The Leader got to talk to Spencer Trawick this weekend at the Mission Valley Firecracker Tournament. The 19-year-old from Polson is currently playing college baseball at Gray’s Harbor Community College in the state of Washington.

What was your career with the Mission Valley Mariners like?

We had pretty good success over the past three years that I've been here with winning. Jami [Hanson] and Joe [Locke] have been really, really good coaches for us.

They taught me a lot along with a few of my previous coaches in the past. I learned the most from them and it's going well in college. I'm tweaking a lot of my pitching styles; I'm throwing faster and more accurate now.

Where are you playing college ball now?

Gray's Harbor Community College in Aberdine Wash. It's a nice college, it's not extremely well-known, so far, but we're getting more players there. Hopefully next time we'll have a better season and help ourselves out more.

How is playing college baseball going for you?

I've never been a big fan of school. Overall, school isn't that bad, I've been learning a lot.

I've kept my grades up pretty well. You have to keep about a C-average for every college, otherwise, they wont let you play. It's to keep the baseball players from not just going for their athletic experience but for academic reasons too. I've enjoyed it so far.

What pitches do you have?

I have five, but so far I've been allowed to throw three in games.

I should be able to bring a fourth one in soon. I throw a four-seam fastball, a 12-6 curve ball and a change up. The two that I don't really throw that often that I wish I could throw more are a splitter and knuckleball. They're working with me right now so I can bring in the splitter for games.

Were you a starter or closer for Gray's Harbor?

I came in this year as a freshman so I didn't expect to play that much.

I moved into the closer role for our team. I'd come in every once in a while for one or two innings when they didn't want anyone to score in.

I didn't do too bad, but unlucky for us, we didn't have the best record to show for it.

I'm hoping this upcoming year that I can move into the starter role since we're only getting six of our guys back. We lost a lot of sophomores since it's a two-year college. We're basically going with freshmen that are coming back.

What's playing on the Washington peninsula like?

You learn to play through a lot of rain. It's not bad, but we've had a lot of times in the fall and winter where we cant go outside because there's too much rain and it's cold.

We get a lot of inside gym work and inside training facility work in. Overall it's a really good place to play; it's basically one solid temperature.

There's not much changing, you just got get use to playing in the rain. Most of the baseball players I talk to when their games get canceled they think they should play through them and not have them canceled.

What's the difference between Legion and college ball?

It was basically how my college coach described it. It's a lot harder but you have to think of it as you're playing against the all-stars of other legion and high school teams.

So basically take every one of the best players around your league and bring them up. And you're throwing against those same guys. Baseball has not changed for me at all.

It's still just as fun even though there's a little more responsibility. You get a little more discipline during college ball because they want you to do better, so they're pushing you. It's still the same fun loving sport that I've enjoyed.

What do you want to do in the future?

I'd really like to get good enough to continue on in my career, like maybe make it to some major league team. But right now I'm focused on playing, just keeping my mind inside the game so I don't let it sidetrack me from baseball. I'm going in for welding and hoping that I'm going to get an associates degree in that.

It's always good to have a back-up career, you don't just want to aim for one thing.

and not have it work out and then have nothing to fall back on.