By: Kevin Piel

FLAT ROCK, MI: Happy New Year Monarchs fans! We with the Monarchs sincerely hope your Holiday season was a blessed one. It may be hard to believe, but we are actually closer to the start of the 2019 campaign at this point in time as opposed to the conclusion of the 2018 season, which occurred 159 days ago. We are just 151 days away from our season opener on the road against the Muskegon Clippers.

As for our upcoming season’s schedule, it has been released and can be found on our calendar page. We will have a full listing of the games coming out down the road.

DEEB: If you didn’t hear already, 2017 team member Michael Deeb was signed to a Minor League contract by the Chicago White Sox at the end of December. He joins 2015 alum Dazon Cole (Angels) and 2016 alum Evan Marquardt (Reds) as former members of the kingdom who found their way into Minor League Baseball in the past six months.

Deeb swatted .300 with one long ball and 22 RBIs in 37 games played with Lake Erie in 2017. He also went 1-4 with a double in the Monarchs play-in contest against the Green Giants in the playoffs.

Michael is a multi-sport athlete, having played linebacker on the football team at Notre Dame all while receiving his degree. He moved on to play baseball for two seasons at Bethune-Cookman where he hit .265 with 22 RBIs in 57 career games with the Wildcats program. BCU is the same school that ’18 Monarch Robert Bell currently attends.

Most recently, Deeb played first base for the Plattsburgh RedBirds of the Independent Empire League in Florida. He paced the league with 43 RBIs and added 3 homers to go with a .352 batting average. These numbers were good enough for him to be named league MVP.

Michael’s hometown is Davie, Florida. He attended American Heritage High School in Plantation and was an extremely successful football and baseball player there.

The Monarchs roster continues to be filled with high-quality talent on a daily basis. Before we know it, the Monarchs will be taking the field in Muskegon to begin another wonderful season.

To keep up to date with your favorite baseball team, visit the Monarchs official website:http://lakeeriemonarchs.com . Be sure to follow the Monarchs on Twitter: @GLL_Monarchs, and on Facebook: /lakeeriemonarchs/.