Albany’s Kameron Davis named to USA Baseball national team

ALBANY — Kameron Davis hasn’t reached high school yet, but he’s going to have a chance to wear a national uniform and play baseball on an international stage.

Davis, who is entering the seventh grade at Albany Middle School, was one of 18 players selected Saturday for the USA Baseball 12U national team that will participate in the COPABE Pan Am Championship later this month in Mexico.

“I’m excited,” said Davis, a center fielder. “I got along with other players from around the country. Now that I’m going to Mexico, I can represent my country on the national team.”

Davis had a strong performance at the plate in the national team trials held last weekend in Castaic, California. He went 12-for-16 with a home run and multiple doubles.

“It was a good experience, being with other players,” Davis said. “I grinded in order to make the team, being the first one on the field, running hard to first base and using skills I learned from my coaches.

“(The coaches) told me they liked what they were seeing and to keep it up, even if I didn’t make the team. They told me if I kept up what I was doing that I would have a chance, and I kept doing what I was doing. They were impressed.”

Davis was among the 111 players invited from across the country, based on USA Baseball Open Development Camps participation, to the 12U National Open, which took place July 23-25.

From that pool, 15 players were picked to join 21 Futures Invitational and National Team Identification Series participants in the national team trials from which the national team was picked.

“He works so hard at it, and he’s such a good kid,” Davis’ travel ball coach, Mike Matthews, said. “He does anything that you tell him to. He’s very coachable.

“He has such a huge upside, even more than what he’s shown, because he’s only concentrated for about a year on baseball. But he’s just so coachable and a great kid.”

The national team meets up again Aug. 19 in Houston for training camp before heading to Pan Am competition.

The USA Baseball 12U national team has a history of international success. The team won the 2013, 2015 and 2017 U-12 World Cup competitions, and the Pan Am tournament is a qualifier for the 2019 event.

Davis is the only player from Georgia on the roster. Half of the roster is made up of players from California, with representatives from Texas, Arkansas, Florida and Washington rounding out the squad.

“It has been an unbelievably lengthy process,” 12U National Team manager Todd Fine said in an article posted on the USA Baseball website. “We have seen thousands and thousands of kids over the past nine months from coast to coast. From the depths of it (the process), we ran 40 Open Development Camps all over the country, not to mention the best youth country in the tournament, with the Futures Invitational, and it all culminated with the 12U National Open. Our coaching staff is now excited and ready to move forward with these 18 players.”