Meet Brady Guzzie, Conwell-Egan’s triple-threat star and one of Pa.’s top baseball prospects

At Conwell-Egan’s baseball field, Brady Guzzie is easily identifiable.

You don’t need to know what he looks like, or even his number to pick him out, says head coach Jeff Manto, you just need to look for the first one to the dugout.

“He gets out and gets to the baseball field. Does his arm band work, he does his stretch work, he does his hitting work, he does all the stuff he’s supposed to do,” Manto said. “He’s not a voice-first guy, but he’s extremely talented, and leading by example.”

The 6-foot-2 junior, ranked No. 3 in the state by Prep Baseball Report, is a triple-threat for Egan. He’s the ace on the mound, as well as one of the team’s leading hitters, and plays center field.

Against Catholic League teams in the regular season, the left-handed pitcher had a 0.61 ERA and a .373 batting average to be named the league’s most valuable player.

Guzzie said he’s been a “smooth operator on the mound” with his mechanics coming easy since he was young. And Manto can attest. He said Guzzie came to Conwell Egan “as advertised.”

“This kid came in really good. There’s nothing that we did that was fancy to say, ‘We have the magic dust on pitching,’” Manto said. “His mechanics are sound, pitching- wise and hitting-wise. All we do is just try to refine some things. And he has done 99% of the work.”

With his natural ability and work ethic, Guzzie is the “total package,” his coach said. But there is another aspect that adds to his well-roundedness as a player: his ability to be a teammate and leader.

“He’s a good dude,” Manto added. “His makeup and how he acts around people, how he acts along the team, speaks louder than his talent.”

» READ MORE: Reggie King, son of former Sixers GM Billy King, took his talents to baseball to star at Episcopal Academy

His emotions, however, don’t say much at all. Guzzie said that his demeanor is hard to read on the mound. If he has no earned runs or 10, the reaction is the same.

“I’m not a big emotions guy,” Guzzie said. “Keeping my emotions and staying with my game is what has really kept me successful.”

Guzzie tossed two no-hitters this season, against Neumann Goretti and Cardinal O’Hara, as well as an unofficial no-hitter in the six innings he pitched against Devon Prep.

Guzzie said it’s “nice to celebrate the no-hitter,” but ultimately, the focus is about moving on to the next game.

He had 105 strikeouts in 57 innings pitched in the Catholic League this season, helping lead Conwell-Egan to the Catholic League championship, where it fell 7-6 to La Salle. He started the championship game and gave up four hits and three runs in 3.1 innings of work.

He then added a two-run homer to his performance in the seventh inning.

Guzzie sees a lot of his game in Yankees pitcher Max Fried. He trains with professional and college talent at the Ghost Lab in New Jersey.

Guzzie said he’s learned a lot from them, especially when going through the college recruiting process before committing to Virginia.

“I knew it was going to be overwhelming to figure out what questions to ask coaches and recruiting coordinators and stuff like that,” Guzzie said. “Asking them how their process went, what questions they ask, and then with those guys being at school now, those high-end Division I programs, what do they like about their school and then stuff that they wish they would have asked more in the recruiting process.”

» READ MORE: A pitching laboratory helped this 16-year-old throw 101.7 mph. But he’s ‘not just a baseball player.’

The most common response was to find a place with a culture that felt like home.

After visits to Duke, Penn State, and Florida State, it was UVA that seemed like the right choice.

“Virginia, I can see that as a place I can call my second home one day,” Guzzie said. “Charlottesville is beautiful. I had a great time when I was down there. It just seemed like a place that was a right fit for me. The coaching staff was very welcoming. I felt [a] relationship Day 1 with those guys and I could play four years of baseball with them.”

But before then, Guzzie still has a year of high school left ahead of him. And for Manto, the goal is to keep Guzzie healthy and focused to succeed in his future endeavors.

“I want to protect his arm, because I know he has a big future,” Manto said. “Yes, we want to win, but not at the expense of hurting somebody’s career. And we’re very cognizant of that.”

While keeping Guzzie on the best path forward, the roles have also been reversed for Manto, and he’s learned a lot from his player in return.

Manto, a former MLB player and hitting coach for the Pirates and White Sox, said it’s his first time coaching a player of Guzzie’s caliber at the high school level.

“Once you have a guy who is so mentally, physically, mature, there’s no need to go in and try to fix anything,” Manto said. “He’s certainly a player that you don’t want to coach too much because he’s in such a good place.”

With his mental maturity, Guzzie has stayed grounded throughout Conwell-Egan’s ride to the Catholic League title game, and remains focused on the next task at hand; the state playoffs.

“At the end of the day, I remember I’m still a high school kid and I got to take that one step at a time, not to rush things and kind of wish my future away,” Guzzie said. “I’m still a high school kid where I still have my priorities here with my team ... living in the moment is really important to me to not really get too wishful of my goals in the future.”