FONDTAIN CAN DO IT ALL FOR SDSU
Aztecs junior lefty a two-way standout coming into his own
San Diego State’s TJ Fondtain lists Dodgers pitcher Clayton Kershaw as his favorite athlete, though Angels pitcher/hitter Shohei Ohtani seems more appropriate.
Fondtain is a two-way player for San Diego State who bears watching this season.
“I think he was a really good secret last year, but the secret is out now,” SDSU coach Mark Martinez said. “I would say it’s really hard as a scout to decide what he will be at the next level, or can he do both?”
The 6-foot-5 junior lefthander from Clovis has emerged both on the mound and at the plate for the Aztecs. With a solid season, Fondtain could reasonably be taken in the top three rounds of July’s 2023 MLB Draft.
“That’s definitely one of my goals this year, to be drafted,” said Fondtain, adding, “I want to pursue both pitching and hitting as long as I can. Over time, if I excel at one over the other, I’m perfectly fine doing one. But right now I want to try to excel at both.”
Fondtain took a shaky first step in Friday night’s season opener at Arizona State. He allowed three runs and seven hits in 32⁄3 innings against the Sun Devils.
Teammate Robert Brodell came on to get the last out in the fourth inning. Fondtain remained in the game at DH, batting fourth in the lineup. He walked three times, scoring once, and lined out to left field. ASU rallied to win 6-5 with two runs in the ninth.
It had been a century since a two-way player made an impact in the majors like Ohtani. The two-way player is much more common in college baseball, where it seems most teams have a guy who hits and pitches.
Some of the most notable two-way players through the years are Dave Winfield (Minnesota), Mark Kotsay (Cal State Fullerton), John Olerud (Washington State) and Todd Helton (Tennessee).
All four of them were strictly hitters in professional baseball, with Winfield (Padres) and Olerud (Blue Jays) going straight to the major leagues.
The most recent two-way standout for SDSU was third baseman/closer Casey Schmitt, who is bidding for the big leagues after reaching Triple-A last season as a third baseman in the San Francisco Giants organization.
How Fondtain is viewed by scouts at the next level remains to be seen. His hitting stands out the most at the moment.
Martinez gets visibly excited discussing Fondtain’s power at the plate.
“All you have to do is watch BP,” Martinez said. “It’s really stuff we haven’t seen. It’s unbelievable. This guy. It’s true raw power.”
Fondtain said one of his blasts last summer in the Appalachian League was measured at 448 feet.
The tape measure hasn’t been pulled out at Tony Gwynn Stadium, where Fondtain’s prodigious blasts are noted by landmarks.
The left-handed hitter has batted balls onto the building beyond right field. He has hammered them into the parking of the campus police station located beyond rightcenter. And he has put a ball off the batter’s eye in deepest center.
“I’m trying to hit the scoreboard this year,” said Fondtain, who batted .339 last season with two homers and 11 RBIs in 62 at-bats.. “That’s my goal in BP . ... I don’t want to break it, but it’s a fun target
to have.”
Martinez said he makes Fondtain hit with wood bat in batting practice.
“It’s so he can be a little more understanding of being more precise,” Martinez said. “Because he can make a mistake with an aluminum bat and rip the ball apart. So it’s a little fake. For him to do it with a wood bat is a little different.”
The pitching piece has been behind the hitting, Martinez said, but it is coming up fast on the outside.
Fondtain’s velocity was in the low- to mid-80s when he arrived on campus three years ago. His fastball now sits in the low 90s. Martinez
said it is accompanied by a “plus, plus changeup” and developing offspeed pitches made even more difficult to hit by the way Fondtain hides the ball as he comes to the plate.
Fondtain went 4-7 last season with a 4.58 ERA and 60 strikeouts in 722⁄3 innings.
Martinez believes the lefty is ready to dominate on the mound this year.
“He was learning to set up hitters (last year) and also having confidence to throw pitches where the location’s been asked for,” Martinez said. “What’s really made him better this year is he can locate his
fastball in all four quadrants of the strike zone. It’s a testament to his hard work.”
Whether all that work will enable Fondtain to continue being a two-way player is debatable, but it will be fun to find out.
2023 outlook
SDSU (18-38 overall, 10-20 Mountain West in 2022) is coming off the fewest wins in a full season in its Division I history.
Martinez doesn’t want that to be forgotten by the Aztecs. He wants it to fuel them.
“I want our guys to remember losing 38 games,” Martinez said. “There should be a little bit of a sour taste in your mouth and a little bit of a chip on your shoulder . ...
“If failure breeds success, then I’m hoping we should be pretty good.”
SDSU was picked for third place behind UNLV and San Jose State in a preseason Mountain West coaches poll.
The Aztecs have the bulk of the pitching returning from a staff that led the Mountain West last season in ERA (4.97), strikeouts per nine innings (9.1) and opponent batting average (.256).
Fondtain leads a starting rotation that includes sophomore lefthander Chris Canada (2-1, 5.11 ERA) and junior right-hander
Jonny Guzman (1-3, 3.72 ERA), who worked mostly out of the bullpen last season.
Senior RHP Robert Brodell (1-2, 4.24 ERA) and junior RHPs
Ricky Tibbett (1-1, 5.89 ERA) and
Kelena Sauer (2-6, 5.23 ERA) are other experienced returners.
Junior OF Cole Carrigg (.388, 3 HR, 40 RBIs, 19 SB), a first-team all-MW selection last season, leads the SDSU offense.
Other returners include junior C Poncho Ruiz (.309, 5 HR, 33 RBIs), sophomore OF Irvin Weems (.293, 5 HR, 22 RBIs, 17 SB), junior 2B Caden Miller (.284, 2 HR, 26 RBIs, 16 SB), sophomore 1B
Tino Bethancourt (.248, 12 RBIs) and sophomore OF Tyler Glowacki (.254, 12 RBIs).
Newcomer Xavier Gonzalez ,a junior transfer from Southwestern College, is expected to start at shortstop.