Season Preview: Bridgemen Baseball Team on Their Way to Florida

At 4:45 Tuesday morning, the Fort Lee Bridgemen baseball team started their journey to Florida that includes a season-opening set of games and a bonding experience unlike any other.

Where most local teams must deal with the cold Northern New Jersey weather for at least another week, Fort Lee has the luxury of a six-day journey to the home of the Atlanta Braves spring training facility, where they will play a pair of scrimmages and their first two games of the season.

“We are very lucky,” said senior third baseman Troy Mattesich. “There are not a lot of teams that get to go.”

And Fort Lee used to be one of those teams until head coach Mike Raferty took over the program in 2006 and made it a goal to establish a trip like this.

It took a few years for the proposal to be accepted last year for the team’s first opportunity, but after returning home, Raferty was already working on the 2011 pilgrimage.

“We have been very lucky that this administration has been very supportive of this trip and trips like this,” the coach said. “They see how it benefits the kids.”

Just dropping off the equipment on Monday night sent a swarm of smiles to the faces of the Bridgemen players as they arrived at the High School and began processing the journey they were embarking on.

“This is my second time going and I still feel the same excitement as I did last year,” junior shortstop Ross Fasman said. “It’s a great experience.”

The players are also taking extra steps to make it even more memorable. Various Bridgemen players have shaved their heads into "Mohawks" to symbolize team unity, an idea of senior captain Mike Frankel, .

“That is just like a team unity thing,” said senior starting pitcher John Hroncic. “We just got the team together so we could all be together before we go on the trip. Do something as a team that we usually don’t do.”

And the boys are looking forward to all of the bonding time that will take place over the next few days.

“When you’re living, working, and breathing with the same guys for a week straight, you are going to create bonds,” said Coach Raf. “You are going to learn things about people on your team that you did not know.”

The team also donned official Fort Lee baseball orange t-shirts to show more togetherness as they start their trip.

The Bridgemen are not wasting much time in Florida as they will hold a practice Tuesday night in anticipation of a scrimmage against Horace Mann High School (NY) on Wednesday at 4 p.m. Fort Lee will then play another exhibition game verses Collegiate School (NY) at 8 a.m. Thursday before playing their first official game on Friday.

But what can get lost in a trip like this, is that the players are student athletes and must deal with missing class for four days, something the staff has thought of well ahead of time.

“One of the major reasons that we are allowed to do this is because I set them up with study periods once a day,” Raferty said. “They still are student athletes.”

So with the mandatory study sessions, players will actually be able to work on their homework as well as their baseball skills, and still make sure that they don’t miss any tests in the process.

The players went from teacher to teacher a week ago with an assignment list to make sure they knew everything that was due during their baseball trip.

All of this work builds up to Friday when New Jersey High School teams are allowed to play their first official games of the baseball season. Fort Lee will play Orangeburg Preparatory School (SC) at 8 a.m. that day and then compete against Abington High School (PA) on Saturday at 1:30 p.m.  

That begins a season with high aspirations for the Bridgemen, who look to become the first ever Fort Lee team to make the County Tournament. The team finished two games under .500 last year but return eight starters this season, including the top three arms in the rotation.

“The lineup is probably the best I have seen in my four years,” senior John Hroncic said. “Everyone can hit and everyone is as athletic as each other. We should have a great team this year and I expect a lot from us.”

To do so, the team will have to compete with the likes of Dumont, who has won the league championship the last three years and a Westwood team that was one of the last four teams remaining in the county tournament.

“This year, I am expecting to make the state tournament and expecting to make a run for counties. If that were to happen, if that does occur,” coach Raferty said, “it would be the first time that Fort Lee High School has ever made the county tournament. How often do you get a chance to make history?”

So with players like senior Pedro Lopez returning at second base and pitchers like Bryan Halpern leading the way on the mound, Fort Lee looks to do something that has never been done before, and the mission to get there begins Tuesday in Florida.