CV’s Grimm, Prep’s Grable earn All-CIF baseball accolades
Will Grimm and Ben Grable often set the tone for the Crescenta Valley High and Flintridge Prep baseball teams, respectively.
Grimm and Grable entered their junior campaigns with high expectations and looking to lead their squads to the postseason.
The duo accomplished those goals and more, as they picked up All-CIF Southern Section first-team honors after the CIF office released its teams across all seven divisions Thursday.
Grimm was named to the Division II squad and Grable landed on the Division V team.
Grimm, a junior pitcher, went 9-3 with a tidy 1.18 earned-run average. The left-hander appeared in 16 games (13 starts) and struck out 65 and walked 36 in 83 innings. Grimm allowed 29 runs (14 earned) and 64 hits to help the Falcons advance to the playoff semifinals against Norco.
At the plate, Grimm hit .384 (38 for 99) with 27 runs, 20 runs batted in and a .495 slugging percentage.
“We’ve had a long list of quality pitchers in the program and Will came through for us with a great season,” Crescenta Valley coach Phil Torres said. “When you’re the No. 1 guy, you have to win the big games and he did that.
“Will just did a really good job overall. His change-up improved and his command on his curveball also improved quite a lot. We’ll be looking at him again next year and we think he’ll again do well.”
Crescenta Valley finished 20-10, 10-4 in the Pacific League to tie for second with Burbank.
Grable, a junior shortstop, flourished for Flintridge Prep (17-9, 9-3 in the Prep League for second place).
Grable hit .475 (38 for 80) with seven doubles, six home runs and 35 RBI. He scored 28 runs for Flintridge Prep, which reached the second round of the playoffs before falling to host Xavier Prep.
“He did an awesome job and it led to him having a breakthrough season,” Flintridge Prep coach Guillermo Gonzalez said. “He by far exceeded expectations.
“Ben came in and led the way for us and the guys rallied around him.”
Milan Tolentino of Santa Margarita was named the Division II Player of the Year and Seth Mattox of Xavier Prep was selected as the Division V Player of the Year. Santa Margarita and Xavier Prep won their respective division championships.
