The top talent from a great decade for the Mat-Su Miners

The Frontiersman conference room served as a baseball war room on a recent Friday afternoon. I was joined by Mat-Su Miners general manager Pete Christopher, Miners board vice president Terry Johnson and Miners historian Chuck Griffin.

The mission?

Create a Mat-Su Miners all-decade team for the 2010 season through the 2019 campaign. With stats, rosters and notes spread across the table, the four of us tried to cut the list of the 302 different players who donned the Miners green and gold from 2010-2019 to one all-decade team.

It was a lot more difficult than you’d think. And it’s not because of a lack of options. If anything, it was a reminder of just how good this team has been, and how much talent has been on display at Hermon Brothers Field.

Let’s take a look at some numbers. The Miners were 291-175 during the decade, winning 62 percent of their games. The Miners won four Alaska Baseball League titles (2010, and 2016-2018) and finished second in the league four times. In six of the 10 years, a Mat-Su Miner was named the ABL Player of the Year. There are at least five former Miners expected to start the 2020 season in the Major Leagues who did not make the list. That’s how good this team has been.

Fans can’t forget that summer ball is different. Each season it’s a brand new team. It’s rare for a player to spend multiple seasons with the Miners. But the Miners have consistently been among the top two teams in the ABL. All of that credit goes to the work of Christopher and his coaches to recruit and maintain relationships with the top baseball programs in the country.

Let’s take a look at the list.

Catcher: Wesley Thigpen, Mississippi State

Thigpen hit .307 in 44 games in 2010. He was among the team leaders with a dozen doubles and also drove in 217. The Miners had a number of very solid defensive catchers during the decade, but Thigpen was good both at and behind the plate.

First base: Nick DiBiasse, Central Missouri

DiBiasse is the first of three Central Missouri players to make this list. It’s an interesting stat. The Miners are generally made up of Division I players, but Central Missouri is a Division II team. He was also part of the 2010 team that won the title, and hit .325. DiBiasse also 14 doubles and 32 RBI.

Second base: Levi Jordan, Washington

Jordan was a big part of the team that won the title in 2016. He led the Miners with 50 hits and 33 runs, while batting .316. Jordan also had only two errors in the field in 41 games.

Shortstop: Brett Schwartz, Central Missouri

Schwartz, another Central Missouri star, was named the ABL Player of the Year in 2010. Schwartz had one of the best seasons of any individual player I’ve covered during my time at the Frontiersman. He hit .420 with 66 hits and 34 runs.

Third base: Stephen Branca, Tennessee Wesleyan

Branca led the Miners with 43 hits and 24 RBI in 2011. He also hit .299, and played a very solid third base for the Miners.

Outfield: Pablo Bermudez, Florida International; Christin Stewart, Tennessee; Cam Newell, UC-Santa Barbara; Quin Cotton, Grand Canyon; Erik Webb, Central Missouri

Selecting the outfielders for this team was like being asked to pick your favorite child. Brutal. Bermudez hit .351 in 2010, and is the only player among the five outfielders we selected who was not an ABL Player of the Year. Stewart (2013), Newell (2014), Cotton (2017) and Webb (2019) were all named the league’s top talent.

Stewart, who is now starting in left field for the Detroit Tigers, led the ABL with five dingers and 31 RBI in 2013. He also hit .336 with 42 hits.

Newell led the Miners with a .351 batting average, 39 hits, seven home runs and 36 RBI in 2014.

Cotton earned the league batting title with a .331 average in 2017. He also had 51 hits and 24 runs. Cotton was drafted by Cincinnati in the eighth round of the 2019 draft.

Webb also won a batting title for the Miners in 2019 with a .368 average, and also led the league with 33 RBI.

Utility player: Andy Mee, Florida Atlantic; Brick Paskiewicz, Paradise Valley CC; Spencer Henson, Oral Roberts; Tanner Nishioka, Pomona Pizer

We opted to select four as our utility players, Nishioka is probably is the traditional utility player, logging innings all over the field for the Miners in 2015. The Pomona Pitzer product was very steady in the field, and stellar at the plate, batting .363. The remaining four are two-way players, who excelled at the plate, on the mound and in the field. Dating back to Monmouth’s Mike Kelly in 2003, the two-way guys have been among my favorite Miners to cover.

Henson helped the Miners win consecutive titles in 2017 and 2018, playing different roles. In 2017, Henson boasted a 0.61 earned run average in six starts on the mound. In 2018, Henson was just short of scoring the ABL triple crown. He led the league with seven home runs and 33 RBI, and was second with a .336 batting average. Henson was drafted by the New York Yankees in the ninth round in 2019.

Paskiewicz earned ABL Player of the Year honors in 2019 after a huge season. He hit .341 at the plate, was great in the outfield and led the league with a dozen saves as Mat-Su’s closer.

Mee was also a standout in the outfield and relief pitcher in 2010. At the plate, Mee hit. .352 with 32 runs and 37 RBI. On the mound, he was 4-0 with three saves in relief.

Designated hitter: Michael Donadio, St. Johns

As a traditional baseball fan, I will never support the designated hitter in MLB. But in the ABL, having a DH is a great way to spread the at bats around and allow the pitchers to focus on their craft. In some seasons, the DH changed by the day. But in 2016, Donoadio was consistent in that spot. He hit .325 with 25 RBI. He also drew 23 walks.

Starting pitcher: Tyler Stubblefield, Texas A&M; Eli Morgan, Gonzaga; Kyle Simonds, Texas A&M; Ian Churchill, Santa Barbara CC; Calvin LeBrun, Gonzaga

I’m going to start with LeBrun, a member of the team in 2015 and 2017. In his two seasons with the Miners, was a combined 8-3 with 77 strikeouts and only 14 walks. He also pitched more than 90 innings with the Miners.

Morgan and Simonds were also on the 2015 team. Morgan was finished in the top three in the league with five wins, 47 strikeouts and a 0.84 ERA. Simonds also won five games for the Miners that season.

Churchill was one of the best midseason additions during my time covering the Miners. In 2018, the community college product helped lead the team to a title with a 7-0 record, 1.55 ERA and 44 strikeouts.

Stubblefield was dominant in 2014, boasting a 5-0 mark and 1.09 ERA. He had a 45-7strikeout-to-walk ratio, and logged three complete games.

Relief pitcher: Thad Ward, Central Florida; Jordan Floyd, Kansas State; Josh Green, Southeast Louisiana; Bryce Tassin, Southeast Louisiana; Jacob McNairy, Alabama; Corbin Martin, Texas A&M

The Miners have had a reliever lead the league in saves in each of the last six seasons, and five of those players made our all-decade team. Paskiewicz led the ABL in 2015, and is one of our utility players. McNairy is the latest, saving nine games in 2019. Tassin had 10 saves in 2018, Green had seven saves in 2017 and Floyd closed the door on nine games in 2016.

But there have also been some really good set up men. Martin, who was drafted in the second round by Houston, did not allow an earned run in 16 games in 2015. Ward was 5-1 with a 1.72 ERA in 17 relief appearances in 2017.

Contact Frontiersman managing editor Jeremiah Bartz at editor@frontiersman.com.