By Michael Letendre
EAST HARTFORD – The Bristol Greeners just completed its third year of baseball in as many leagues.
And that wasn’t such a bad thing for the Bristol contingent.
After a three-win campaign in 2019, the pandemic saw the Connecticut Tri-State Baseball League cancel its campaign in 2020.
That cancellation actually spelled the end of the Bristol Greeners 11-year run in the league.
The Greeners moved on to the Nutmeg State Baseball League – an entry that only played on Sundays – over 2020.
The locals were extremely successful in the league, winning over a dozen games, and was more than competitive in Nutmeg State play.
That win total was the most the Bristol contingent compiled since posting 19 victories in Tri-State action during the summer of 2013.
But for the 2021 summer season, Greeners’ head coach A.J. Lorenzetti and crew joined up with the Greater Hartford Twilight Baseball League.
Bristol went 5-15 overall in its first year of action and wasn’t that far off from the Bristol Merchants (2001-2011) initial win total (7-21).
“I’ve definitely seen [positive] gains in some places,” said Lorenzetti of playing in the GHTBL. “It’s always tough when you have a young team.”
At one point, when wins were a little easier to come by in Tri-State play, the Greeners saw success with players like Tyler Bush, T.J. Wyrebek, Reid Roberge, and Tyler Cyr.
With those veterans moving on, the locals have gotten a bit more youthful in terms of talent.
The 2016 unit won eight games and in 2018, the Greeners snared 11 victories and played in the Tri-State Tournament.
But this season, Lorenzetti and Jerry LaPenta led a squad with the likes of Zach Marquis, Ben Mazzone, Kenny Knox, Trevor Mays, Noah Fradette, and Stephen Warkoski.
Those guys have a history playing ball in Bristol but that group was a bit on the youthful side overall.
“We had an older core that kind of filtered out a couple years ago,” said Lorenzetti. “It’s a new core with some of the guys my age starting to filter out a little bit too.”
The 2021 Team
Off that 5-15 ledger, the Greeners lost six games by three runs or less.
In fact, Bristol went 2-4 over its six games and all four of those losses were within three runs.
There was a frustrating six-game losing streak after that second win but the Greeners went 3-4 to end the regular season.
Bristol was 5-13 in regular season action and went 0-2 in the GHTBL postseason tournament, dropping its final game of the year to the Hartford Colts by a 6-5 decision in nine innings.
The Stats
It wasn’t all doom and gloom as Lorenzetti was named a GHTBL All-Star with an average of .321 to pace the squad during the regular season.
Keegan Bartis hit .250 for the year while Mazzone hung in with a .242 average.
Jon Pierce was second on the squad in hits (12) while Jonah Giblin was tied with Mazzone for this place (eight).
Mayes (27 Ks) started six games on the mound for the Greeners this year, Knox (2-2) was one of the league leaders in ERA at 2.10 as was LaPenta (1.46 ERA in 19.2 IP) when he was healthy.
Casey Horjus was 2-2 with two saves and a team-leading 28 strikeouts while Warkoski carried a 2.06 ERA in 17 innings pitched.
All the program can do is improve for 2022 campaign and with a player or two from Bristol American Legion’s baseball team (19-7 in 2021), the Greeners expect to be much better next summer.
“Next year, we’ll hopefully be able to reload with a few guys off the [Bristol American] Legion team. I know the Legion team won the zone this year so I know there’s a lot of talent there and hopefully, we can just pick up a few more pieces.”
“We are definitely not too far away.”
The coach
Lorenzetti has done a solid job leading the Greeners over the past five years or so as the program’s coach.
He’s put together a very competitive Bristol outfit and the life-long catcher gets to do a little more coaching on the field and not just from the dugout.
“The catcher is always kind of he captain of the field,” said Lorenzetti. “So it’s a bit second nature. It’s nice that I can tell what the pitchers are doing. As for the offensive standpoint, a lot of the guys have good at-bats. Certain guys know when to run, guys know when to lay down a bunt so there’s definitely at lot of mature players that makes it easier.”
“It was certainly a little bit more challenging this year with [my school stuff] but it was a lot of fun. I enjoyed coming to play every night.”
