Tuesday, September 11, 2007
The fall season is barely underway for the Kansas baseball team, yet the changes from last year’s roster already are apparent.
Kansas’ starting lineup against the Croatian national team on Sept. 2 included just one underclassman, but Coach Ritch Price made it clear that several young Jayhawks could push for starting jobs. He called this year’s recruiting class the best he’s had at Kansas.
The infield
Price expects to experience the most turnover in his infield.
Although junior catcher Buck Afenir, junior first baseman Preston Land and senior shortstop Erik Morrison are sure bets to keep their starting spots, Price might have to do a little juggling to find starters at second and third base.
One way or another, sophomore Robby Price will be starting in the infield, but after starting 57 games at third base last season, he may be the regular second baseman in 2008.
In place of Robby at third base, Coach Price likes what he sees out of Tony Thompson. Although a freshman, at 6-foot-4, 214 pounds, Thompson has the body of a corner infielder. But Price also wants to find a way to get freshman infielder Jimmy Waters into the starting lineup.
“The young man can really hit,” Price said of Waters. “He’s not as proficient defensively as he needs to be to play at our level, but he’s been one of our better hitters in the first two weeks of the captain’s scrimmages. He’s a tremendous athlete.”
One alternative Price is considering is moving Waters to an already crowded outfield.
The outfield
Senior John Allman has been a mainstay in left field for the Jayhawks the last three seasons, and that isn’t likely to change any time soon. After losing Kyle Murphy and Brock Simpson to the draft, the team has vacancies in center and right field, but a trio of upperclassmen are already vying for those spots.
Senior Casey Larson appeared in 40 games last season, starting 20, and played almost exclusively in center field. But it was junior Nick Faunce who started there Sunday and led off for the Jayhawks. Faunce knows a lot can happen between now and the spring, though.
“He’s really mixing it up. I think he wanted to put players in who had experience at the beginning of the game,” Faunce said of Price. “I’m hoping I’m going to stay out there, but I can’t guarantee it.”
All that’s left is right field, where senior Ryne Price will be making the transition from second base. Coach Price said Ryne also would catch occasionally, which was his natural position in high school. So Waters might be able to fill in right field on days where Ryne is behind the plate.
Pitching
The only new face out of the nine pitchers who appeared Sunday was freshman Brett Bochy, who was a redshirt last season, but Price also expects some newcomers to challenge for spots in the starting rotation — in particular, sophomore left-hander Shaeffer Hall.
Hall transferred to Kansas after one year at Jefferson College, where he went 10-1 with a 2.19 ERA, six complete games and 67 strikeouts in 83 innings. As a senior at Lee’s Summit West, Hall was named the Kansas City Star All-Metro Player of the Year and was drafted in the 28th round by the Texas Rangers in the MLB Amateur Draft.
Fortunately for Price, he’ll have more time than usual to sort out his roster before the spring season.
Because of new NCAA regulations, teams can’t begin spring practices until Feb. 1 and must wait until the third Friday of the month to play their season opener — a major cutback, considering Kansas played its season opener Feb. 1 last season.
But the NCAA did grant programs more practice time in the fall. Price said he could only hold 11 fall practices in past years, but this year he has a 45-day window in which to hold as many as 33 practices.
“I really like the change,” Price said. “It allows you to practice properly and prepare your players to play on the weekend properly as opposed to before, where we were basically just scrimmaging.”
— Edited by Tara Smith
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