Conestoga's Scott Williams pursues baseball perfection with every workout

His family can always tell when he is up. Scott Williams rattles the house with the quake of his fast, weighty feet when he bounds down the steps. The daily romp each weekday morning always comes with a purpose and a destination.

That search for the perfect game.

It's a familiar trek that begins with a two-mile bike ride to the gym, where he works out by himself, insulated from any distractions. Williams likes solitude. He'll lift, go through his routine, then takes some dry swings with a bat, covering every nuance he detects.

By around 10, the pangs of guilt are gone. Williams has solace in knowing he's probably done more work than most any other high school athlete from the time he gets up at 6:15 a.m. each morning to the time he finishes around three hours later. But the 6-foot-2, 192-pound Conestoga (Berwyn, Pa.) catcher isn't finished. The rising senior finds time to throw and hit with his brother, and do additional baseball work with a group of players he's been with since his youth.

It's that insatiable desire to improve that's created a sound foundation. It's what has led Williams to a baseball scholarship to Atlantic Coast Conference powerhouse Virginia and will most likely see him get drafted next June.

His stock is rising this summer, and he's coming off a junior season in which he hit .500 with 25 RBIs, three triples and seven doubles. Williams also played a leading role in helping Conestoga win its first PIAA Class AAAA (large schools) state baseball championship.

But none of this would be possible without that bottomless work ethic.

"I always have to get my work in one way or another or else I feel guilty. I feel like I'm cheating myself if I let up, because I always hear the stories about players that have the talent and never use it," Williams said. "I want to work to get the most out of my ability. I was born with semi-athletic genes. Most of what I got is through working hard. I'm not the most gifted. My friends think I'm nuts; they think I'm obsessed with baseball. I think I'm obsessed with being the best I can be.

"I ask people to watch my swing and I'll videotape myself with my laptop. I know where the line is between working hard and driving myself nuts over it. But the more I play against better competition, the more I know I have to be prepared to play against the best."

It was a hard lesson Williams learned last summer, when he first started playing elite-level travel baseball, hitting the showcase and tournament circuit. Williams did OK — but not OK by his standards.

"I struggled a little bit, playing up against older players," Williams said. "It was my first real exposure playing at that level and my inexperience really showed. I didn't meet my standards of what I wanted. Some kids may just be happy to play up at that level, I wasn't. I wanted something more out of it. I was determined not to have the kind of summer I had last year."

So he poured more work into his hitting, his patience at the plate and his catching skills. As for the arm, that's always been there. Williams was on the chubby side ("I was 5-foot-4, 150 pounds in sixth grade," he said) growing up. But there some things people are just born with, and their natural skills often surface early.

It was quickly evident the first time Pete Greskoff saw Williams. Greskoff, a long-time area youth coach who goes way back to when Williams was 8 years old, noticed a throwing motion uncommon for young kids. It was smooth. It was explosive. The other kids his age were too afraid to catch him, fearful of the heavy ball he threw.

"You noticed Scott quickly by the way he threw the ball, because you wanted to show the other kids this is how you throw a baseball, look at the way Scott throws," Greskoff recalled. "Scott's motion was perfect. I remember doing evaluations of Scott when he was 9, and he wasn't a catcher at the time, but I recall writing that he was a catcher waiting to happen. You could tell at an early age he was talented, but it's his arm that sets him apart.

"Scott is really special to me. We have a dedicated group of kids that wanted to get better from the original group Scott was with, about nine or 10 kids that are still involved. I've seen good players. I grew up in the Mike Scioscia (Springfield, Pa.) era. People are just starting to find out about Scott; everyone who's played against Scott already knows who he is."

Catching, however, was something that needed added work. Greskoff recounted one of Williams' first exploits behind the plate with a laugh. Williams was 10 at the time, and his travel team was playing in a tournament in Cooperstown, N.Y.

"The home plate umpire came over and told us to take Scott out because he was killing him back there," said Greskoff, laughing. "Scott was missing so many balls that the umpire was getting hit. By 12, Scott was the only kid that could reach second base in the air from the catcher's position. Each year he's rapidly improved. In time, Scott became a weapon for us behind the plate. The kids that play with him will realize 10 years from now how special it is to play with him. You realize his passion for the game."

Dan Williams always knew his younger brother's passion. Dan, a four-year starter at Pitt, is eight years older than Scott and imparted much of what he learned through playing major Division-I baseball to his younger sibling, a constant shadowy, playful nuisance.

Scott still is. He looks continuously for feedback. After Conestoga won the state title, Scott called Greskoff to see if he watched the state championship on TV and what he thought about his swing. He's always in Dan's ear about how he looks, if he could do something better, what were some of the small things he could have done.

"I told Scott that he had certain things that he was born with and how he's grown up in the game, thinking things a step ahead, that's the way he's always been, he wants feedback," said Dan, who graduated with a marketing degree from Pitt. "I'm not afraid to tell him good things about himself whenever I can. The only thing I have to get on him about are his workouts. But not for working hard, it's almost to the point where I have to pull the reigns back a little bit because I'm afraid he works too hard sometimes."

Williams won't have much time for workouts the rest of this summer. He did well in North Carolina at the Tournament of Stars and is scheduled to play in East Coast Professional Showcase in Lakeland, Fla., from July 30-Aug. 4. Then it's off to Long Beach, Calif., for the Area Code Games with the Northeast Yankees from Aug. 4-10.

Scott credits many for the position he finds himself in, a spot that could concurrently become more complex and more exciting by this time next year. He may have a big decision to make, Virginia or the pros, but his attitude and his routine don't look like they will vary.

Greskoff will still get calls from Scott after games about his swing. He'll still drag Dan out as often as he can to throw to him. He's determined to wring every drop of sweat out of each morning workout.

Williams' search for perfection will continue. And one of these days he may just attain it.