Nick Dumesnil is enjoying his first time in sa国际传媒, and Victoria HarbourCats fans are glad the Cal-Baptist slugger crossed the border to play summer ball this year.
The six-foot-two, 205-pound second-baseman and outfielder has been bombs away and leads the team and is second in the West Coast League with four home runs. Dumesnil is fourth in HarbourCats batting with a .301 average behind Tyler Davis’.352, Michael Crossland’s .347 and Jack Johnson’s .303 (among a league officially countable minimum of 2.7 plate appearances per team game) following Thursday night’s 9-7 win against the Edmonton Riverhawks before 1,536 fans at Wilson’s Group Stadium at Royal Athletic Park.
Victoria moved to 14-4 and Edmonton fell to 4-13 as Crossland had a homer with two hits total, three RBIs and two runs scored for Victoria and Johnson also a home run.
“We are off to a great start and want to keep the momentum going,” said their teammate Dumesnil, the native of Huntington Beach, California, during the three-game series sweep against the Riverhawks.
“It’s been a full team effort. If one guy has an off game, the other guys are there to pick him up.”
Dumesnil hasn’t missed a beat from his outstanding freshman season at Cal-Baptist in which he made 13 starts and 20 appearances for the Lancers in the WAC, hitting .333 with a slugging percentage of .444 with five doubles in the mix and no errors in fielding.
“This has all been a new experience in a different country.”
But he has adapted well.
The WCL is among several summer collegiate leagues across North America in which NCAA players can extend their seasons into the summer after their university and college seasons end in the spring. Summer ball is an opportunity not to be squandered, especially when your coach in Victoria is five-season former major-leaguer Todd Haney. Asked what he wants to get out of the experience in terms of development, Dumesnil said: “I want to be more mature at bat and understand myself more and to be more locked in.”
That’s the power part. Dumesnil also has ample speed and said the other thing he is learning from Haney is how to use it to be a better base runner, as attested by Dumeesnil’s two stolen bases Thursday night for 12 on the season.
“These are all fresh opportunities to learn,” said Dumesnil.
It isn’t lost on any of these players that there are 40 WCL alumni in the Major League Baseball this season and 20 who played in the 2023 World Baseball Classic. Or that four former HarbourCats have gone on to play in MLB. Nick Pivetta is with the Boston Red Sox and Andrew Vaughan with the Chicago White Sox and Nathan Lukes has played with the Toronto Blue Jays and Alex De Goti with the Houston Astros.
“It’s cool to see a lot of players from summer leagues have gone on. We here all have pro dreams. But it’s one pitch at a time,” said Dumesnil.
NCAA is weekend baseball due to classes. Summer collegiate ball better emulates what these players will face if they go onto pro ball and start in Single A, with games almost every night, and hours of rumpled bus travel on the road.
“It’s fun to play every day, and if you have a bad game, there is always tomorrow to redeem yourself,” said Dumesnil.
Dumesnil was held hitless in three trips to the plate as DH on Thursday but reached base twice on a walk and being hit by the pitcher.
The HarbourCats open a key three-game set tonight in Bellingham against the Bells (12-3). Victoria then starts a three-game series Monday in Kelowna.
