Dunn Smith will forever admire and appreciate the award he won at the 2024 POWER SHOWCASE, at Globe Life Field in Arlington, Texas. The sophomore from Longview, Texas, earned the Dove Tail Bats Offensive MVP Award for his performance in the Babe Ruth Classic, and the award is a brand new, custom-made baseball bat from Dove Tail Bats.

Dunn was 2-for-2 with a double, two RBI, a stolen base and a run to help lead his American League team to an 8-5 victory over the host National League team.

“This feels great. I really just worked hard to get to this moment, and it feels good to get it,” Dunn said of his MVP award. “It’s going to go up on my wall and I get to look at it everyday.”

Dunn scored the winning run in the top of the fifth inning, to put the AL up 6-2 at the time. He led off the frame by hitting a lead-off single to the deep right corner of Globe Life Field, and then he advanced into scoring position when Texas’ Camden Edwards drew a walk. Smith then stole third, and came home to score thanks to a sac-fly RBI from Texas’ Grant Huffman.

In the game format unique to the POWER SHOWCASE event, after the entire batting order has gone, it then snakes back in reverse order to the beginning again. So players batting at the end get back-to-back trips to the plate when their turns arrive.

Hitting just four spots from the end of the order, it also meant that the action snaked back around to bring Dunn back to the plate for his second at bat just an inning later. Texas’ Wes Morris led off that top of the sixth with a single to left, and Camden Edwards was hit by a pitch to put two ducks on the pond. This brought Smith back to the plate, and he delivered again by crushing a shot deep into the right-center field gap for a two-RBI double and a 7-2 lead.

“The first fastball is one I like to hit; that’s the one you always want back,” Dunn said. “That’s the one he gave me and that’s the one I took off of him.”

The AL took the lead right away with a run in the top of the first inning. Leadoff hitter Jayson Sapp, from San Antonio, Texas, worked a walk to get it going. Sapp stole both second and third base to get into prime scoring position, and then scored on a balk.

Sapp earned the ProSway Offensive MVP honors for the AL, after reaching base three times with a single, two walks, three stolen bases, a run and an RBI. After scoring the first run for his team, he also drove in the last, with a bases-loaded, RBI single in the top of the eleventh inning that scored Jacob Stogsdill, the new 14U World Champion.

The AL tacked on another run in the top of the second. Utah’s Ali Carrillo Jr. singled up the middle and then swiped second to get into scoring position. Carrillo then had a great jump on a perfectly-executed hit-and-run, as Texas’ Carlos Pascual slugged an RBI single that allowed Carrillo to fly through third base and race across the plate.

After AL starter Heber Garza struck out six in his first two innings of work, the NL finally got to him in the bottom of the third inning to get on the scoreboard and tie things up at 2-2. Texas’ Kade Myrann and Arkansas’ Zaxton Aldridge drew back-to-back walks to start the third, and Massachusetts’ Nicholas Fantini drove in the NL’s first run with an RBI single on a blooper to shallow left field. New York’s Darwin Alexander Ovalle then evened the score with an RBI single on a hopper to the shortstop.

Heber Garza struck out eight in his three innings on the mound.

The AL wasted no time in taking back the lead for good. The first three batters all reached to start off the top of the fourth, and they all scored. Texas’ Miguel Morin singled through the left side, and North Carolina’s Brayden Cap was hit by a pitch and then replaced on the bases by courtesy-runner J.J. Chavez, from Texas. Connecticut’s Mason Morgan then walked to load the bases, and Connecticut’s Kamden Kaldawy got the job done with a grounder to the right side for a 1-3 RBI groundout that plated Morin. Texas’ Raymond Lyerla then delivered a shot deep to center field that cleared the bases with a two-RBI triple, with Lyerla getting thrown out at home plate after trying to stretch it for an inside-the-park home run.

Who could blame Lyerla for trying? Certainly Dunn Smith understands what it feels like to get a big hit like that in this cathedral of a baseball stadium.

“That’s the special part that makes it feel really great,” Smith said. “To do it on the Rangers’ field is a really great feeling.”

Zaxton Aldridge also got to enjoy a big hit like that, to drive in the final runs of the game in the bottom of the eleventh inning. Darwin Alexander Ovalle led off with a walk, and California’s Jagr Scott also walked to bring up California’s A.J. Starkey, who reached on an error that allowed Ovalle to score. Aldridge then crushed a shot deep to left field to score both base runners with an impressive two-RBI triple.

Aldridge was also named the ProSway Offensive MVP, going 1-for-1 with a triple, a walk, two RBI and a run.