UH baseball recruiting class draws national attention

The core of Hawaii’s 2014 baseball recruiting class has been known for a while.

With the addition of two left-handed pitchers from California in the last 10 days, Hawaii coach Mike Trapasso has put together perhaps his best early class yet.

Eight players signed letters of intent in the early signing period over the last week, including pitchers Michael Echavia of Amador Valley (Calif.) High School and Blake Taylor from Dana Hills (Calif.) High School, who made their commitments in the last month.

Those two join Hawaii’s quintet of local recruits — Waiakea’s Kean Wong, Mid-Pacific’s Marcus Doi, Saint Louis catcher Iolana Akau, Kailua pitcher Bryce Ah Sam and Hilo’s Chayce Kaaua — and Marina (Calif.) High School first baseman Jake Bauers, who committed before his junior year, to make up a class praised on Wednesday by Baseball America’s Aaron Fitt.

UH has never appeared in Baseball America’s 13-year-old recruiting rankings, but according to Fitt, the Rainbows "look poised to factor prominently in those rankings in 2013."

Doi (ranked No. 49) and Akau (No. 97) were ranked in Baseball America’s top 100 high school prospects rankings while Wong, Taylor and Bauers were listed in the top 150.

All eight prospects are seniors in high school. The key for Trapasso, as usual, will be trying to hold onto these kids after the draft next summer.

"It’s worth a gamble because of how talented they can be," Trapasso said. "You never know about the draft … but with college baseball recruiting now, a lot of these guys have been committed to us for over a year and during that time have continued to grow and improve."

Akau is considered one of the best defensive catchers on the West Coast while Wong, Kaaua, and Doi have the versatility to play multiple positions.

Bauers is a left-handed hitting first baseman with one of the top bats on the West Coast and Taylor is a top-of-the-rotation caliber pitcher starting with a fastball already in the low 90’s and a power curveball.

Trapasso said Echavia has a "high ceiling" and calls Ah Sam "a sleeper" who can reach 90 mph with his fastball.

"When you sign guys in the top 150, you talk about them having a tremendous skill set, being tremendous athletes and with that comes being very versatile," Trapasso said. "And that’s not a knock on the other three guys because we think they are going to be really good players for us."

Hawaii opens its season Feb. 15 with a four-game home series against Oregon.