Why Mark Kingston wants to see Gamecock baseball ‘with their pads on’ this fall
The last time South Carolina baseball was assembled as a full team on the field was around six months ago, preparing to open SEC play against Tennessee before the coronavirus pandemic upended college sports, along with virtually every other aspect of life.
On Thursday, the Gamecocks finally return in (mostly) full force to Founders Park for their first scrimmage of fall practice. And after an unexpectedly long, chaotic offseason, it will mark a welcome return to some kind of normalcy for coach Mark Kingston.
“Excited to just get back on the field with these guys. It’s been a long, long time — players, coaches, we’re all very anxious to get out there and start to do baseball,” Kingston told reporters Wednesday.
What exactly college baseball will look like come 2021 is still not clear; Kingston said he and his staff are preparing as though they’ll play the usual 56 games, but talks with SEC commissioner Greg Sankey and other coaches have hinted at all sorts of different scenarios, including no midweek games, fewer or no nonconference opponents and more doubleheaders to squeeze four games out of a weekend.
All of that likely won’t be decided until winter sports like basketball are sorted out, Kingston suggested. In the meantime, he’s got plenty to work on within his own program. COVID-19 protocols have made it such that the whole team has spent almost no time together as a unit, making chemistry a unique challenge.
“By now, we would have had so many team meetings up in our media room where we get to know each other. The time spent as a team has been very, very small so far. That’s the biggest thing we need to try to play catch up on once we start team practice. I think some (guys) are still trying to learn each others’ names because there’s been so much separation in small groups,” Kingston said.
Competition, meanwhile, will likely be fierce. The Gamecocks return a few more players than they typically would due to a shortened MLB Draft that only ran five rounds, and at the same time, they add a top-10 recruiting class. And on top of all that, an interrupted spring season and reduced opportunities for summer ball mean many guys haven’t gotten as much game experience as Kingston would like.
That means this fall will be especially pivotal.
“I think every every fall is important for evaluation, but this one even more so, maybe than ever, because we have so many returning players, but we have such a talented incoming class,” Kingston said. “So, we will play more scrimmage games than we’ve ever played in the fall because I want to see what it all looks like together on the field. Because batting practice is one thing, bullpens are one thing. I just want to see how these guys look. In football terms, I want to see how they look with their pads on. I want to see which freshmen are ready to play at this level, I want to see which returning players have taken that next step, and then I want to see how it all gets blended together and what our best look is as we get closer to the season.”
A position like shortstop exemplifies the logjam Kingston will have to sort out this fall. Senior George Callil, a mainstay at the position throughout 2019 and 2020, likely would have gone pro had the draft been its usual 40 rounds. He’s back now, but he’ll have to compete with junior college transfer Michael Robinson and freshmen Jalen Vasquez and Jack Mahoney.
“That’s a position that’s going to be looked at very closely all fall and all spring to see who the best guy is, but I anticipate shortstop being a very interesting position to watch and see how that develops,” Kingston said.
Roster size and injuries
The NCAA has lifted college baseball’s usual 35-man roster limit because of the pandemic and shortened draft, but Kingston said Wednesday that USC’s athletics department has given him a cap of 40 players for the spring, three fewer than will be on the roster in the fall.
Pitchers Hayden Lehman, Wesley Sweatt, Will McGregor and Dylan Harley all missed the 2020 season due to injury and will miss the fall as they recover, Kingston said. In addition, Kingston hinted that several more players will likely miss some scrimmages due to COVID-19 testing and contact tracing, though he did not say how many.
Graduate transfer utility players Dallas Beaver and Bryant Bowen, who both started at least nine of 16 games in 2020, have moved on from the program and are not on the fall roster.
