The Shadow
COVINGTON – While the 2024 Valley Baseball League season has come and gone, the accolades continue to roll in.
Recently the VBL announced the All-VBL North and South teams, which featured four players from Covington; Jorge A Garcia III and Thomas Marsala were named to the first team, while Spencer Williams and Chenar Brown were named to the second team.
For Garcia III, the accolades keep coming in. The right-hander out of Atlantis University in Miami FL, was recently named the South Division’s pitcher of the year and was also a 2024 VBL All Star for the South team. Garcia was outstanding this summer out of the bullpen as he recorded a 1.28 ERA and went 3-1, with four saves.
Marsala logged the most games played for Covington with 35. Marsala was a first-team South Division utility player where he batted a staggering .336, while also leading the team in hits with 44, but was second on the Lumberjacks in RBI’s with 20 and second in stolen bases with eight. In one of his best individual performances where he went 4-for-5 with three RBI’s in a Lumberjacks 10-4 win over Waynesboro.
In 31 games Williams posted a .287 batting average with two home runs, and 19 RBI’s. Williams finished third on the team with 31 hits. The outfielder out of Carson-Newman College had nine games of two or more hits. Much like Marsala, Williams’ best individual performance came where he had four hits in five at bats. The Seymour, TN native’s four hits came via singles in a 6-3 loss to Culpepper.
One can argue that Marsala and Brown were the 1-2 sluggers on the team. Brown hit .291 in 33 games this summer where he slugged four home runs and drove in a team-high 21 RBI’s. Brown, one of five VBL All-Stars from the Lumberjacks scored the second most runs on the team with 19. The Apopka, FL native was a second-team South Division utility player. The junior out of the University of Louisiana Monroe had 11 multi-hit games. One of Brown’s top performances came in the Jacks’ only win over Charlottesville where they won 7-6. Brown went 2-for-4 with a home run and three RBI’s.
