How a high school athlete refused to give up on his dream of playing D-1 baseball and made his college dream come true in the process
Baseball is a game of failure.
After all, the best hitters in the game only reach base safely three out of every 10 at-bats. For 18-year-old Trenton Lombardo of Southern California, two seasons of total failure had nearly broken him.
To use a baseball analogy, Lombardo’s athletic career was facing a 10-run deficit with an 0-2 count in the bottom of the ninth inning with two outs and no runners on base. Realistically, his playing days were over. ESPN analytics would give him a 0.000001 chance of winning, and yet Lombardo saw hope in that fraction of a percentage.
He had dreamt of a career in baseball his whole life and didn’t believe that the nightmare of the previous two seasons should define him. However, while baseball is a timeless game that doesn’t end until the third out is recorded in the last inning, Lombardo was battling a ticking clock. Entering his last year of high school, he’d had two seasons of effectively not playing while facing the likely prospect of riding the bench again as a senior.
Nobody wanted him.
Although many of his baseball metrics were strong, community bridges had been burned and, in a sport where politics can determine who plays, Lombardo had been politicked to the end of the bench. He considered transferring to his fifth school in four years, but didn’t believe he would be accepted or judged based on his ability.
He considered quitting baseball to play golf, a sport where his sweet left-handed swing could effortlessly drive the ball 300 yards. He also considered giving up playing baseball to work with baseball players (and other athletes) by following in the footsteps of his grandfather to become a talent agent.
During his junior season at Calabasas High, Lombardo barely reached the Mendoza line, batting .200 and playing in only 9 of 31 games on a team that finished under .500. In the game where sports analytics were invented, all signs pointed toward Lombardo hanging up his spikes.
As he worked on college applications, Lombardo tried to convince himself that golf or business school was the path for him.
But catchers can be a stubborn breed.
If only there was a utopian, diamond-shaped world in which he could be judged on his baseball skills alone, he thought, then he could prove that he is good enough to play Division-1 college baseball. If he failed after being given a fair chance, then he would have been willing to accept failure and move on.
Enter IMG Academy, the Florida-based sports powerhouse that has produced countless MLB, NFL and NBA stars. If Lombardo was willing to move across the country (by himself) for his senior year of high school, they were willing to serve as the meritocracy that he had been seeking. However, they warned, he’d be playing against some of the best baseball talent in the country, so don’t be surprised if your stay in Bradenton is a short one.
Coached by his dad and uncle all through elementary and middle school, Lombardo had always been an all-star catcher. His teams won championships and he played alongside and excelled against athletes who eventually earned D1 scholarships. When he got to high school, he attended Sherman Oaks Notre Dame High in the San Fernando Valley (California), a baseball factory that has produced No. 1 overall draft picks and MLB MVPs and Cy Young Award winners, among others.
After playing catcher for the JV squad as a freshman, which was no small feat, his family moved further north and he landed in what seemed like the perfect spot–at a Ventura County school where his private batting instructor happened to have just been named the varsity baseball coach.
While the rationale remains shrouded in mystery, Lombardo was demoted from the varsity team, leading to him transferring to another school for his junior season. There, despite a dearth of talent at catcher, Lombardo saw his playing time diminish as the season went on. And with a lack of reps and consistent play, his confidence and average went south as well. When Lombardo gestured in frustration while being pulled in the middle of a game, his coach chewed him out and he never played again.
With the prospect of playing for this same coach again as a senior, Lombardo faced the situation that eventually led to him enrolling at IMG.
Before committing, he attended a weekend camp at IMG in mid-August. Almost immediately, Lombardo sensed that he was in the right place. Not only were the practices run professionally and the talent extraordinary, he developed a relationship with one of the coaches, and “old school” former MLB outfielder, Dee Brown.
After the camp, Lombardo had 4 days before his high school in California was starting. It was time to make one of those potentially life-altering decisions.
After long conversations with his family and even longer sleepless nights, Lombardo decided to go for it: “If nothing comes of it, at least I can tell myself that I did everything I could to follow my dreams.” Suddenly, he found himself on a one-way flight to his own Field of Dreams.
He remembers writing two affirmations to himself on his phone while on the flight. First, “I will be the harder worker.” And perhaps more poignantly, “Don’t prove others wrong. Prove yourself right.”
And from the moment he stepped onto the perfectly maintained fields at IMG Academy in September of 2023, Lombardo found himself on an upward trajectory. There are some athletes who perform best when everything is on the line, and it appears that Lombardo is one. Although he didn’t play for Brown’s team during the Fall, Lombardo was the first to practice and the last to leave, soaking up every bit of advice and wisdom from his coaches while also taking extra batting practice and reps behind the plate. By the time the Fall semester was concluding in December, IMG was beginning to take notice.
“Lombardo isn’t the kind of player who is going to ‘wow’ scouts with size or power,” Brown said. “But he does everything well and he’s proven that he’ll outwork everyone else on the field.”
After returning from winter break, Lombardo got called up to IMG’s national team–the one where D1 athletes play at every position. His first at-bat came near the end of one of these showcase games against none other than Jayden Stroman, a Duke-committed pitcher who is the younger brother of MLB All Star Marcus Stroman.
After taking two 94 MPH fastballs out of the zone, Lombardo fouled off a couple of pitches before working the count full, getting more comfortable at the plate with each look. Stroman came after him with a heater away and Lombardo lined it back up the middle for a single. Not only did Lombardo’s confidence skyrocket, but so did interest from colleges–his dream was actually becoming a reality.
Suddenly, Lombardo’s play combined with the IMG spotlight led to interest from several D-1 schools. After dancing with Michigan State, Northwestern and San Diego State, Penn State’s head coach, Mike Gambino, extended Lombardo an offer based on Brown’s recommendation.
And then, like a rain delay that wouldn’t end, Lombardo’s phone went silent. While he continued to tear up opposing pitchers at IMG, finishing the season with a .431 batting average, Penn State had gone dark. “For a few days, I thought the dream was over again,” Lombardo said. “But then Dee was able to reach the head coach and everything was back on track.”
When Lombardo travels to University Park in August, it will be his first time setting foot on the Penn State campus. And when he visits Medlar Field and dons the navy and white jersey with his name emblazoned on the back, one can’t help but reflect back on the long and storied history of the sport to the day Lou Gehrig retired from the Yankees. The “Iron Horse,” a Hall of Famer whose body was being ravaged by amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, expressed his gratitude for the gift that baseball had given him. And while Lombardo’s perseverance through years of setbacks in baseball is far different, the emotion will almost certainly be the same.
“Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth.”
