Plum’s Kiriloff off to hot start in minors

Alex Kirilloff says the toughest adjustment to professional baseball has been mental.

Kirilloff has made the physical part look easy.

Kirilloff, who played his final game for Plum High School a month-and-a-half ago, is off to a great start in minor league baseball for the Minnesota Twins organization.

Kirilloff, the 15th selection overall in June’s Major League Baseball draft, is the Appalachian League offensive player of the week after hitting .500 (16 for 32) with two home runs, seven RBIs and 10 runs scored in a recent seven-game stretch.

The Appalachian League is a step above the rookie leagues, and teams in the Appalachian include players drafted out of college and some who already have played a year or two in the minor leagues.

Kirilloff, an outfielder, plays for the Elizabethton Twins of Tennessee and is by far the youngest player on the team.

For the season, Kirilloff is second in the league in batting average (.364) and sixth in slugging percentage (.545). In 24 games, he has four home runs, 18 RBIs and an OPS of .911.

“I’m definitely not disappointed at the way things have gone so far, but I can still do better. I can improve every day,” said Kirilloff.

As for the mental adjustments, Kirilloff said, “Mentally, you have to prepare yourself to focus every single day, instead of a couple games a week. That’s a big adjustment. You have to prepare yourself to be at the ballpark eight to 10 hours a day. You have to perform at a high level every day, take care of your body, have good habits eating and discipline yourself to get sleep.”

As for the physical adjustments, Kirilloff said the pitching is much different than he faced at Plum. Due to his lofty reputation at Plum, he often did not see many good pitches.

“All of these pitchers go right after you, and I like that,” Kirilloff said.

“My goals are to stay healthy, keeping getting better and just enjoy this. I’m healthy and God blessed me to play the game I love. My goal is to stay positive.”

Transfer to Pine-Richland

The Pine-Richland football team picked up a transfer student who could make a “big” impact for the Rams this season.

Grant Carrigan is a 6foot-7, 260-pound senior tight end-defensive end who has enrolled at Pine-Richland and has been attending Rams workouts.

Carrigan attended Weir High in West Virginia last year and already has a scholarship offer from Kent State. Some other colleges are interested. Carrigan’s father has cancer and will receive medical treatment in Pittsburgh, so the family decided to move here. Reports had Carrigan possibly going to Central Catholic, but his family moved into the Pine-Richland district.

“Florida called the other day to ask about him,” PineRichland coach Eric Kasperowicz said.

“He has great hands and he’s fast for his size. We don’t use a tight end in our offense, but he will definitely help us.”

Elsewhere

• The Aliquippa football team started preseason workouts recently but the Quips had to deal with tragedy. Marcus Tigner, who was slated to see playing time this season as a fullback and linebacker, committed suicide July 16.

• Central Catholic lineman Donovan Slater has decided to play next season at Yale. He is the second Central Catholic lineman to choose Yale in the past three days. Jacob Hinish committed to Yale Sunday.

• Kevin Deitrick resigned as athletic director at North Hills to become an assistant athletic director at Duquesne University. Deitrick worked in the athletic department at Duquesne before coming to North Hills in 2013.

• Ethan Morton hasn’t played a game for the Butler basketball team, but he already has a scholarship offer from a Division I college. Cleveland State recently offered Morton, a 6-4 point guard who will be a freshman. Some other colleges also are showing interest.

“Mentally, you have to focus every single day ... You have to prepare yourself to be at the ballpark eight to 10 hours a day.” Alex Kirilloff