Toms River East Named Week 2 Joe Leone’s Baseball Team of the Week | Shore Sports Insider
Week 2 Joe Leone’s Team of the Week:
Toms River East Baseball
Shore Sports Insider is proud to partner with Joe Leone’s this spring to present our weekly Joe Leone’s Baseball Team of the Week Award, recognizing standout Shore Conference programs for their accomplishments on the field.
We are also thrilled to welcome Joe Leone’s Italian Specialties as our title sponsor, providing a generous $250 gift card each week to celebrate the winning team.
The Week 2 recipient of the 2026 Joe Leone’s Baseball Team of the Week is Toms River East after a week in which the Raiders swept a two-game series against Point Pleasant Beach, then ranked No. 4 in the Shore Sports Insider Top 10.
Many of the names have changed, but the standard set over the last two seasons of Toms River East baseball have not. The Raiders are Ocean County’s most decorated program of the past two years and even with two top pitchers, the 2025 Shore Sports Insider Player of the Year and four other hitters gone to graduation, they have designs on maintaining that stature through the end of 2026.
That journey to that destination got off to a bumpy start with a 16-1 loss to Brick Memorial and a 1-2 record during the first week of the season, but last week, the Raiders bounced back in a big way.
To open last week, Toms River East planted itself on the other side of a Class A South division rout by steamrolling Point Beach, 17-3, in five innings. The Raiders batted around in two different innings, scoring six runs in the second and nine in the third. Fourteen batters stepped to the plate during the nine-run third, which extended Toms River East’s lead to 16-1 by the end of the inning, the very score by which the Raiders lost to Brick Memorial a week earlier.
“We know going into it, our first week was going to be tough. Brick Memorial’s got a lot back, we had Rumson and I think Rumson is a really good team too. We split with Brick Memorial and then Rumson took it to us, but I kept telling our kids ‘We’re young, we’re still trying to figure it out and it’s only going to get us better’ – playing the good teams, seeing the good arms.”
Toms River East sophomore Carson Frazier. (Photo: Tom Smith | tspsportsimages.com)
Sophomore centerfielder Carson Frazier got the game started by blasting his first career home run – a solo shot to right-centerfield that gave Toms River East a 1-0 lead.
Frazier finished the game 2-for-4 with three runs scored and two RBI, which was a follow-up to a big game he played at Point Beach as a freshman in 2025, when the Raiders beat the Garnet Gulls, 4-3, in the Shore Conference Tournament semifinals. In the win, Frazier went 3-for-4 with two doubles, one of which cleared the bases and gave his team a 4-3 lead in the top of the fifth inning.
“Carson smoked a big double here last year so he likes hitting here,” Smicklo said. “He is still growing into his body: he is six-five, he is long, he is lanky. His baseball is still to come and you can see it every day in practice, he is getting better. His swings are getting better and better and I think he is going to be very interesting in a year or two to see what he looks like. I have known (Carson’s father) Charlie since we were kids and I have known Carson since he was little, so it’s been fun to coach him.”
Frazier is one of three returning full-time starters for Toms River East and each of the other two made an impact in the first win over Point Beach. Junior shortstop Joey DiMeo went 1-for-3 with two walks and an RBI double in the nine-run third. Senior rightfielder Lucas Melton, meanwhile, was also 1-for-3 with a pair of walks, three runs scored and two RBI.
DiMeo started at third base as a freshman and during a First Team All-Shore sophomore season and has shifted to shortstop with the graduation of Matt Ferrara. After winning the Shore Sports Insider Baseball Player of the Year Award in 2025, Ferrara was selected by the Philadelphia Phillies in the ninth round of the 2025 Major League Baseball Draft and signed with the club.
Toms River East junior Joey DiMeo. (Photo: Tom Smith | tspsportsimages.com)
“It’s tough not having him behind me because that was a lot of protection, but Lucas helps a lot,” DiMeo said. “It was cool playing third next to him because it gave us two good defenders on the left side. I liked third but I’m excited to play shortstop.”
“He naturally plays (shortstop) and even in the last couple of years, we knew he would be moving over there when Matt graduated,” Smicklo said of DiMeo. “So there were a lot of times in practice that he would go over to shortstop and he would learn from Matty on a lot of the little things: holding runners, getting in and out. He has been there, so it has been a natural transition. He has played it his whole life and he loves it. He is a ball hawk. I think you’re really going to see him take off once he is comfortable.”
In addition to graduating Ferrara, Toms River East entered 2026 looking to replace two top pitchers in First-Team All-Shore right-hander Dan Nafziger, plus right-hander Mason Pentz. Nafziger also hit in the middle of the order and played second base, which put him on the list of graduated 2025 starters that also includes catcher Gavin Toth, second baseman and leftfielder Mike Vaccarino and first baseman Jax Buatez.
“We lost a number one arm, our middle infield a catcher and those kids were with us for three years,” Smicklo said. “They know what was expected out of them and they played in a lot of big games and did really well in them. We’re replacing a lot, but our feeder programs have been really good. We’re just really young and we may need some time to get it going in the right direction but we should be pretty decent once they figure it out.”
Sophomore Logan Macchia went 2-for-3 with a double, two runs and two RBI and junior Chris Tennaro was 1-for-2 with a double, two runs and one RBI to give Toms River East production from the Nos. 5 and 6 spots in the order in the 17-run outing. Sophomore Jayce Cappello also hit a triple and drove in two in a 1-for-3 day out of the No. 9 spot.
To complete the sweep of Point Beach in Toms River, the Raiders had to win a much different game. Point Beach sophomore Thomas Slobiski did not allow a hit over his five innings of work, but Toms River East pushed four unearned runs across against him thanks to five errors by the Garnet Gulls.
Toms River East won game two, 4-2, with Macchia notching the only hit of the game for Toms River East. Seniors James Whalen and Jonathan Pallman split the game for Toms River East and combined on a four-hitter, with Pallman earning the win with one unearned run allowed in 3 2/3 innings with four strikeouts and one walk. Pallman was third on Toms River East in innings during the 2025 season, with most of those innings coming in relief.
With Whalen, Pallman and fellow senior Liam Scallon leading the pitching staff, junior Dominic Roma, junior Max Mika and Macchia are new to the staff, with Roma earning the win in the 17-3 drubbing of Point Beach and Mika closing out that same game by recording the final five outs.
“It’s going to be mixed on the mound this year,” DiMeo said. “We have some guys with experience who have pitched for us the last couple years. I think Roma is probably one of our top guys and we already see him keeping guys off-balance.”
“We have some young arms, some that we have seen a couple of times and some that we haven’t gone to yet that I think are going to help us,” Smicklo said. “We’re going to work them in as we go here and try to figure it all out come May.”
Toms River East got their new week started on the right foot by beating Jackson, 5-1, for their third straight win, with DiMeo connecting on his first home run of the season and Scallon pitching a complete game in the win.
On Tuesday, Shore Sports Insider visited practice to present Toms River East’s Head Coach Keith Smicklo and the team with a $250 Joe Leone’s Italian Specialties Gift Card, courtesy of our partners at Joe Leone’s, for a well-earned team meal.
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