Weigand ‘excited’ about team’s progress, next season
Lake Hamilton may not have ended its American Legion baseball season the way it planned, but for the Wolves and first-year head coach Matt Weigand, the summer league helped develop a different “culture” and “a new foundation” for the program’s future.
A former head coach at Sheridan and Malvern, Weigand accepted the head coaching position at Lake Hamilton last year, but before he could really see how the team worked together, the COVID-19 pandemic shut down the sports world.
Weigand said that he was happy when Gov. Asa Hutchinson announced in late May that baseball competition could resume in June, a fortunate development for many graduating seniors who would’ve otherwise missed out on their last chance to play for their alma mater.
“For them as seniors to not have a high school season was hard, and of course it is what it is and we’re not the only ones going through it, but for our seniors to have a chance to actually have a season (with) almost 20 games was awesome,” Weigand noted. “I was super excited for those guys. … They put in a lot of work, and then before we got shut down, those guys put in a ton of work getting ready for this season to try to start to build our program and change our culture. … That was huge.”
Three Lake Hamilton teams competed in American Legion baseball this summer, and Weigand is pleased with each individual group’s overall performance, especially the Wolves’ returning junior and senior athletes.
“For our AA group, which is our guys that are coming back next year who we project to be our varsity, there was a lot of growth,” explained Weigand. “We got a lot better as a team, and those guys really, really learned how to play the game the right way. Going into next season, I know we won’t be the most talented team, but those guys are going to play the game the right way. They’re going to play hard, and I’m really, really excited going into next season after the growth that I saw this summer from those guys.”
Weigans was also impressed by his freshman squad, noting major improvements for the team.
“With our youngest guys — our freshmen — I didn’t even get to see them play at all during high school, so to actually get to see them on the field against other teams and kinda see where we’re at there was awesome,” he said. “There was a lot of growth there with that group. Overall this summer there was a lot of growth, and it’s exciting going into next season seeing where we’re at. We were able to lay a foundation. … This is my first year over here, and we’re just trying to lay the foundation and get this program turned around, and I definitely think we accomplished that this summer.”
Weigand said that he has several seniors who will be leading the charge for the team this season. Carson Harris and Austin Hale, he noted, would likely be his top two pitchers.
“I think those two guys, in conference games, are going to give us a chance to win no doubt,” he said. “They throw strikes. They compete. They don’t get rattled, and I’m really excited to see those two on the mound for us.”
Weston Dobyns also showed his mettle during the summer season, stepping in as a strong reliever.
“He’s able to throw a lot,” Weigand said. “He’s a submarine guy; he gives different looks and is another senior on the mound who’s going to throw a strike, going to compete and give us a chance to win. I also see Weston being a real threat in the lineup. He made big jumps this summer at the plate hitting. He really hit the ball hard all summer, and I think he’s going to drive in a lot of runs for us next year.”
Ryan Fields and J.T. Bardwell stook out for the Wolves in the lineup.
“(Fields) is going to be our shortstop, and he’s going to more than likely be our leadoff,” Weigand explained. “I think you can count on one hand how many errors he had all summer. He’s just solid defensively … He’s a guy you want leading off for you and then in the middle.
“(Bardwell’s) got good speed, and he’s going to hanker down center field for us. … There weren’t hardly any balls that dropped in center field this summer when he was out there. I mean, that guy goes and runs it down, and between him and Ryan, they take runs off the board but they also play the game the right way in that one and two-spot. They’re going to get us off to a good start.”
One of the keys for Weigand and his staff this summer has been developing his team’s pitching, which in turn generated a higher level defense by fielders who improved in consistently backing their teammate on the hill.
“Our main focus this summer was our pitching and then playing defense behind it,” he said. “We didn’t want walks; we didn’t
want freebies. And we discovered early on (that) our guys were throwing strikes, but we weren’t playing defense behind them. … About midway through the season, through practices and all that, those errors went down. We were making few or less errors a game, and we were playing defense behind them. That’s what you want to see.”
Going into next year, the Wolves look to continue what the club accomplished during the shortened season while also applying new and improved strengths that will help further the program’s future.
“Offensively, we want to make them play defense for seven innings,” Weigand pointed out. “We want to eliminate pop-ups and strikeouts, and we did that. We weren’t striking out; we were hitting balls in play, but we were hitting balls hard on a line — no hang time or anything like that. Our bunt game and our run game got a lot better, so I think going into next year, we’re going to throw strikes. Defensively, we’re going to play defense behind them, and then we’ll be very dynamic offensively to allow us to score runs in a lot of different ways then be able to do that for seven innings.”