On Thursday, the preseason FAB 50 national baseball rankings as issued by Student Sports for the last 15 years and compiled primarily by Cal-Hi Sports editor and publisher Mark Tennis were released.
California’s competition in prep baseball is really second to none, even without a CIF state championship, because of the high number of leagues in which it’s almost impossible for even the greatest team not to get beat a few times.
Some of the leagues in the state this year will be even better than ever — particularly the Mission League in the CIF Southern Section and the Tri-River Athletic Conference in the CIF Central Section.
Two Mission League teams both were chosen in the top 10 of the preseason FAB 50 — Harvard-Westlake (last year’s No. 1 team in the state and returning Mr. Baseball State Player of the Year Jack Flaherty) and Loyola — with a third Mission League team listed among the next 50 top teams to watch. The Tri-River Athletic Conference, meanwhile, had three teams written up in the actual FAB 50 portion of the preseason package — defending section champ Clovis North, Clovis and Buchanan of Clovis.
Of course, that’s not to say that those two leagues are clearly head-and-shoulders above all others. The West Catholic Athletic League of the CIF Central Coast Section (St. Francis, Valley Christian, San Mateo Serra, etc.) and the Trinity League of the CIF Southern Section (Mater Dei, Orange Lutheran, JSerra, etc.) also offer intense matchups virtually every week during the season.
To check out the full package of the Student Sports FAB 50 preseason baseball rankings, CLICK HERE.
The Cal-Hi Sports State Top 25 preseason baseball rankings also will be out within days, but the softball rankings will be going first.
