Mercer County NJ All Stars in Championship at Citizens Bank Park

This is big...and personal for me. The Mercer County All Star baseball team will be playing in the championship game of the Carpenter's Cup Classic at Citizens Bank Park on Thursday (June 24th), according to The Trentonian.

The Mercer County all star team is made up of the best of the best high school baseball players in the county (The Hun School, Steinert, Notre Dame, Allentown, Lawrence, Hightstown, Ewing, Hamilton High West, Robbinsville, Princeton, West Windsor Plainsboro South, Hopewell Valley). It's personal for me because my cousin, Carson Applegate, stellar player from The Hun School, is on the team.

This is a big deal. It's the 35th annual Carpenter's Cup Classic. It's a 16 team, single elimination tournament, gathering 400 of the greatest players from the tri-state area, to compete against each other. Talk about talent.

Team Mercer County beat reigning champs, Burlington County, in its first game last week, and then took down Lehigh Valley in the semi-finals. Team Lehigh Valley was runner up in 2019. The tournament was canceled last year (2020) because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Mercer County takes on Tri-Cape (Tri-County and Cape-Atlantic League all-stars) for the championship game Thursday at 10am at the home of the Philadelphia Phillies. Carson will be pitching. Game time is 10am. Our entire family is so proud of him.

College coaches and major league scouts show up at these games to take a look at up-and-coming talent, so it's a huge chance for these boys to show 'em what they got. My cousin, Carson, is already committed to D1 school, University of Kentucky.

Those amazing baseball skills run in the family. Another one of my cousins, Jason Applegate (Carson's older brother), was also a star baseball player for The Hun School ('15) and had the second-highest win total as a pitcher in school history his senior year at Villanova ('19).

Go Team Mercer. Good luck, Carson. The whole family is rooting for you. We love you always.

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