“Baseball is a game that when you’re playing on a daily basis, that’s when you make your improvements,” he said. “I’ll be giving Joey a start [against the University of Arizona this weekend] just based on what he did during the summer…. His fastball really improved throwing every day.”

Senior pitcher Brent Suter—who played in the top-tier Cape Cod League with classmate Jeff Reynolds last summer—agreed.

“I was struggling mechanically a lot last season, and the pitching coach [in Cape Cod] really helped me a lot,” Suter said. “By the end of the summer, I felt it was coming together for me.”

But no matter the level of play or location, the player consensus is that one of the best parts about playing over the summer is the people.

“Just meeting all these kids from different parts of the country and from all these different schools is so great,” Wineski said. “I mean, I still talk to kids from two summers back.... You build this network of friends. That’s by far the biggest thing I’ve taken away from these summers—the relationships I’ve built with all these other kids.”

Though Wineski and the rest of the Hawaiian League stayed in a hotel together, in most other leagues, players reside with host families. Suter, whose host family had two young boys, grew close with his host brothers.

“It was great just going to the beach with them, hanging out, playing video games,” he recalled. “Everyday activities were really special.”

While the players sacrifice their summers in order to improve their game for Harvard and, in some cases, to get drafted, Walsh believes in the experience that the leagues present his players.

“It’s a lot better than going to Wall Street,” Walsh said. “And you can print that.”

—Staff writer Taryn I. Kurcz can be reached at tkurcz13@college.harvard.edu.