Baseball’s interim coach hopes to impress

Bobby Colla

Sports Editor

The newly named interim head coach for Hudson Valley’s baseball team is 23 year old Alex Jurczynski, and he has the credentials to be a head coach at this level.

According to Jurczynski, the school is still searching the country for a head coach, but he can still win the job.

“I’m really excited. We have a really good team this year,” said Jurczynski. He also said he wants the job permanently, but it’s not up to him. “All I can do is my job,” he said.

Jurczynski graduated from Schenectady High School. He then spent two years at Mohawk Valley Community College, where he played catcher for two seasons. During his time at MVCC, he led his team to a Final Four berth, and was named a captain for his sophomore season.

After his time at MVCC, Jurczynski transferred to SUNY Oswego, where he played two more seasons at catcher. During his senior season at Oswego, Jurczynski earned SUNYAC All-Conference and led Oswego to a conference championship. Jurczynski was the Catching and Hitting Coach at Oswego last season.

As well as coaching the Hudson Valley baseball team, Jurczynski is also giving hitting and catching lessons at All-Stars Academy in Latham. All-Stars is one of the top indoor baseball facilities in the area and Jurczynski said that he loves giving lessons.

“I love giving catching lessons,” he said. “I like giving hitting lessons too, but catching is just more in depth. Catching is working on different aspects of the game,” he added.

“With hitting, it’s teaching the proper technique, and then just repetition. But with catching, you get to work on receiving, dealing with pitchers, blocking, throwing out runners, controlling the running game and a lot more,” Jurczynski said.

Jurczynski said he also learned a lot from living with former MLB star Bernie Carbo for two weeks. Carbo was the 1970 Major League Rookie of the Year as a member of the Cincinnati Reds outfield. He also played in the the 1975 World Series with the Boston Red Sox.

All these things contribute to his hiring as interim head coach for this season, and he is not alone in his excitement.

During his time at Oswego, Jurczynski played a season with his current assistant coach Brady Farkas. Farkas was a pitcher at Shenendehowa High School and then again at Oswego. He is now the Vikings pitching coach and handles almost all of the responsibilities of the Vikings pitching staff.

He added that it helps that he caught Farkas at Oswego and according to Jurczynski, “Brady knows what he is doing. He makes my job a lot easier,” he said.

“Our pitching is awesome this year,” he said. He added that he doesn’t do much with the pitchers, just overview stuff. “I work mostly with the hitters,” he said.

Jurczynski also mentioned that the team is working on hiring another assistant to work mostly with the outfielders and throw BP. “I know it’s a little late in the year for that, but having another coach would be a big help.

Jurczynski is confident in his team, but said his only concern is the amount of games. “Every game we’re going to have a different lineup. I’m going to try to keep it as consistent as possible, but the scheduling does that,” he added.