26 Jul 2007


Home is where the heart is for Costello


Photo by Dave Colantuono
Barnstable’s Matt Costello has delivered in the bullpen for the Kettleers.

By George Kostinas
GateHouse News Service

Cape Cod - Not many hometown players get a chance to play in the Cape Cod Baseball League these days, so it was like a dream come true when the Cotuit Kettleers called Matt Costello last week to join their pitching staff.

    “I didn’t think I was eligible to be on the roster. I didn’t think it was even a possibility. It came out of left field,” says Costello.

    But when a few injuries and some tired pitching arms opened some spots on the roster, Kettleers’ General Manager Bruce Murphy gave him a call, and Costello jumped at the chance.

    “I called him at about 9:15 and by 10 he was down here starting the paperwork,” says Murphy. “We knew him from last year, and we knew what he could do, how he could throw for us, so I called Mike Roberts who said, ‘Yeah, sign him up.”

    He’s trying to make the most of his second appearance with the Kettleers, where he is being used, so far, in relief. And Roberts is pleased with what he’s seen.

    “I’m looking at the long haul, not the short haul; there’s a long way to go,” says Roberts.
Costello has made four appearances since joining the team, pitching 7 innings and giving up four earned runs; he has six strikeouts while walking only two.

    He came into Friday’s game against Wareham with the score tied at 2, struck out the first two batters he faced and got the third to pop up to the third baseman.

    The next inning he gave up a walk and a single and was taken out of the game with two outs and two men on base.

    “I don’t understand why I was taken out. It was a lefty batter and I’m a lefty. I would have liked to have stayed in,” says Costello.

    Roberts brought in Garret Richards, a righty from Oklahoma, who gave up a single to the next batter, handing Costello the loss.

    “I just thought of Richards as more of a closer; I don’t look at Matt in that role,” says Roberts. “You win some and you lose some.”

    Realizing a dream does not always come easily and it has been somewhat of a rocky road that brought Costello to back to Cotuit. Costello was the star pitcher for Barnstable High School two years ago and received a baseball scholarship to Iona.

    He did reasonably well as a freshman.

    “I was the cleanup hitter and the Sunday pitcher,” he says. “But as a pitcher I didn’t do so well. I was 4-7 and kind of struggled.”

    Then last summer he made the Kettleers as a temporary player.

    “I was thrilled,” Costello says.

    As a kid, he grew up watching the Hyannis Mets, because he lived near the field. He had watched players like Jason Varitek and had dreamed about playing in the Cape League.

    “I thought those kids were like superhuman,” he says.

    But by the second week of the season, the regulars joined the team and Costello was released.
“That’s a tough way to let a kid go, especially a good kid, like Matt,” says Murphy. “But he handled it well, and that’s one of the reasons we brought him back.”

    He then went to play in the Texas League.

    Last spring, he left Iona and came home, taking some classes at Cape Cod Community College.
“I didn’t like anything about it [Iona]; the only thing I liked was the coach. He treated me pretty good. I wanted to be at a school that cared about its baseball team and they didn’t,” says Costello.

    Before joining the Kettleers, he pitched two games in the Boston Intercity League, then pitched nine games for the Cape Cod Braves in the Cranberry League.

    “I threw about 50 innings before I got here,” he says.

    Last year, Costello in his short time with the Kettleers began working on his changeup and has been developing it ever since.

    “That’s one of the things I liked about Matt. He’s humble. He’s very coachable and interested in learning. You don’t always realize what a kid has learned until you see him later. It’s obvious that he took what we taught him and built on that,” says Roberts.