A big outing in the batter's box vaulted a Mitchell athlete into the spotlight at the recent U23 Men's Fast Pitch tournament.
Tyler Pauli won the gold medal at the U23 Fast Pitch Championship in Quebec earlier this month, and finished as MVP and top hitter. Pauli says this was the most competitive tournament he's ever played in.
"Any team could have won. The games we won we won them by 1 run, and the games we lost we lost them in extra innings. So it could have went either way for us but this was the most competitive for sure, which made it extra special and extra hard fought that's for sure."
Pauli went 21 for 40 at the plate for a crazy .525 average, with 5 homers, driving in 15 runs and scoring 13 times himself in 12 games. He says he started to really feel comfortable in some tournaments leading into the U23's.
"We had a few tournaments in between, and I was hitting well at those tournaments and after the first day at the U23, I had a few good hits and I thought it could be something special because I was seeing the ball better than I ever had before."
Pauli notes that the approach of batting in fast pitch is different than traditional baseball.
"In fast pitch you don't have as much time, where in hardball you have more time to react but the ball moves more in hardball. So there's big differences in the movement, but the biggest difference is reaction time."
An easy tournament all-star selection, Pauli says winning gold was by far better than his great individual outing.