The most encouraging thing about the Tracy High baseball team’s league championship season may be all the young players coming back.

The Bulldogs had six underclassmen on the squad, helping it to finish 12-3 in the San Joaquin Athlete Association (SJAA) and 22-9 overall. Tracy made it to the third round of the San-Joaquin Section playoffs, getting knocked out by St. Mary’s, 7-3 on May 20.

“I think we did fantastic,” head coach Vic Alkire said. “We had a great season and won league for the third year in a row.”

Even though the team did not make it all the way through playoffs, they impressed their coaches with everything that they did achieve.

“They went above and beyond our expectations,” Alkire said. “We lost a lot of our key players from last year’s team, so it took a lot of guys to step up and fill their places, and I think they performed great on the field.”

Having different players on this year’s team, the boys had to work hard to get to where they were.

“It was a completely different team from last year,” Alkire said. “I think last year we were dominating in our pitching, and then this year we stepped up as a whole team in everything we did. It was a more solid team this year.”

Senior outfielder Braedon Oki was one of the players that really stood out to the coaches and entire league. He won league MVP with a .526 batting average.

“I was shocked,” Oki said. “It was exciting. Last year was not my greatest year, so winning MVP this year made me feel really good.”

His coach was proud of him as well.

“I thought it was well deserved,” Alkire said. “He had a solid season from the first game of the season to the last game.”

Alkire is looking forward to the coming seasons.

“I think our future looks very bright,” Alkire said. “We had four sophomores, and two freshmen on the varsity team and that is very unusual for a baseball team.”

One of the top underclassmen on the team was sophomore Thomas Greely. He hit .366 and mainly handled catching duties.

“Greely was very good all year long,” Alkire said. “It was definitely not expected from a sophomore.”

Being on the varsity team as a younger classmen can be difficult.

“In the beginning of the year, I thought I would be lucky to even make the varsity team, let alone play,” Greely said, “but at the same time, I knew it was the game I have been playing my whole life which relaxed me a little.”

Another player who did exceptionally well was senior pitcher Anthony Nunez. He went 8-3 with a 2.35 ERA and earned a spot on the SJAA first team.

“Nunez didn’t pitch for us a lot last year,” Alkire said, “but he came in this year and had 8 wins when he pitched. When he wasn’t pitching for us, he was catching.”

Nunez has been playing baseball all four years of his high school career.

“I started each year,” Nunez said. “My freshman year I went straight to the sophomore team and stayed until I moved up to varsity my junior year. Something that really stood out to me this year was my pitching. I feel like I established myself, and I may even have a future with pitching.”

Both seniors plan to continue with baseball in the future.

“I’m going to play at Delta and then, hopefully, transfer to a four-year school and then make it into the pros from there,” Oki said. “I would love to play for the Colorado Rockies.”

“I’m pretty settled on going to Delta for a year or two,” Nunez said. “Then I hope to go to a four-year college. Whichever school I go to just depends on who watches me and who wants me.”

Alkire was named Coach of the Year in the league.

“It’s an honor, of course,” Alkire said. “It’s voted on by the other coaches in the league and it’s nice to know that the other coaches in the league think so highly of me.”

Bulldogs honored to the SJAA first team, as voted on by the league coaches, were juniors Jacob George, and Jacob Alvarado.

Earning second team honors were sophomore pitcher Brett Mansell, and senior infielders Dustin Dibble and Aaron Denholm.

Honorable mention went to sophomores Noah Denoyer, Thomas Greely, junior Robert Ramirez, and freshman Chandlyr Metal.