Courtesy of THE MELVILLE ADVANCE, WEDNESDAY, APRIL 6, 2011

The Melville Millionaires baseball club is way ahead of last year’s pace--in terms of rounding out a roster anyway.

The WMBL club has signed four more players and now has 13 roster spots full for the summer league, which begins for the Millionaires June 1.
“Things are going well as far as fleshing out the roster,” says team governor Jeff Bouvier who is pleased with the player signings thus far. “It’s good to have as much of this out of the way early as we can so we can concentrate on other issues with the team like getting billets lined up and stuff. It makes the whole operation that much easier.”

Three right-handed pitchers and a speedy middle infielder make up the latest signings for the Melville club.

Cuba- born Edgar Valle from Santiago de Cuba will join the club from Northwood University. The six-feet, two inch Valle currently sports a 2-2 record with Northwood. The righty has 16 strikeouts over 23 and 1/3 innings and has a 6.56 earned run average.

Brenden Gillies, the first of two Canadians to be signed this week, is also a right-handed hurler. The Junior at Jesuit University at Wheeling, West Virginia was born in Owen Sound, Ont. and is 2-1 this season with one save. The reliever who may also be spotted as a starter for the Millionaires has pitched 10 and 1/3 innings with an 8.71 ERA. Last summer, Gillies threw in the Great South Summer League, pitching 10 and 1/3 innings with a 2.61 ERA.

Vancouver’s Allen Rimer joins the Millionaires from Iowa Central University. In two starts this season, Rimer has a 1-0 record with 14 innings pitched, 11 K and a 3.21 ERA. The Sophomore sported a 6-win, 2-loss record last season and was a workhorse, going 59 and 2/3 innings with 31 strikeouts and an ERA of 4.68.

One player expected to make an impact with the bat is Ben Villafuerte of Corpus Christi, Texas. The middle infielder with Texas A & M-Kingsville is currently leading his team, batting at a .375 clip with 25 runs, 10 steals and a .471 on-base-percentage. Last season as a Freshman, Villafuerte hit .324 with 17 runs and nine steals.

Bouvier is pleased with the players inked thus far but says the club still needs to sell some lottery tickets.

“We were just under last year’s pace with the early bird draws and we still have about 1,100 tickets to sell,” he explains.

Tickets for the Farm and Leisure Lotto are available for $100 each or three for $250. To purchase tickets people can call, toll free, 1-877-946-6457 and for more information they can browse to www.millionairesbaseball.com on the world wide web.