Arkansas begins fall practices
FAYETTEVILLE Whether they win more than last spring’s 45-19 baseball Razorbacks remains to be seen, but Arkansas fans will see a stronger team, Arkansas coach Dave Van Horn and Razorbacks Blaine Knight, Luke Bonfield, Grant Koch and Jared Gates said earlier this week.
Van Horn and those four players met with media at Baum Stadium, as the Razorbacks commenced the first of 30 fall ball practices they will conduct past mid-October gearing for the 2018 season, which officially starts in February.
The Razorbacks literally will be stronger, Van Horn and crew said, because they already are stronger under the auspices of new strength coach Blaine Kinsley.
Kinsley has been a strength coach on the collegiate all-sports level at East Carolina University and baseball, particularly on the minor league level for both the Chicago Cubs and St. Louis Cardinals.
“That guy is a psycho in the weight room,” said Bonfield, a senior outfielder-first baseman-designated hitter. “He works us harder than we’ve ever been worked before.”
Knight, Arkansas' junior ace, but always too thin, says even he can throw his weight around with a summer conditioned by Kinsley.
“We’re all getting bigger,” Knight said. “We’re all getting stronger. I’m putting weight on. I’m up to 172 now, and that’s absolutely the most I’ve weighed in my life. Absolutely. I’m super excited to get started today.”
As a draft-eligible sophomore, Knight, second baseman Carson Shaddy and Bonfield all were presumed to get selected in last June’s draft.
They didn’t, but they have all said it’s not the end of world, but a new beginning to complete unfinished business ended with the championship game loss to Missouri State at Baum Stadium in the Fayetteville Regional.
“We got cut short last year,” Knight said. “Our goal this year is to get past where we were last year and get on to a super and get on to Omaha (site of the College World Series) and try to win it. That’s our main goal, and I think we all have that attitude.”
Junior first-team AllSEC catcher Grant Koch returns after spending the summer playing for the collegiate Team USA squad, which he led in hitting with a .372 average, going 16-for-43 with two home runs.
“I met a lot of good dudes and played for a lot of good coaches and got to see a lot of different cultures,” Koch said of playing against international teams while traveling up and down the east coast from North Carolina to Boston.
If right-handed pitcher Isaiah Campbell, injured last season, continues returning to form, Van Horn believes the Hogs will commence 2018 with two aces of Knight and Campbell, just as the 2017 Hogs ultimately threw two aces with Knight and Trevor Stephan, who was drafted and signed this summer by the New York Yankees.
“Isaiah is good,” Van Horn said. “He’ll throw a little bit Friday or Saturday in one of our scrimmages. We actually are having to put the reins on him a little bit and slow him down.”
Pitcher Keaton McKinney, a letterman from Arkansas’ 2015 College World Series team, is progressing well from last February’s Tommy John surgery, Van Horn said and should pitch at some point next season.
Van Horn said sophomore third baseman Hunter Wilson has returned healthy from last spring’s season-ending leg injury.
However, freshman outfielder Cole Turney has undergone shoulder surgery won’t participate in fall ball, and reserve infielder Matt Burch has transferred to a junior college, Van Horn confirmed.
Afield and on the mound, the Razorbacks return much of last spring’s nucleus, but have some freshmen whose time isn’t apt to be denied, Van Horn said.
“There are four, five or six pitchers that could get the opportunity to pitch a lot and there are four or five position players that could get in the lineup and help us,” Van Horn said.
Look for sophomore Evan Lee, who hit .333 as a DH and pinch-hitter and occasional outfielder last spring while posting a 3.60 ERA with two saves as a southpaw reliever, to get expanded opportunities in 2018 with both his bat and his arm.
“Evan Lee had a tremendous summer with the bat and on the mound in California,” Van Horn said. “If we started tomorrow, Evan would be in the lineup offensively and have a great opportunity for him to pitch, maybe even start on the weekends. I think Evan is at the point that he can handle it. He wants to pitch and he’s tough mentally to do both.”