Lake County Sentinel: Gallas Proving Scouts Wrong
6/21/2011 12:00:00 AM | Baseball
By Justin Lada, Lake County Sentinel
"He's for real, he's intense, and he's committed."
Those are just some words from Captains manager Ted Kubiak about Captains outfielder Anthony Gallas. As of Friday afternoon Gallas is showing whatever he's doing, he's doing it well. He's hitting .350, with 23 doubles, six home runs and 20 RBIs. His .350 average is the highest in the Midwest League as are his 23 doubles and 63 hits.
Of course being the best hitter in the league and holding offensive records is nothing new for Gallas.
At Kent State he holds team records of 513 total bases, 224 RBIs 135 walks, and is tied for the teams all time record in home runs with 49.
Going further, he is the only player in the Mid-American Conference to ever record 200 career hits, 200 RBIs and 250 runs scored.
On all the records and his success at Kent State Gallas says, "I really didn't know what to expect going in, Josh Shorts (Gallas' high school coach, who coached at Georgia Tech and Hawaii) got me ready for Kent State, kind of engraved it in my head what college was going to be like so once I got there it was an easy transition. I came in with the same attitude with something to prove, nothing was going to come easy. I earned everything I got. "It got me ready for what's going on right now.
His senior year at Kent he hit .369, had 17 home runs, 24 doubles, scored 68 runs and drove in 81.
And he went un-drafted.
Well right about now he is making the other 29 teams who passed him 50 times in the draft look pretty foolish.
"Every day I have something to prove. I carry that with me everywhere", Gallas says about going un-drafted.
Gallas didn't have to go too far to continue his baseball career at any level. He played his high school ball right here in Ohio, at Strongsville High School, before getting a scholarship at Kent State. After the draft was over, his hometown team that he grew up watching, the Indians called him to sign him to a contract.
"It was like everything was validated for me. People said that I wasn't going to get drafted, some people said I would." "Once they called it validated everything, all my hard work, and I was a professional baseball player."
Despite not being drafted Gallas kept a positive attitude though. "I wasn't mad because I gave it everything I had."
Going from being un-drafted despite breaking conference records is motivation enough, but playing for your hometown team adds even more for Gallas. "It takes the pressure off; you just relax and just play." Gallas says that playing so close to home helps him more than it puts pressure on him. "It's pretty sweet (playing for the hometown team), I get to stay at home, separate myself from the field when I have to, it's just good because you have fans at the game every night and it makes it that much more special."
He's certainly made things special for the Captains this season and is making plenty of people in the Indians front office take notice now that he's here. In addition to all of his focus and hard work on the baseball field, off the field Gallas is focused on a different career as well. In the off-season Gallas is a real estate appraiser.
Right about now the pitchers in the Midwest League are wishing he would stick to real estate. If Gallas continues to swing the bat as he has in the first 49 games, he may soon be picking out houses instead of pricing them for others.
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