FT. MYERS, FLA.- The road to a future career in baseball has continued to be busy for Braden Booth. The sophomore baseball player for the Bob Jones Patriots and the elite Vipers Baseball Academy Black Platinum 16 travel team recently showcased his enormous talents at the Perfect Game Select Baseball Festival in Ft. Myers, Fla. The four-day event came on the heels of the National Showcase, also held in the city in Florida, located on the west coast of the Sunshine State, where over 300 players from across the country played in several games to try and impress the scouts with their skills. The top 40 players were chosen to advance to the Select Festival. One of which was Booth.

“I feel I did very well compared to some of the other players who were there as I finished among the top 20 in the hitting portion of the Festival,” said Booth.

The 6-foot-1, 180-pound Booth turned 15 years old this summer where he continued his whirlwind tour of playing with his travel team and took side trips to a multitude of camps at some of the most prestigious college baseball programs in the country. He visited camps hosted by Mississippi State, Vanderbilt, Alabama and Tennessee, but it was both the National Showcase in August and the early September Select Festival that were the highlights of his off-season agenda.

At the Select Festival, Braden participated in the event held at JetBlue Park, which was built to be a complete replica of Fenway Park in Boston, home of the Boston Red Sox. At JetBlue, nicknamed “Fenway South,” the facility is a complete training and development facility that is also home of the Red Sox’s spring training. The field replica includes the famed “Green Monster” wall in left field.

“The workouts at the event led up to a game with all 40 players involved,” said Booth, who attended the elite experience with his parents. “I played for the East team as we defeated the West. At the plate, I went one for two with a single. On the mound, I pitched two innings. I gave up two hits and two runs and also recorded two strikeouts.”

The event surrounding the game featured skills workouts for hitting, fielding and pitching. The festivities also included a home run derby contest. Booth finished second hitting seven homers compared to the winner hitting eight dingers.

All-in-all, playing among some of the best players in the United States was a great learning experience and helps kick start his soon-to-be sophomore season at Bob Jones, which begins in January. He’ll head into his sophomore season as the Patriots’ No. 1 reliever and will also play third base. Booth has received an early scholarship offer to the University of South Alabama (USA) and has received lots of correspondence from other major college baseball programs including Tennessee, Mississippi State, Alabama, Vanderbilt and Auburn. He’s undecided at this point about he wants to attend college.

“There was a lot of good baseball talent at the Festival as I found out I can play with the best of them,” added Booth of his play in the Labor Day Weekend Festival.