown its Texas operation to around 20 teams while still maintaining teams in the Memphis area, its original base of operations.
Most of the 2022s on the roster were at the WWBA World Championship in Fort Myers a year ago as juniors. But in reality they’re getting a first taste of the “Jupiter experience” just like the 2023s are doing this year.
The majority has been playing together since their 14u seasons and have thrived while their Dodgers teams have enjoyed great success at the PG World Series tournaments. They know each other well and Dulin said he and the others on the staff sometimes find themselves just sitting back and watching the kids play. “Sometimes the best managers are the ones that just get out of the way,” Dulin said through a laugh.
“We do spend a lot of time with our staff on trying to figure out, if you can, who’s the best guy to go against this club,” he continued. “At the end of the day we’ve really done good with our matchups and our pitchers haven’t walked very many guys and they just attack the strike zone. Anytime you’re playing on big fields like this and they’re swinging wood, we’re not trying to pitch away from contact, we’re trying to pitch to contact, and it’s worked.”
When asked who on this team he really leans on for their leadership skills, Dulin didn’t hesitate when he first named 2022 catcher Easton Carmichael out of Prosper, Texas, an Oklahoma commit ranked No. 346 overall nationally.
Carmichael has been in the program since he was 14, following the steps of older brother Braden Carmichael, who is now at Oklahoma. Dulin called Carmichael the “core leader” because he’s been on board for so long and as the primary catcher he handles the pitching staff with ease.
“Tim, Coach McGarrh, Coach Bevington, they’ve done a great job of keeping our heads on straight and teach us how to play the game,” Carmichael said. “Everybody has bought into that culture of what this team is built on and that’s helped us in this tournament and even in the past. That’s why the Dulins Dodgers have had so much success over the years.”
Dulin also gave a shout-out to the ’22 shortstop Cade McGarrh and the ’22 second baseman Kolby Branch for their leadership skills. Those are the three guys he looks to, and it’s convenient that they’re right there up the middle of the infield.
“Our coaching staff is constantly stressing the little things,” McGarrh said. “We’re running on and off the field, we’re executing picks and pitches and bunts. The things that win a ballgame, the things that kind of go unseen throughout the game.
“(The staff) has stressed that since we were young kids and now that we’re here we’re living the moment in 18u; we’re taking care of business with the things we need to do.”
Throughout the two decades Dulin has bringing his Dodgers clubs to Jupiter he’s always been consistent in his approach. He constructs his rosters with a pretty even mix of seniors and juniors – with an occasional sophomore and freshman ragging along for good measure – to get the youngsters the experience of playing in the unique Jupiter atmosphere.
And that’s not just to get them in front of the pro scouts but also the college coaches they’re already committed to. It’s typically a limited roster built around players who have been in the program for multiple years, and Dulin has found more and more college coaches are looking for players who have thrived within the model of a “team” environment.
“I think building chemistry and teamwork is kind of a lost art,” he said. “We’ve just kind of stuck with the way we’ve done things and it’s worked for us. My ultimate goal for our players is to mentor them and develop them as good baseball players and help them get to college.”
To a man, the Dodgers have found the Jupiter experience simply remarkable, being captivated by the hundreds of roving scout-filled golf carts and really just the overwhelming number of people who converge on the Roger Dean Complex during the WWBA World Championships five-day run.
“It really is an unbelievable experience’ the atmosphere is unreal,” McGarrh said. “I thank Tim and our coaching staff for the opportunity to be here. This team stresses the little things and being here and soaking it all in is just an unbelievable experience.”
Now the real fun starts. Rain on Saturday forced tournament directors to move the brunt of the playoff
schedule to Monday, so now all that can be said is “Let the games begin.”
“There’s a ton of talent here, a ton of dudes, if you will, and you attack every player the same way,” Carmichael said. “Everybody here knows how to play the game so you can’t take a pitch off. You attack everybody one pitch at a time and see what happens.
“Hopefully at the end of the day you’ve done enough to be the winner. You just have to maintain focus … and go at it and keep grinding. You play against the ball; you don’t play against the other team, necessarily.”
Dulin said his staff’s message to his players has remained as consistent as the day is long. The trip to Jupiter is made for the benefit of them, so that the thousands of eyes belonging to baseball’s decision-makers can be trained on them one ballgame at a time. To give those scouts/coaches the opportunity to their jobs, which is to assess and project.
It really isn’t about winning the championship, Dulin said, a statement that might make purists cringe. They want to make a strong showing, of course – he was extremely proud of gaining the No. 1 – but a championship isn’t the end-all, be-all.
That said, it’s easy to get the feeling that these Dulins Dodgers would love nothing more than to cart that coveted WWBA World Championship trophy back home to Texas.
“We’re playing as a team; a lot of chemistry going on,” Branch said. “I think that’s one of our best qualities; we have fun all the time. We take things seriously, obviously, but we allow ourselves to have fun and let everything happen the way it happens.”
Carmichael is on board with that, as are the others: “It’s fun to watch us because we’re not guys who are super flashy; you don’t know a lot of us,” he said. “But we play together, we play the game the right way and we’re looking to make a run right here.”