Momentum isn’t supposed to last very long in baseball. It’s as good as the next day’s starting pitcher, they say.
For several members of the 2012 Wareham Gatemen, momentum seems to have held strong for a good six months.
Kyle Schwarber, Daniel Palka, Mott Hyde and Tyler Horan were four of the biggest reasons why the Gatemen put together their magical run to the 2012 Cape Cod Baseball League Championship. They combined for six playoff home runs and delivered big hit after big hit in leading Wareham past Y-D in the championship series.
Six months later, that quartet continues to rake on fields far and wide.
Schwarber, a sophomore at Indiana, is batting .378 with two homers, three doubles and nine RBI. Horan, a junior at Virginia Tech, is hitting at a .365 clip with two homers, three doubles and 14 RBI. Hyde, a Georgia Tech junior, is a little off the pace at .267 but he’s got five extra-base hits and eight RBI.
And few in the country have been better than Palka. The Georgia Tech junior is mashing the ball to the tune of a .489 average, three home runs, five doubles and 20 RBI. He’s slugging .800.
At some point, they might cool off, but the way last summer went, I wouldn’t count on it. The boys of Wareham’s summer are still shining in the spring.