Local travel baseball teams find success

Two local travel baseball teams took on some of the country’s top amateur baseball talent and nearly came out on top.

Out of the 91 teams from around the country competing in the Perfect Game/World Wood Bat Association World Championship in Fort Meyers Oct. 7 to 12, Winter Garden’s own Power Baseball 2021 finished in second place.

For many of those teams, most players are brought on whenever they play in major tournaments, but for Eric Lassiter’s side, that’s not the case.

“We used only our guys from Power Baseball that play in our organization — so no borrowed players,” said Lassiter, also the head baseball coach at Windermere High. “To be able to do that and come in second place is obviously a special thing and shows how good Central Florida baseball is.” 

The tournament started with 32 pools — featuring four teams each — and it was smooth sailing for Lassiter’s side as they went 3-0 against teams from different parts of the country.

Although PB 2021 came out of pool play undefeated, the tournament also went by numerous stats — such as runs given up — so the team ended up as the No. 10 seed. 

In the span of one day — Sunday, Oct. 11 — PB 2021 played three games and pushed itself into the semifinals against Scorpions Marucci after taking down the No. 2 seed South Charlotte Panthers in a dramatic 5-4 win.

“We hit a triple in the top of the sixth to win the game and close it out,” Lassiter said. “We were never winning the whole game, but one of our kids — Marcus O’Malley — hit a triple off the right field wall to take the lead by one.”

The following morning, PB 2021 beat the Scorpions 4-2 before falling to GBG Navy 2021 9-1 in the championship game.

With eight games in five days, Lassiter said his players had just ran out of gas after giving the tournament everything they had. 

“They start adding up quickly,” Lassiter said. “It’s funny, our coaching staff and our owners … were on the phone and I was just like, ‘I don’t even know if I can drive home right now.’ I’m exhausted and it’s like 1 o’clock in the afternoon but it felt like 2 a.m. It was an emotional rollercoaster for the guys.”

A week following PB 2021’s impressive tournament, Jesse Marlo’s Team Orlando 14U — a developmental team for the Power Baseball organization —  had its own runner-up finish at the WWBA 14U World Championship from Oct. 16 to 19 in Panama City.

After going 2-1 in pool play — during which the team lost to eventual champion Canes National 2025 — Marlo’s team had to go straight into a play-in game, which added another level of difficulty to Team Orlando’s title hopes.

“Honestly, if we wouldn’t have had to play that game, and we only had four games like everybody else, I think we could have won it, because I would have had one of my best pitchers still available,” Marlo said. “But (because) we had to play five instead of four, I had to use that guy to get there.”

Marlo’s side won that game 2-1 before going on later that day — Oct. 18 — to win two more games to get to the semifinals. The following day, Team Orlando would beat 5 Star 14U National 3-0 early in the morning before finding itself against the only team it had lost to.

In that championship game, Canes jumped out to an early lead by scoring two runs in the first and second innings, which would prove to be enough as Team Orlando fell 4-0.

Despite the loss, Team Orlando came away with a trophy, and Patton Pinkins was named MVPitcher of the tournament.

“If you feel your son is one of those guys (who) is kind of at the top of his class and you want him to really excel, I think it’s definitely something they should experience,” Marlo said. “You’re gonna see the same type of pitching that you see in high school. … (it’s) a great way to get prepared for high school.”