Brogan Walsh heeded his mom’s advice when she told him playing baseball away from home would be a great opportunity for him.
The 15-year-old Corner Brook native, son of Jackie and Geordie Walsh, is now honing his baseball skills at Newbridge Academy — a private school in Darthmouth, N.S.
His mom visited the school during a work trip to Halifax earlier this year to get a feel for what the school offered on both an academic and athletic front.
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When his mom returned home she promoted the school and he figured mom knows best. So within a week of chatting with the coach he was on his way to the next part of his baseball journey.
He’s been in his new surroundings for three weeks and admits it’s been an adjustment being away from home and tackling a hectic daily grind.
His day includes classes that are 20 minutes longer than what he was used to as a Level 1 student at Corner Brook High.
He also has to sandwich 90 minutes of baseball training into every day and he’s never had to do that before.
“It was really tough at first,” Walsh said from campus earlier this week. “It’s a lot quicker and there’s a lot of new stuff going on that I normally don’t see home, but I’m getting used to it.”
For the next month or so Walsh and his teammates will be busy honing their skills indoors and, once the weather warms up, training will move outside.
Walsh, a pitcher who is quite handy when he plays the middle infield, was a key player for the Corner Brook AAA bantam team and the provincial 15U male baseball team last season.
His focus is on working hard to earn a scholarship to play baseball in the United States and he figures Newbridge is a great place to learn the game and develop as a player.
“I just want to get better all the time really,” he said. “I’m always trying the best I can with 100 per cent on every drill at practice.”
He got a good arm. He is solid on defence at second or short. He can handle a bat.
But, for him, he believes his strong work ethic is what will help him earn and keep whatever baseball brings him along the way.
Work hard on every aspect of his game and get better each day is how he plans on finding his way to a college baseball scholarship in the United States.
