The plan, the new Head Coach says, is to excite fans and win games with an up-tempo game, with power added to blow games wide open.
Cody Andreychuk, the first-year bench boss of the Nanaimo NightOwls, a team entering its fourth season in the WCL, is proud to add the first four players to the 2025 summer roster — one Division1 power pitcher, and three impact bats on the position side.
“These are exciting players who have been hand-picked by us to give this roster a great start, and we have more to announce soon as paperwork gets put in place,” said Andreychuk, the Head Coach at the University of Pikeville — and a Nanaimo baseball product, who takes over after Greg Frady set the tone in three years in the lead role.
“We are very excited about the track record of these players. Caden Petrey has produced incredible numbers in college, and Eli Watson and Brady Morse are strong players from Bellarmine. In Sammy Lee, we have a spark plug catcher who has proven he can handle the bat and is strong defensively — the catcher spot will be a strong one for this team.”
Announced Today:
3B/1B Caden Petrey, Junior, Cumberlands (KY) NAIA, 6-0/210, Williamsburg, KY C/OF Sammy Lee, Sophomore, Pomona-Pitzer (D3), 5-11/175, Lafayette, CA OF/1B Eli Watson, Junior, Bellarmine (D1), 6-1/190, Jefferson, IN RHP Brady Morse, Junior, Bellarmine (D1), 6-2/200, Danville, KY
Petrey’s numbers make you stop and re-read them — a combined 40 home runs in two seasons for NAIA powerhouse Cumberlands in Kentucky, with 135 runs driven in and a 1.160 OPS. He had a pair of three-homer games in the spring of 2024, finishing with 25 total after a freshman campaign with 15 bombs.
Lee, who will start for Pomona-Pitzer this spring, hit .355 in the New York Collegiate league last summer, with nine extra base hits and just 14 strikeouts in 28 games, and was named to the all-star team.
Watson is a transfer from Arizona Western who was previously at Western Kentucky. At Arizona Western, the lefty hitter batted .319 with 14 doubles and 12 stolen bases as his team went 37-17, adding to Watson’s winning pedigree from his youth and high school levels, where he was on a number of title-winning teams.
Morse is a two-way player but is focusing more on being on the mound, where he started two games for Bellarmine in the spring of 2023. Morse can also hit for power from the right side as a corner infielder.
