Travieso, Brinson Make History For Broward In MLB Draft First Round

The Major League Baseball Amateur Draft began at 7 p.m. Monday evening, and by 10:25, both Nick Travieso of Archbishop McCarthy and Lewis Brinson of Coral Springs had achieved their dreams of being drafted in the first round.

Broward County has never had two high school players chosen in the first round in the same year in the history of the Major League Baseball draft, and that brings me to why we started this site. It was to do whatever we could to help Broward players reach their dreams and to get to know these athletes and their personalities along the way.

The story on Monday night did not start with the phone calls Travieso and Brinson received from the Cincinnati Reds and Texas Rangers, respectively. Their stories began years ago, on the same Little League fields that thousands of kids take to every day of the week.

When kids are young, baseball is life. There are no girls. No scouts. There are no overzealous parents and advisors pulling players in different directions. There are simply bats, balls and gloves, the fun of playing with friends, and quite often the smell of freshly cut grass.

As players develop, and by the time they reach high school, the childhood game they once loved turns into a full-time job. Drones of players take to the high school fields, many believing they are bigger than the game. But a funny thing happened Monday night, and really throughout this season. Travieso and Brinson showed that a player can reach the top by playing the game the right way and putting their teams before themselves.

One of the joys of having a site like this is to be able to interview players in their rawest form — after a big game and sometimes after a tough loss. It is there that we learn about character. Over the past two years, I personally have interviewed Brinson and Travieso more than a dozen times, and not once did I come away with anything but admiration at the type of character these two players exhibited.

Imagine heading into your senior season at 17 or 18 years old as one of the top high school baseball prospects in the nation. Now imagine that your respective teams are favored to win state championships, and 20 to 30 scouts would be at every one of your games. This was the life Travieso and Brinson experienced this season, yet neither let their individual goals get in the way of their team goals.

“This season is not about me, it’s about us winning a state championship, and that’s our only goal right now,” Travieso told us after a mid-season game in March.

Brinson was equally as focused on the team goals.

“Even when I struggled early in the year, my teammates picked me up,” said Brinson after a big night at the plate in April. “The draft will work itself out, but really all I want to do is win a state championship. That’s been our goal all year, and that’s my only focus.”

While those two comments might seem to some cliche, the truth of the matter is, these are just two young men who were raised with the right values and understood that team success and humility would get them where they wanted to go.

Travieso’s Mavericks went on to win a third straight state title, while Brinson’s Colts won their third consecutive district title.

The two future stars had one more shining high school moment Sunday night. At a time when most players expected to be drafted were hiding out, Brinson and Travieso showed up at the BHSB Senior All-Star game to pick up their all-county awards and hang out with the friends that they made on the baseball fields of Broward County over the past four years. At this point, after building a relationship with both players, we would have expected nothing less.

I asked Travieso at the game what his plans were for the draft and whether he was having a big draft-day party.

“Nah, I’m just having some family over, and a few of my boys,” said a humbled Travieso, who seemed to be embarrassed just by the thought of being the center of attention. “Besides, we don’t have a very big house, so we can’t throw a big party.”

The next time a party situation rolls around, I imagine the size of his family’s house will no longer be an issue. Travieso was drafted 14th Monday night by the Cincinnati Reds, a position that last year got UF’s Jose Fernandez a $2 million signing bonus.

Brinson, on the other hand, had to wait a short while longer to hear his name called. As can sometimes be the case in a baseball community, coaches, parents, fans, and friends all had their own ideas of where Brinson would go in the draft. By most accounts, Brinson had played himself out of the first round this season, and was struggling to stay in the second round.

Showing again why most friendly banter among “draft experts” around the county should be taken with a grain of salt, Brinson was selected with the 29th pick in the first round, by the Texas Rangers.

Upon seeing the pick, I wondered into my office and asked my wife to find me Brinson’s number. Her response?

“I have it right here. I just texted him to congratulate him.”

As I prepared to dial Brinson’s number to offer my own congratulations, my daughter, a high school teenager herself, came in and heard the news.

“That’s so cool,” she said. “I can’t believe someone I actually know got drafted.”

And therein lies the answer to why we started this site. For years, players, coaches, parents and fans, have been forming bonds within their own teams, rarely getting a glimpse into what’s going on down the road at the next high school field.

That isolation no longer exists. We have become a bonded community, one in which even virtual strangers feel like family. Thousands of people across Broward rejoiced when Travieso and Brinson were announced as first-round picks Monday. Their tales had been told over the course of two seasons, and they felt like one of us, no matter who “us” was on this night.

“I don’t even know how I’m still standing,” said Brinson, when I finally touched base with the new Texas Ranger. “I don’t understand what just happened.”

And that’s the beauty of it. He was telling the truth. A teenager, overcome with emotion, watching his mother and family cry, but not fully understanding why. It’s because all any parent ever wants is their child to reach their dreams. Travieso and Brinson may not understand that now, but they will soon enough.

Good luck to both of you and congratulations from the entire Broward high school community.

Leave a comment using your facebook account!