MARBLEHEAD — When Marblehead baseball coach Mike Giardi looks back on the 2017 baseball season, his first at the helm of the Magicians, there’s plenty to feel good about.
The Magicians battled with the challenges that come with playing under a new head coach and managed to finish the season at 13-10. They earned the No. 9 seed in the Division 2 North state tournament and started with a 6-4 win over No. 8 Boston Latin in the first round. Marblehead then eliminated Classical in a 6-2 upset win over the top-seeded Rams. The tournament run ended with a 5-1 loss to Gloucester in the semifinal.
“Being my first year as head coach, we weren’t sure what was going on,” Giardi, now in his second season, said. “We didn’t know what guys we had, who was going to be able to pitch or who was going to be able play. That’s the tough part coming in. You’re not sure who you have and who’s going to be healthy.”
Now it’s time for the Magicians to get ready for the 2018 season. Key returners at the plate/diamond include senior infielder Stephen Pappas, junior catcher/utility player Ben Brennan, junior shortstop Chris Gally and senior outfielder Cole Garavengi.
Giardi feels the Magicians will be in good standing this season if they can get the offense moving in the right direction.
“If we can get the offense going, it’s going to be real important,” Giardi said. “Everybody’s in the same position with struggling to get outside on the field. We didn’t have tremendous bats last year but we had some good hitters. We’re hoping our guys can all step up.”
On the mound, the Magicians will rely on three returning pitchers who each carry varsity experience. Gally will be joined by fellow right-handers Max Karras and Mitch Godes, both seniors, to form the top of Marblehead’s pitching rotation.
The challenge on the mound for Marblehead will be replacing the innings pitched by last season’s senior hurlers.
“The problem will be how many innings and how often can they go,” Giardi said. “With the weather, we might be piling up some games. We had a lot of guys last season who were eating up a lot of innings that are now gone to graduation.”
Marblehead, like the majority of other area teams, has been limited to practicing indoors thus far. The Magicians kicked off their tryouts last week and numbers are looking to be in their favor.
“I think the big thing for us is that we have a lot of players,” Giardi said. “We have 54 guys trying out and that’s a good thing. We just have to find the pieces that fit in the right way, that’s for sure.
“We have a lot of good energy,” Giardi added. “We’re still in the tryout phase so it’s tough to do a lot of coaching. We’re only a week into the season.”
The Magicians will be battle-tested in the Northeastern Conference this season. Giardi’s hopeful that a second look at the Greater Boston League teams, which merged into the NEC last season, will work in Marblehead’s favor.
“It’s going to be tough,” Giardi said. “It’s not our first go-round facing the GBL teams. The disadvantage is you only play everybody once. Baseball’s one of those sports where you try to see a variety of different players by playing a lot of games. We play 20 games and 15 of them are against teams we’ll only see once. It’s almost like March madness right away.”
Marblehead opens the new season April 9 when the Magicians host conference rival Swampscott.
