Owen Diodati's Super 60 Experience

Owen Diodati C / 1B / A.N. Myer, ON / 2019

Each year the top seniors in high school across America find their way to Max-McCook Athletic & Exposition just outside Chicago to showcase their skills in front of hundreds of pro scouts for the first time in the new year.

The prestigious Super 60 begins a big step for a lot of these young players towards making their dreams come true of being drafted, and eventually playing major league baseball.

It is an honour to be named to the Super 60 roster, but even more so being invited as a Canadian. The country only sees roughly one or two players invited each year.

Catcher Owen Diodati was the lone Canuck participating in this year’s event on Sunday, which may have somewhat played into the nerves as he walked into the building, but he says that all quickly went away once he began getting into his routine.

“It was a big place so it was a little intimidating at first but once I got in there and started warming up, I saw a couple familiar faces that I had played with in the summer and the nerves kind of went away and it just became baseball again,” said the 6-foot-3 catcher from Niagara Falls.

The day consisted of the 60-yard dash, followed by a batting practice session and lastly the defensive drills. I wanted to focus on how this day felt performance wise, through the eyes of Diodati.

60-Yard

Diodati ran his 60 faster than previous occasions at 7.09 seconds, sitting in the middle of the pack among catchers. He has put on a lot of strength over the past year and isn’t looking to sacrifice any speed as he would like to improve on his 60 time.

“I ran it at a quicker time than I have in the past so it was a good start to my day. I still want to run quicker, my goal is to get under 7.00 by March. I think I could have ran it yesterday but it really just always depends on the day. Hopefully the next time I’m out I can run that at a sub seven but it was a good start to my day.”

Batting Practice