Pilots' Phenom Always Drawn to Diamond
By
Tom Markowski
Special for Second Half
April 19, 2018
WARREN – Baseball, at its core, is a simple game. Throw a baseball, try to hit it and then catch it.
And that was more than enough to hook Bryce Bush.
“Baseball was first,” Bush said when asked which sport initially grabbed his attention. “My dad got me started. I was 3 years old. We’d always hit, play catch. Everyday. I just liked it.”
Bush has been all in ever since. One of four underclassmen selected to the 2017 all-state Dream Team by the Michigan High School Baseball Coaches Association, Bush is a 6-foot, 205-pound infielder at Warren DeLaSalle. He started at first and third base his sophomore season and played those two positions plus outfield last year before moving to shortstop this spring.
“I’m the best athlete on the team,” he said. “I’m used to it. It used to be my primary position. At shortstop, you’re in control of the whole infield. (Playing) third base was harder. You have to come in on balls, and that throw (down the line) is one of the hardest to make.”
For some, the transition would be a difficult challenge. But Bush, 18, isn’t your typical high school player. He has all the tools. He can run, hit for power and field his position. Pencil him in anywhere, and he’ll succeed.
Bush said he’ll likely play third base or right field at the next level. Just where at the next level has yet to be determined. He signed with Mississippi State University, and it’s likely he’ll be selected in the Major League Amateur Draft in June.
Where he’s headed next will be decided at a later date, and Bush said he doesn’t think about it that much. He said there were 10 major league scouts at his last game.
“I have no clue at all," he said of which round he'll be selected. “(The scouts) try to make it as hard as possible trying to figure it out. It’s really no big deal. I have a good backup plan.”
Until then, Bush’s focus is on this season and what he can do to make himself a better player while helping his team any way he can. Last season the Pilots reached a Regional Semifinal before losing to Sterling Heights Stevenson, 5-4. In 2016, DeLaSalle won the school’s fourth baseball Finals championship as the Pilots defeated Saline, 7-6, in the Division 1 championship game.
Bush and the other 15 returning players from last season have a new coach. Dave Zelmanski, a 1974 DeLaSalle grad, was hired after Matt Cook left the program to take over at Grandville.
Zelmanski had never met Bush before last fall. The new coach was a pretty good player in his day, having played four seasons at Wayne State University – but he said Bush is special. Zelmanski compares his introduction to Bush to when he was invited to a Detroit Red Wings practice about 15 years ago before he became a sales representative.
“I was working at Chrysler at the time,” Zelmanski said. “And I’m meeting guys like (Joey) Kocur, (Brendan) Shanahan and others. Then I saw (Steve) Yzerman. He was it. Just the way he carried himself. When I went to meet the (DeLaSalle) team, I saw Bryce, and he was it.
“I was talking with Jake Badalamenti, he’s one of our better players and he was part of the state championship team for football. He was in the (batting) cage, and I asked him where Bryce was. Jake takes me aside and he put his hands at his chest and said, ‘Coach we’re all here, the rest of us.’ Then he raised his hands over his head and said, ‘That’s where Bryce is.’
“(Bryce) is as quiet as a church mouse. He’s the nicest kid. And there isn’t anything he does that the other guys can do.”
Bush has what some call “God-given” talent. And it’s easy to see why.
His father, Elwood Bush III, grew up on Detroit’s west side and played baseball at Detroit Cooley. He went on to play at Hinds Community College in Mississippi and on the National JUCO championship team in 1989. Bush’s uncle, Ricky Bush, played at Jackson State, and his grandfather also played baseball.
Bush also has a brother, Ryan, 25, who chose basketball and was a good player at Berkley High.
Bryce Bush played basketball too but stopped after his freshman year to concentrate on the diamond.
In addition to his natural abilities, Bush is determined to out-work the competition. He works at his trade six days a week, taking Sundays off. He’ll run a half mile or so to begin his workouts before going into light stretching and then a more strenuous stretching exercise called dynamic warm-up. Many of these stretching exercises focus on his legs and arms.
He’ll then work on his footwork and field ground balls for 20 minutes or so.
He ends his training hitting with his teammates or, if he’s alone, in a batting cage. He’ll use a 35-ounce bat at the start to get loose, then go to his favorite wooden bat. Hitting alone takes an hour.
“I remember when I was 3, maybe 4 years old,” Bush said. “And I’d use a toy golf club and just start swinging it. I hit a wall with it sometimes.
“Honestly, I like everything about baseball. The best feeling is, of course, hitting a home run.”
Last season Bush hit 16 home runs to go with a .541 batting average. Through five games this season, he’s hit just one home run – but it was a memorable one against Birmingham Brother Rice.
“The wind was blowing in hard,” Zelmanski said. “Nobody was going to hit one out that day, and (Bush) just crushed one. I mean, it’s hard to say how far it went over the fence, but it had to go 20 or 30 feet beyond. Nobody could believe he hit it that far.”
Tom Markowski is a columnist and directs website coverage for the State Champs! Sports Network. He previously covered primarily high school sports for the The Detroit News from 1984-2014, focusing on the Detroit area and contributing to statewide coverage of football and basketball. Contact him at [email protected] with story ideas for Oakland, Macomb and Wayne counties.
PHOTOS: (Top) Warren DeLaSalle’s Bryce Bush applies a tag against Lake Orion. (Middle) Bush, after playing a variety of positions over the last two seasons, will line up primarily at shortstop this spring. (Photos courtesy of the Warren DeLaSalle baseball program.)
West Rides Hot Start after Record Finish
April 21, 2017
By Dennis Chase
Special for Second Half
TRAVERSE CITY – Traverse City West has the blueprint.
Now the Titans are hoping to build off their success from last spring when they won a school-record 41 games and reached the MHSAA Division 1 Baseball Semifinals.
So far, so good. The Titans are off to a 6-1 start.
“We always keep the same goals, the same expectations,” coach Matt Bocian said. “Winning the conference, winning the District, those are the expectations. And then you set your goals a little higher (after that). Once you get a little taste of something (like a Semifinal appearance), maybe you want a little more. We try to keep them hungry.”
West returns just two everyday starters from a year ago – centerfielder Gavin Garmhausen and pitcher-third baseman Ryan Hayes – but several other underclassmen saw significant action.
“We feel good with the team we have – and where we’re at,” senior catcher-first baseman Carson Rosa said. “We have good talent. We just have to come to practice every day wanting to get better. Without that attitude, we’re going to flat line and we’re not going to be as good as we want to be.”
Rosa provided the biggest hit in the first couple weeks when he singled in Garmhausen in the bottom of the seventh inning to beat Flushing 4-3 in the opener of a doubleheader Monday at Central Michigan University. West won the nightcap 14-1.
Earlier, the Titans beat Coldwater 4-2, Hamilton 7-1, White Cloud 12-2 and Morley-Stanwood 12-1. The lone loss came in the Coldwater tournament to Fremont, Ind., 9-6.
“We’re not where we need to be, but we’re going to get better and better,” Hayes said.
Hayes was one of the standouts last season. He was 10-1 with a 0.90 ERA on the mound. At the plate, Hayes hit .418, one of four players to bat over .400.
As a team, the Titans scored 427 runs in 44 games, which is 10th on the MHSAA’s all-time runs list. West also pounded out 431 hits, also 10th all-time. The 41 wins rank sixth in MHSAA history.
“It was crazy,” Garmhausen said of last season’s offensive fireworks.
The centerfielder did his part, hitting .368 with 41 RBI, 44 hits and 47 runs.
The run to the Semifinals, where the Titans lost to eventual champion Warren DeLaSalle 3-1, was the longest in school history.
“We came from behind in every (tournament) game,” Garmhausen said. “It proved to us that we could do big things up here.”
Garmhausen has picked up where he left off. He’s currently hitting near .500.
Hayes, meanwhile, has pitched in two games. He went five innings, allowing no earned runs, three hits and striking out 10 in the win over Hamilton. He also went the first six innings in Monday’s triumph over Flushing, surrendering two earned runs and striking out nine.
Sophomore Brendan Pierce earned the win in the nightcap to improve to 2-0. Mike Laracey, Dan Ayling and Colin Campbell are all 1-0.
“I always tell my teams pitching and defense will win you games,” Bocian said. “Then you see if you can scrape across a few runs. That was our motto last year. It just so happened we had some kids (explode at the plate), and others followed.”
Garmhausen, Hayes, Laracey, Rosa, Ayling, A.J. Ruskowski, Sam DeKuiper and Tristan Reeves have wielded the hots bats this season.
Three of those players – Garmhausen, Hayes and Rosa – have particularly interesting backstories.
Garmhausen’s father, Brad, was a three-sport star at Frankfort in the early 1980s, earning all-state recognition in football, basketball and baseball. He coached Gavin in Little League.
His advice to his son?
“Keep working, keep a positive attitude and things will go your way,” Gavin said.
Gavin, 18, plays two sports. He was on the West varsity hockey team four years and was named to the Traverse City Record-Eagle Dream Team for his play this past winter.
Garmhausen is in his third year on the varsity baseball team. He bats leadoff and plays centerfield.
He describes himself as “a hard worker, a leader, a guy that wants to win, a guy that wants to set an example for his teammates.”
His coach agrees with that assessment.
“He loves the sport,” Bocian said. “He wants to succeed as much as anybody. He has a lot of tools. He’s put a lot of time into getting where he’s at – and it shows.”
Garmhausen plans to play baseball at Bradenton Inspiration Academy in Florida next school year before enrolling in college.
Hayes, a 6-foot-7 junior, is a bona fide three-sport star. He’s one of the state’s top football recruits in the 2018 class. Hayes holds 11 scholarship offers, including from University of Michigan, Michigan State and Notre Dame. A tight end-defensive end for the Titans, Hayes is being recruited as an offensive tackle.
The junior was the most valuable player in the Big North Conference in basketball. He led the Titans to the Class A Regional Finals – the best boys basketball tournament run in school history.
He also comes from an athletic family. His older brother Connor, also a lineman, signed with University of Pittsburgh out of high school. His father, Mike, was an offensive lineman at Central Michigan University. His mother Sue (Nissen) Arthur starred in basketball at CMU. She’s the school’s second all-time leading scorer and was a freshman All-American and a three-time first-team Mid-American Conference honoree. Arthur was inducted into CMU’s Hall of Fame in 2001.
(Incidentally, at CMU, Arthur played with Traverse City’s Suzy Merchant, Molly (Piche’) Russell and Wendy (Merriman) Sherwin and Gaylord St. Mary’s Lori (McCluskey) Phillips. While Merchant is now the women’s basketball coach at MSU, Arthur, Sherwin and Phillips all reside in Traverse City and their children have gone on to success at three different schools.
Sherwin’s three sons – Ben, Sam and Jack – were linemen on Traverse City Central’s 9-2 football team last fall that won a second consecutive Big North Conference title. Their offensive line position coach? Their father, Greg, a former lineman at CMU. Ben, a senior, signed with Ferris State.
Phillips’ son, Noah, plays basketball at Grand Valley State. The 6-8 Phillips averaged 19.8 points and 7.2 rebounds his senior season at St. Francis. Juliana, a current senior at St. Francis, just earned all-state laurels in basketball, to go with similar honors in volleyball. She’ll attend St. Louis University on a volleyball scholarship in the fall.)
In another year, Ryan Hayes will be gearing up for college. He planned to make a decision where – and notify college football coaches – late this summer, but that timetable has been moved up.
For now, he’s enjoying baseball. And when asked if there’s a sport he doesn’t like, he laughs.
“Not really,” he said. “I like them all.”
Hayes has a fastball that’s been clocked at 89 miles per hour, he said, although he hasn’t thrown that hard in this cold, spring weather. Still, he has 19 strikeouts in 11 innings.,
“Ryan came in last year as a sophomore, not projected to be our No. 2 starter, and he ended up 10-1,” Bocian said. “When you look at his athleticism, and the opportunities he has as a player in all three of his sports, it’s mindboggling.”
Like Ben Sherwin, Carson Rosa signed to play football at Ferris State.
It’s where Rosa’s father, Mark, played baseball after a standout career at Clare High School. Mark Rosa was inducted into the Clare Hall of Fame in 2013.
Carson Rosa’s senior football season was interrupted by injury. The 6-5, 220-pound senior quarterback had led the Titans to impressive wins over Midland and Grand Haven to start what looked like a promising season. Then, in a week three showdown with Traverse City Central, he dislocated his right ankle and broke his fibula when he was hit attempting a pass and his cleat caught in the artificial turf.
Incredibly, he returned after six weeks to start West’s playoff game, also against Central.
“My doctor, Dr. (Tom) O’Hagan, planted the seed in my mind that it was going to be at least a six-week recovery,” Rosa said. “That meant I was going to strive for that six weeks. All I was focused on was school and rehab.”
Rosa wondered if college coaches would back off. Not all did.
“I got a couple texts,” he said. “They were like, ‘Sorry to hear about your injury. We’d still like to have you as part of our team in the future.’ That was nice to know because I wasn’t going to get a senior year to prove (myself).”
Ferris was one of the schools that kept in touch.
“They see me as an athlete who has the potential to play multiple positions, not just quarterback,” Rosa said. “I could be an H-back.”
Rosa also played three sports until this season. He gave up basketball since his ankle was still sore.
“I wanted to be 100 percent ready for baseball,” he said. “I love baseball. It was my sport until I started playing football in eighth grade. But I still love it and I did not want to sacrifice the season that we’re going to have because I knew we were returning some good talent – and I was going to get to play with my best friends.”
Rosa is off to a hot start. He belted a two-run homer in the Morley Stanwood tournament.
“He’s got all the tools to be successful,” Bocian said. “He’s a gamer. When it’s game time, that’s when Carson is at his best.”
Now, if the weather would just improve. West might still be a couple weeks away from hosting its first twinbill. In the meantime, the Titans are hitting the road. Their travels will take them to Grand Rapids Forest Hills Northern on Saturday.
Dennis Chase worked 32 years as a sportswriter at the Traverse City Record-Eagle, including as sports editor from 2000-14. He can be reached at [email protected] with story ideas for Manistee, Wexford, Missaukee, Roscommon, Ogemaw, Iosco, Alcona, Oscoda, Crawford, Kalkaska, Grand Traverse, Benzie, Leelanau, Antrim, Otsego, Montmorency, Alpena, Presque Isle, Cheboygan, Charlevoix and Emmet counties.
PHOTOS: (Top) Traverse City West pitcher Ryan Hayes works on a hitter during last season’s Division 1 Semifinal loss to Warren DeLaSalle. (Middle) Gavin Garmhausen, also here against DeLaSalle, joins Hayes among returning starters this spring.