Joe Andreas has been a solid contributor for the Ewing High School baseball team over the last two and a half years.
Now the junior is growing into a better leader too.
Andreas, who gained significant time towards the end of his freshman year, has built on his sophomore year when he hit .343 in his first full season starting for the Blue Devils. Through 19 games, he led Ewing with a .408 batting average and was second on the team in hits, one behind sophomore Sam Simpkins while trying to become a stronger presence overall for the team.
“It started freshman year when I had good leaders in the dugout to teach me things and guide me along,” Andreas said. “I just use things from each year I’ve played with the different type of leaders we had in the dugout and just try to take all that information and just be able to use it when I get to that position. I think this year is like a little bit of an intro into being a leader. It feels good to take that step so next year I’ll be ready to help the younger guys and make sure I give them my experience on the game so far from being in high school and just help them get through tough times.”
Andreas will have plenty of experiences to fall back on. He has continued to grow in the way that he has navigated the ups and downs of a baseball season. He has been conscious of not riding the highs and lows as much as he used to.
“As I’m getting older, I gotta really control my emotions, stay even keeled and be a leader,” said Andreas. “I just have to keep playing my game and just keep contributing to the team as much as I can. It gets tough here and there. Dealing with certain things, just keeping my emotions in the middle really helps.”
That’s been important for the Blue Devils as a team in a bit of a roller coaster of a season. Ewing came into the year expecting big things with their lineup back from a year ago. A 4-8 start might have totally derailed their high hopes, but then came a run late in the regular season to show that they could play to their potential.
Ewing won four of five games to reach the semifinals of the Mercer County Invitational Tournament. The Blue Devils fell to West Windsor-Plainsboro High School North in the semis, but their run showed their capabilities.
“I think that what we’ve done the last seven or eight games has proven what my expectation was in the beginning, except we just started a little bit too late,” said Ewing coach Dave Angebranndt. “I think the last seven games or so is exactly how I thought we would be playing the entire season. You talk about momentum, you talk about riding some waves, and I think that if you’re going to start out bad, as long as you figure it out and you start rolling about tournament time I think you put yourself in a good spot.”
Staying positive and working toward improvement has been a theme for the Blue Devils. As the wins started coming more frequently later in the year, Andreas noticed a change in the overall feel for the team.
“We’re keeping our mood even keeled, just keeping our emotions at a good spot, playing more with the team,” he said. “Our team chemistry is at an all-time high right now. We’re just playing as a team of one, playing selfless baseball, not selfish. So I feel like as a team we’re clicking together.”
Andreas traces the turning point back to the start of May. The calendar turned and so did the team’s fortunes in a 12-3 win over a respected Hamilton West team May 2.
“The game against Hamilton West is when we really figured out we could do damage,” Andreas said. “We won that game 12-3 and we were rolling. We played as a team, and I remember one instance in that game when we put on a squeeze play and we executed it perfect. And from that point on, I feel like as a team we really came together and we’ve played ball well together.”
Andreas has done his part to help the team wherever possible. After playing third base earlier in his career, he is playing second base. And he’s also moved around at the plate, going from ninth early in the season to second to then fourth in the lineup.
“Beginning of the season, I started off slow and was just struggling at the plate and I couldn’t really find it at the plate, which in baseball happens so I got moved to 9 hole,” Andreas said. “There’s nothing I could do about it. Then I just really started to figure out my mental aspect of it and just tried to figure out what I need to do at the plate in order to start contributing. Halfway through the season, I really figured out the bat which caused me to get moved up in the lineup and ever since then I just been on a tear and it’s felt good.”
Andreas’ handled the early slump better than he would have in prior years. And his maturity showed in battling back to earn a move up in the lineup. He fell back on his previous experience as well as his teammates to get through the down slide.
“I remember last year, about halfway through the season I was just going through a real bad slump,” Andreas said. “I just remember I was hitting balls hard right at people and getting frustrated. And then the mental side starts to lag when that stuff happens.
“So you gotta pick yourself up. But this year, I felt like I had my teammates around me and they picked me up and made me feel like I’ll get it next time and it’ll eventually come. And then it eventually came. I just started picking it up and again the mental aspect of it, I’ve gotten mentally tough over time and that has really helped this year to just make sure I got through it.”
Ewing as a team has gotten through it, working their way back within a game of .500 with a few games left in the regular season and chance to improve their seeding for the sectional tournament. The Blue Devils started to put things together at the perfect time, and it wasn’t just the games that produced new results.
“Preparation has gotten better,” Angebranndt said. “I think they’ve done a lot better at practice when it comes to trying to figure out what needs to be done next, taking what we’ve done as a mistake in the previous game and kind of hounding on it and making sure we don’t get it wrong again.
“I think our offensive approach has gotten a lot better,” he said. “We’ve put together a lot of good at bats with runners in scoring position, where before the course of that seven-game stretch, we weren’t doing those things offensively.”
Andreas has been a part of the productivity. He looks forward to continuing his progress in every area. As a player, it helps that he works year-round with the Trenton Thunder Baseball Academy. The offseason work has helped him strive toward his ultimate goal of playing in college, hopefully at nearby Rider University, where he’d also plan to study business.
Andreas has been dreaming of playing college baseball for at least eight years, and joining the Baseball Academy four years ago was another step toward that end. Andreas also used to play soccer for Ewing, but over the last two years he has put all of his energy into baseball.
“He’s just a workhorse,” Angebranndt said. “He’s the guy that comes out and you ask him to go run the bases 16 times and he’ll run the bases 17 times. He’s just a guy who wants to come out and get better by any means necessary. He’s going to put the work in. He’s going to put the time in. He’s going to educate himself on what he needs to do to get better.
“And he’s always looking for that next step to get an advantage. And he’s done that offensively, he’s put himself in good spots. He’s taking pitches. He’s swinging at good pitches, which is what we preach. We talk about being offensive in offensive counts, and if you’re offensive and offensive counts you’re going to get better pitches to hit, which as a result is going to give you better chances to get on base. And I think he’s running with it and I think he’s proven to himself that he can hang at this level.”
Andreas has been able to make an impact this year, and he still has a year left in high school when his role could expand further to what he sees now from the senior class. For now, he’s playing his part for a Blue Devils team that has leaned on its five seniors to pace an experienced group. They have combined to bring the team together for a stretch run that has Ewing in good position for this season and the future.
“We all know each other really well, and we have a small group of guys which makes it even tighter and closer,” Andreas said. “
With these guys being there, it really helps and you know you’ve got leaders in the dugout and you’ve got guys that know the game and know how to handle stuff. So it’s really good and brings up the team when you’ve got those kind of guys in your dugout,” he said.
Junior Joe Andreas plays the field during a recent Ewing High School Baseball game.,
