Yeah. Hello, Monarch fans and welcome to the first episode of the Hudson Homers podcast. I guess you can call it now the Monarchist podcast network. So if you go to our website, we're no longer two podcasts, one group. We are three podcasts, one group, and we are certainly excited to get this one rolling because we're going to talk all about ODU baseball here on the Hudson Homers podcast. I am Gary and I'm joined by my awesome co host.
You've probably seen his work all over our website and social media. Mr. C. B. Wilkins, thanks so much for jumping into this venture. Yeah, I mean, I'm very excited. I'm looking forward to, you know, one of my favorite things in the world is ODU baseball, so I'm very excited to They talk about him a bunch. I'm not sure that anyone that's not directly affiliated with the program knows more about ODU baseball than cb. He's around them year round. He's plugged into the high school baseball scene.
Other colleges, if you follow him on Twitter or Instagram, you're constantly seeing stuff from baseball in the area. So a wealth of knowledge. Joining me here to talk all about the good ODU baseball stuff. So you're gonna get two episodes here before this season starts. One each either Monday or Tuesday before the regular season gets started. We're going to break it into one episode where we talk a lot about the offense and the bats and dollars for dingers.
We're going to have a special guest join us for that episode as well. Then we'll have a second episode come out. That's talking more about the pitching, the bullpen, the fielding, and we'll have another Monarch join us to talk more about the pitching staff and the bullpen and all of that good stuff. So getting you two episodes before the season gets kicked off here. With George Washington starting on February 16th.
So CB, you are nice enough to throw together a little projected depth chart for ODU this season. So I was hoping we could kind of dive in and talk about new faces and just an overview on the roster. And then we can go position by position from there. Yeah, that sounds great. I'm, I'm. You know, my depth chart obviously is not at all accurate, but it's the best I can come up with based on what I saw.
I mean, obviously it'll get blown up within a week, uh, but you know, that's how it goes when you just look, yeah, that's baseball. That's college baseball for sure. Yeah. Well, awesome. I know we've got quite a few new guys on the team. I think you had a clock that wasn't 20 new guys coming to the team. I think we actually came up with 22. I think that's where we ended up at was 22 new guys, which is a lot. I think we had 20 or 21 last year.
So it's, I mean, that's, I think it's just how college sports are going to be anymore. I think. You're just going to have a lot of turnover and just guys are always trying to find some place that they can play and contribute and do what they know they can do. Teams are always looking for those guys too. So hopefully the guys we brought in, we brought in a bunch of great kids. That's one thing I know is that they're out there. They're great kids.
And I know in the fall, when I was seeing a few of the guys, even before they, I really got to some practices, I saw them just at some random sporting events. And without me even saying a thing, whoever I was talking to, they'd be like, man, we're going to be really good. You know, we're going to be really good. I was like, I like that. I like them saying that.
Yeah, you love hearing that, you know, coming off the last season that started off really well, but really kind of faltered down the stretch. But even with kind of a quote unquote disappointing season for ODU baseball, there were still 32 and 23. They're 15 and 15 in conference. I think that's really from the back half of the season. They're not the way they wanted to end it, but certainly not a disaster of a season by any means.
But I think you hit the nail on the head with the roster management and bringing in 20 plus new guys. I just think that's the way of college baseball these days, both with the transfer portal and a lot of guys moving, but also you're really seeing the effects of the MLB draft shrinking and those minor league systems shrinking and guys are staying in college for a couple extra years. And maybe in the past, there would be a later round draft pick. And get the chance to go.
So I'm sure that coach Fenwood is loving having to do all this roster management, but as a college baseball fan, the overall product across really all of college baseball has gone up because you have more talent staying in the college ranks. Yeah, I think it's absolutely true. I was telling the guy the other day, I was talking about how much he loves college basketball and football. I was like, man, you got to start watching baseball. It's always fun.
You know, the intensity level is always fun, but man, the product is really raised up because, and we get to see, we get to the Sunbelt, which is, it's a power five conference. We are probably by most metrics about the fourth best conference in the country. Um, so you get to see some really phenomenal baseball. You're going to see guys who are going to be playing in the pros. I know ODU's draft history is pretty fantastic.
We've got a lot of guys that are in there and hopefully we're going to be able to talk to. Some of them throughout the course of the season and kind of see what their experience has been like, but there's some great ball in the Sunbelt. I think we have a pretty solid non conference schedule too, with a couple of ranked opponents getting Virginia and East Carolina and a few others in there.
Uh, I mean, I'm excited for the season mainly just cause it means warmer weather and getting to watch some baseball, hopefully some warmer weather here in February. But yeah, I think there's a lot to look forward to with this new team. And one thing I think coach Fenway did a good job of is. You know, these 22 new guys that are coming in, they're not all freshmen, they're not all just juco.
It's kind of a mix of guys that actually have quite a bit of playing experience, whether it's at the D3 level, the juco level, kind of, I think mimicking the model that coach Milton Jones had for ODU women's basketball, where I'm going to go out and find people from all different tenures, but with a background of coming from programs that have a history of winning, or they've grown up in a culture of winning to kind of continue.
The winning ways here at O. D. U. And I thought coach was done a really good job of that, especially with the in state division three schools. Yeah, I mean, you always want to find guys who have competed and guys were used to winning. And that's how you not just build a culture. They have obviously have a culture, but keep that culture going is by having guys who are really focused on competing and playing hard and understand what it takes to win. I think that's a lot of times that yeah.
You know, winning in high school is great. We want guys who went to high school, but having some guys who won at the college level at different, different levels really is important. I mean, we got Brandon pond is one of our new pitchers and he won a, the national championship last year with Lynchburg. Like that's a big deal. That's a cool thing. And there's a couple of those guys.
I mean, Hunter Cole coming from Randolph Macon, they built a powerhouse of a program there and he was really the best player in the ODAC conference. So him moving up a little bit in competition, I mean, it's probably the perfect spot for him. Ray Hedrick there at Randolph Macon does a great job of developing guys and has just built a powerhouse there. And then I think we have, we have a couple of others too. Someone from Christopher Newport, is that right? Yeah, we got Jay Cassidy.
He came from Christopher Newport. And he's, he's the guy a couple of summers ago, he pitched in the Summer League for the Pennsylvania Pilots over in Hampton. And it was just one of those weird things that I think, I only got to like seven games. It was a weird summer for me. But I think he started four of them. So I probably saw him throw, you know, 25, 27 innings. And the guy is just, was phenomenal.
Um, it was kind of thing I was, I actually was bugging Marin because I was telling him all of a sudden, you gotta get this kid, gotta get this kid. And then he's, he's like, I can't go get some kid from Southern school. Like, yeah, you know, me as a fan, I'm like, but it turned out we got him. So it was great. A couple of years later, you know, when he ended up and ready to move up to a level and just a great kid and a really good pitcher.
And yeah, so, so getting those guys, especially guys already used to playing in Virginia and ready to compete. It's a big deal. It's good. I look at it too. We're almost the victims of our own success a little bit, right? The amount of talent that we have put into Major League Baseball or have come close to putting into Major League Baseball the last couple of years, it's, it takes its toll on the roster at a certain point when you have that many guys going out.
So being able to refill some of those roles and add some weapons to your arsenal that are already kind of. Proven known quantities, right? Like we, we know these guys can hit, they can play. There's going to be a little bit of adjustments to the level that they're facing, but not having to start from scratch, I think is a big advantage and lets you kind of load balance.
where people are in their seniority with the team to not too many freshmen, not too many seniors and keep the turnover relatively the same year over year. It is, it's not upsetting, but it is, it's a good problem when you start moving guys onto the pros, but it also, that success leads to guys wanting to come play for you. If they know I can come play it over to you.
And success there will lead me to be a playing pro ball, then it's very easy to say, well, I'm going to come play there because I know they're going to coach me up. I mean, we do a really good job, particularly with infielders. Infielders know like they come here, they're getting some high level coaching and going to really take off. That's just going to drive more talent up. It's obviously an exciting time for ODU baseball with the new stadium on the horizon, really not that far away.
Just kind of putting the final touches on dates and what that's going to look like for a year, not playing at the bud. Yeah. There are some really big things ahead for ODU baseball, and I think this is the first team that's going to help make that push into what will likely be an even better era of ODU baseball moving forward. Yeah, I look at the current bud with the Rally Alley and the Paul Keyes hitting facility.
And even just the brick around the back behind home plate and the way the dugouts are now, I mean, it wasn't 10 years ago. It was all, it was chain link fences out in the back and the dugout was the ugly little, it didn't have the front, uh, armrest to the fence lean on. I mean, it wasn't that long ago. It was. So for me watching, just seeing what now it looks like a palace compared to what it used to.
And then to have this idea that within a couple years we're going to have this just gorgeous place. I mean, that's very exciting. It's, it's a pretty awesome thought of what's right around the corner for ODU baseball and just the big upswing. So they definitely need your support. All of you fans out there coming to games, checking out the team, supporting them, all that good stuff.
But. I want to jump into the depth chart here a little bit and talk about what to expect coming back this season because we do see some familiar names on here but also some very new ones. So CB, I'll, I'll let you take it from here as far as what position you want to cover first from a very projected non official depth chart. All right. Well, I'll tell you what, let's start in the infield because we, I think the infield is where we're going to find the most names that we kind of recognize.
So third base, we got Cain LaVarie coming back. Cain LaVarie, he's a senior lefty hitter. He's a phenomenal third baseman. The guy, honestly, it bothers me he's still playing for us. I don't know how he's not playing professionally. I will never stop being upset about that. I mean, as much as as happy as I am that Kenny's here, I don't know what teams are looking at that they don't see him and say, I got to have him playing pro for me.
So Kenny, he's our third baseman, but he's also going to do some pitching for us this year. Kenny, when he came out of high school in 2020, I think if it hadn't been for that weird 2020 COVID year and the shortened draft, he probably definitely would have been drafted maybe in that six to 10 round range. Maybe we never got to us, but he was every bit as good a pitcher coming out of high school as he was a hitter.
So they finally kind of have this come around to say, okay, we want to let Kenny's arm do some work this year. And so they talk about it every year, but this year I think it's actually going to happen. This is the first time I saw them actually having some times where he was going to play, he's going to pitch. So he's playing first base. the days he's going to pitch. So you might see Kenny playing some first base in addition to third.
He looks very good over at first base, despite not really having done it much. So those days where Kenny is not playing third, you'll probably see Alex Boucher playing third. And Alex had a phenomenal season last year as the everyday shortstop as a freshman. And so you'll see him playing third when Kenny's not there, but you'll also probably see him playing first base a lot. He's probably the main option at first base.
So right there just with two guys that are returning, but they're both kind of going to be in different positions that maybe we've seen them in. The long way to return to the bump for Kenny. Yeah, he is look, look dirty. I haven't seen him. I didn't get to go out this past weekend, but when I was out there in the fall, he looked good. It looked really good. So that's Kenny's a gamer. He's a leader.
Um, he's a talker on the field and down there a lot and you can hear him talking light and it's all positive stuff. So he's, it's, he's a guy that's, it's, as I said, I, I wish he was playing pro just for him, but for us, man, uh, asset to have that guy around. Absolutely. And the position flexibility is a huge plus for Kenny as well, but I think you, you hit it with the leadership angle. I think that it's going to be a very solid leader for this team, especially getting going down the stretch.
Yeah, for sure. So then going to shortstop Alex Boucher. As you said, he was the every day shortstop last year. Um, I think if some different, I think if we don't realize he was going to play shortstop every day, we might have made some, if we knew he was going to be that good. I mean, I think they knew he was going to be really good, but I didn't know if they knew he was going to take over, but. This year, Kyle Edwards is gonna be the shortstop.
Kyle had a phenomenal second half of the season last year. Really just pounded the ball. He looked like he looked in high school. I mean, I've seen Kyle play since he was about 14 years old. And the first year or so here, he just didn't have the same swagger and confidence. And he's got it back. He, again, he's a leader. He has fun. He's got that long, wiry body. He just has that whip with his arms. And he's a phenomenal shortstop. So he's going to, he's going to be the everyday shortstop again.
If he occasionally isn't playing at Boucher, we'll probably be there. Because Kyle might also play some outfield if the lineup just needs it that day. Then, moving over to second base, we're definitely going to have somebody new, right? It's going to be somebody we haven't seen in the bud before. I would say most days our second baseman is probably Maverick Stallings. He is a junior college kid, um, from St. John Rivers down in Florida, where he had a very nice year for him.
Yeah, St. John River State down in Florida. I had a very good year for him. So between him and then Gavin Abram, who actually came to us from Clemson, spent the last two years at Clemson. He was a really highly sought after guy out of high school. Went to Clemson, didn't play a ton at Clemson, but I don't know what's going on at Clemson because I've, again, I've seen him out here in the fall and Gavin looks outstanding. He was seeing time at second base.
He saw some time at third and he's been playing out in right field and looks good at all of them and is really hitting the ball well. So that's, both those guys are going to be very strong options. We have, one thing we have with our depth chart is a lot of flexibility.
And a lot of talent and a lot of it's gonna be hard for Finney to figure out I think how to use it all but it's gonna be fun to figure out how to use it all It seems like a lot of kind of utility guys that you can plug and play anywhere Which is a blessing and a curse curse for a coach of who do you put where and who has the hot bat at the time?
so i'm sure that'll get figured out over the first year 10 to 15 games, but I like to look at that as a great weapon to have, especially when you start looking at conference play and the conference tournament at the end of the year, being able to rotate guys like that is a huge win. Yeah, I mean, you know, a baseball season is a grind.
They play 56 games in a very short amount of time, and guys get nicked up and beat up, and guys slump and struggle, and some guys get hot, and I think it's gonna be one of those. Nobody ever wants to slump, but man, if you slump in this, in this lineup, you might not get back in there for a while. Because there's a lot of options, iron on iron for these spots. I mean, that's how you get better. You just bring in, you just have a roster full of really good ballplayers. That helps. Yeah, it does.
It does. And so, speaking of, so we already talked about First Base having Boucher there a lot, Bavari there some. Another guy who was probably going to see some time at First Base is Hunter Cole, who you mentioned before. He came to us from Randolph Macon, from Granby High School right here in Norfolk. So it's again, the guy, I got to see a bunch of play in high school, phenomenal kid, just a great kid, great family. And I've been a fan of his forever.
I was so excited when he was playing for the pilots this summer over there in Hampton and told me he was going to come play ODU and I was like, I love it. Had a phenomenal summer too. And like you said, he was the ODAC player of the year last year for Randolph Macon. So just a really, and he can also play right and left field and play some very, kid runs well, so there's more versatility. I'm excited to see what he can do.
Obviously, getting up to speed with the higher level of pitching is probably the only hurdle. But if he was playing well like that in the summer against other college pitchers from all over the place, I think that's going to be a pretty short learning curve for him. With his position flexibility, I mean, got some options to sneak him in the lineup, especially if he gets hot.
I'll tell you the catching in the summer ball usually isn't as high level as it could be because a lot of times you're dealing with guys who didn't play much and the reason they didn't play much is not the best catchers, but he stole 30 bases this summer. In like half a season, so it's just the fact that he's willing to run and has the speed to run. So I wouldn't expect him to get 30 bags, but he can add some speed to your lineup too.
That is a very nice weapon for us to have, especially where it seems like maybe we won't have quite the number of home run hitters that we've had in the past. Could be more of a double singles kind of team. So to have some dudes with some wheels and get in scoring position is going to be big for us.
Yeah, somebody asked me the other day on on twitter If I thought we're gonna see the same amount of home runs and my answer is i'd be surprised if we saw another 100 home run season, but I was also surprised The first, second and third time it happened. So, who knows? I, I agree. I think there's a lot of guys who can really hit the ball. There's definitely some pop. And so speaking of pop, we'll go to another, another spot in the lineup. Designated hitter. Uh, the DH, Jake Tyser is back.
Man Mountain, the, the giant from out west. He is one of the largest human beings you'll ever see in your life. He's also one of the nicest. And the guy just hits the ball extremely hard. I mean, he hits singles off the wall because he hits it so hard, he just can't get to second base yet. It's incredibly fun. It's a shame. He got hurt. He's the guy who also should be playing pro.
I think you were talking about if they still have a couple of minor league levels, they still have a few more rounds of the draft. He'd be playing pro right now, but unfortunate for him, but thankful for us that he's here because I mean, if he's healthy, that guy could hit 30 home runs himself. He hit 16 last year and he only started in 38 games. So I mean, that's.
If he's able to stay healthy throughout the season, he could do some big numbers and probably be one of the Sunbelt leaders in home runs and slugging and all of those really nice, fun stats you like to see from. Yeah. And even in those 38 games, he had a wrist injury and a hand injury. And then was still playing a little bit at the end with the hamstring injury. So even those 38 isn't, it wasn't a real 38. He probably got about 20, 25 games where he was actually healthy.
If he's feeling good, I mean, he's going to put up some monster numbers. They're going to have to put some boards up on that chemistry building just to save some windows. I think the car is in the parking garage across Elkhorn. They're going to be in peril. Yes. Didn't he hit one? Was it him or Fitzgerald last year? The hit went on top of the parking deck. I, I don't know. I don't know if that was confirmed or not, but that's, I believe it. It's one of those stories.
I would, any story you tell me about either one of them hitting the ball very far, I would believe you. I'd have to go to the film and try to find that. But yeah, it's. There's, there's, there's still definitely some pop, but yeah, I think, yeah, but I think that the contact, the gappers and the speed may be something we rely on more this year than before, or we'll do, we're just going to hit another a hundred home run season. That's what I was speaking of contact and speed.
Let's talk about our guy. Who's probably going to Rome center field for Stephen Meyer. Stephen Meyer coming to us from Columbia Basin now in Washington. So Stephen, he, I'm pretty sure he led that league in stolen bases. He hit well over 330. He is a phenomenal ball player. He hits the ball very hard. He runs very hard. He plays great center field. Like I am extremely excited to watch this kid get to play at this level coming up from junior college.
He is absolutely one that we want to want to keep an eye on. I think one that's going to stand out quite a bit just with the speed, if nothing else, in center field. You've pumped him up to me. I'm excited and he'll be joining us. Here later in this episode to hear more and learn more about Stephen Meyer. He's a great kid really fun.
That's the reason I wanted to come on as a real personable kid, but Really good outfielder and I am very excited about what he can do in a lineup with both the power speed Just hitting the ball around. So then standing in the outfield, as you said, Gavin Abrams is going to see some time in right field. I see Hunter Cole having some time out there. We've got Luke waters who ended up being mostly right field last year for us. And it had an outstanding year as a sophomore.
It was kind of like he was, came in as an infielder. Good infielder, not necessarily at our level of infielder, and so they just, once they put him out in the outfield, they don't have to worry about him or he can just go out and run and catch the ball. He took off offensively, did what he could do, and so he, if he could come back and have a very similar season or elevate that, man, you got a, you got a really great ball player on your hands as a junior.
Just being able to keep his bat in the lineup, I think, is a key aspect of that too, so it goes back to that position flexibility and Being able to put the hot bats in at the right spot in the lineup and then mess around with him on the field umpires scorecards Probably pretty ugly at the end of most of our yeah We have and then so another option out there in the outfield is Nick Mueller. I think it's Mueller I'm gonna say boy, I believe it's a Nick Mueller is another option out left field.
So he's a another juco kid from out in In Texas, I think he started out at Texas A& M, and so he's a lefty hitter, a lot of pop. So you play left field, play some right field, might DH depending on how things go. But there's another good option in the outfield. Then T. J. Aiken is a freshman from South Carolina. Really just tall, rangy, athletic. He was a little bit nicked up, so I didn't get to see a ton of him in the fall.
With the deep depth of this lineup, I'm not real sure how much he's going to get to play, but he's a very good ball player. He's definitely one of those guys in a couple years that might be a team leader as far as batting goes. And who knows what comes out of the early part of spring camp and who's able to get some spots, but I mean, having some young talent that you were able to ease into division one baseball, in my opinion, I think is a good thing.
And something that doesn't get to happen a lot anymore in college baseball with the transfer portal. But I think if, if you're in that spot, you're looking ahead at some pretty good guys that. should be challenging you to continue to raise the bar of what your performance is. Yeah, absolutely. And to that, to that end, I skipped over a couple of our young infielders. So they're kind of in the same boat as TJ.
So Rowan Massey, who is from Connecticut, is you may remember if you're a old time Yankees fan, his dad, Billy Massey, he played for the Columbus Clippers for about four years. I remember seeing Billy Massey when I was a kid. Going out the old Met Park pre Harbor Park, planning the tides. And then Carter Sunderman, who's an infielder from Ohio, and they're so they're both. You're going to see time at third base, second base, shortstop.
Again, not real sure how much time they're going to play, but they're both excellent ball players. They're both definitely big parts of the future here. If, and if they can find a way to work themselves in the lineup, man, that's the, you're going to have some, so again, Finney has some good problems. It'll be interesting to see the lineup combos over the first 15, 20 games and seeing what works and what doesn't and when to pull what levers. I think that'll be a lot of fun to watch this year.
I think you're going to see more guys kind of rotate through the lineup that maybe even. Some of our years prior, I think the last position we went to look at was catcher. And I know we've had a good bit of turnover there coming into this season. We did actually right before I get to that. So Jack Spites, another guy, he's an outfielder. I'd be surprised to see him, but I think he's going to be a pinch hitter DH option.
And so he's the guy, he's actually originally from Chesapeake and then moved down to Florida. And so he ended up back here. He was with us a little bit last year, an elbow injury kind of limited him, but he's a very good hitter. Who's going to, I think, see some time, maybe not as much in the field, but at the plate for sure. So yes, catcher. All right. So catcher, we definitely, we have out of our four catchers, three of them are brand new to us. One of our returners was Jake who played.
Just a little bit last year, but played very well. He got a lot of walks in the few appearances he got. Very good hitter from Western Branch in Chesapeake, which they just, Roland out there just produces good ballplayers. But our two guys who I think are really going to split the time, I really couldn't tell you how they're going to split it, but Evan Holman and Jack Slater. Slater played at the same JUCO that Gavin Abrams played at out in St. John's River State College in Florida.
Holman's from Bellevue College in Washington. He's originally from Oregon, but he played in Washington. And he's a switch hitter. Slater's a lefty hitter. So there's just a little bit different for catchers, usually just righty righty guys. But again, both very solid hitters. I don't think either one of them has kind of that home run pop that we've had in the last few years. But just both guys who are really good at those bat to ball skills, putting the ball in play.
Um, and just making things happen and both very good catchers. So I think it's going to be interesting to see if one or the other kind of takes over more of the playing time, but they both are very good ballplayers, good catchers, good leaders. So it's going to be interesting to see how that all shakes out with the firepower in the lineup. If they can draw some walks, they can put the ball in play and avoid strikeouts and double plays. That's a, that's just bonus.
I feel like with this lineup, you're getting that from the catcher position, plus just being strong defensively, being able to call games well, like there's a lot to like there, but it will be interesting to watch that dynamic unfold of who's taking the lead from a playing time standpoint. Yeah, this is definitely a lineup where hitting eighth or ninth is not like a slight on you. It's just, well, somebody has to go down and hit eighth or ninth.
Realistically, you can just be turning the order over. I think that's the way I look at it, especially if you are stacked. You see some of the really good Major League teams are basically doing that, where they've got a really good hitter in their eight and their nine hole, and it's so that their leadoff hitter can be, have a little bit more power, hit some more home runs, and come up with guys on base. So, I'm excited for it.
I think it's going to be a slightly different offense than maybe what we're used to, but I like the direction that it's going to, where we're bringing in all this talent with different backgrounds. We're adding to the talent that we already had here that's coming back. I mean, it's just, it feels like a reload from coach Finwood and his staff rather than What I think most programs will be suffering a pretty substantial rebuild this year.
Yeah, I think most teams, you're bringing in 20 new guys, you're rebuilding. But I think if you look at who's come back, I mean, again, LaVarie's back, Kyle Edwards is back, Boucher is back, Waters is back, Tyser is back. That was a pretty substantial segment of your lineup. Uh, that's there. The biggest loss we had, obviously, was Hunter Fitzgerald. That guy was just all world for us.
But the rest of these guys that we kept and the guys we brought in, it really doesn't feel like I'm not looking at this lineup thinking like, Oh man, I wish we had what we had. Like, no, this lineup is outstanding. And like I said, in very interchangeable, a lot of moving pieces, you could come up with a different lineup every day and still have a good lineup. Again, Finney has got his work cut out. Yeah. Finney definitely has his work cut out for him this year.
Working with this lineup, finding the right combos and all of those good things. But I'm excited for it. I'm excited to see these guys in action here in a couple of weeks. Stick with us here. We are going to have an interview with Stephen Meyer shortly, and then we will be back in episode two to chat through pitchers, some defense, and then talk with another monarch. So thanks again for tuning into the Hudson Homer's podcast. Welcome back to the Hudson homers podcast. Monarch fans.
We are lucky today to be joined by Stephen Meyer. He's an outfielder for the Monarchs transfer him from Columbia basin college, originally from the great state of Washington. Stephen, thanks so much for joining us. Of course. I'm glad I can be on the podcast. Glad we were able to steal you away for a couple of minutes here, but we'd love to hear a little bit about your recruitment process and how you ended up here at Old Dominion. Of course.
So I played two seasons at CBC, Columbia Basin, and I had a pretty solid freshman year. I didn't finish the way I wanted and got not the greatest. I got kind of big leagued by the schools in the West Coast, which happens, and I came back for my sophomore year and in the fall early coach last year, came out to a showcase for Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Canada, kind of schools.
And that's where we touched base and flew me out and we had a nice visit and they checked every single box that I needed and that I wanted, that I cared about. And that's about it really. Came a great place from there. Think about those check boxes. Like what was maybe like one or two for you that ODU really checked off? I mean, really, it was basically I needed my school to be partially paid for at least. I needed a place where we can go win a conference, go play in a regional, and go win.
I wanted to win. Obviously have a great camaraderie and team morale and culture, as some people like saying. Every facility, obviously. I needed to get everything out of it. You know, obviously there's little things here and there, but everything overall kind of check. That's a great checklist. See, that's a really good checklist. Thank you. Yeah, I tried to, there's definitely a lot of, I wouldn't say flashier options.
during my recruiting, but there's places that try to win me over by their facilities and buy cool new Oakleys and their gloves and their bats and all that. And that wasn't exactly what I was looking for. I know ODU fans will be happy to hear that winning part and believing in the program can win and win this season coming up. So certainly glad to hear that, but. What's, did you just get to campus for the spring semester or were you here for part of the fall too? I was here for the entire fall.
So I came August 20th. I drove here actually. Oh, all the way from Washington? Yeah, that was a fun, that was a fun trip. Oh, that is awesome. Any, any good spots you stopped at on the way here? I mean, we kind of saw everything. We drove through nothing of Nebraska and Wyoming and saw, ended up in the Midwest where we saw Royals game and part of Indiana and Illinois and West Virginia. So we kind of saw all you can see out of other states, which isn't much, to be honest.
I mean, covered the whole, the whole nation there, but what's it been like for you on campus since you've got a full semester under your belt now and fall ball and all that good stuff. What's your experience been like so far? It's been great to be honest. I think part of the reason I committed here was the supporting staff. There's a lot of good people that are around us that helps a lot and also the relativity to our like teammates in the houses are great.
Like the fact that I can knock next door and there's a teammate there or walk down a block and we can go play poker or something. You know what I mean?
Like there's a lot of good camaraderie and there's also people like Amy Lynch in the Academics who kind of feels like the mom away from mom sometimes and the coaches you see it real good with and really enjoyed my first semester here more, not more than I thought I would, but that, like, it's just kind of all clicking exactly how I hoped it would. We are definitely glad to hear that. CB, I think you had an outfield related question. Did I have an outfield related question?
So Steve, you're going to play center field probably, right? I mean, that's realistically where you're going to end up, right? Yeah. So, how would you rate yourself as an outfielder and then further as a hitter? How do you see yourself? I think as an outfielder, I don't think I'm going to let a ball drop this year if I'm being honest. We'll see how my legs come up with me, but I love playing outfield. I believe it. Yes. I was talking you up earlier here to Gary.
I'm a, I'm a big Stephen Meyer fan. I really appreciate that. Was pumping you up with the wheels and the fielding and the bat and all that stuff. So Sunbelt player of the year, I think we'd go ahead and light it up. Let's do it. I mean, might as well, right? You choose for the stars. You might hit the moon, that kind of thing, right? Hey, it's great. Yeah. I'm like that. Don't spike. Let's do it. So, so as a hitter, how do you kind of do it all?
Like you, you're not like a, you know, the big time Jake Tyser power hitter, but you got pop. Yeah, of course. I, so coming from a Juco in Washington, it's not very warm there. played in a lot of 15 degree weather games, doubleheaders in the week, weekdays coming here. We played with wood bats as well. So coming here early in the fall, I came out with my like, wow, I'm, if I can hit bombs with wood bats at practice, I can hit some bombs here, you know, on the east coast, this is easy.
And then I found it real quick. If I don't stay within myself, I end up not doing as well. And so I think honestly, it's just about staying within, it'll be a lot of. Hustle triples, hustle doubles, and then when they fly, they'll fly. So, just keep playing my game. I think the power will be there, and I think it'll complement guys like Tyser, like you said earlier. No, I love that.
That's one thing I noticed about you, is you are going to hit the ball hard and then run even harder, which is, as a fan, I think you couldn't ask for much more. Yeah, I think I owe it to my parents to run real hard every time. I don't think there's a reason not to. I think I was sacrificed by them too much to not hustle every single second. That's great. How often are they going to come out and see you? I'm hoping once or twice. I think maybe, I think they said maybe once a month.
That's fantastic. So I think it. March, April, and May, so maybe three times, hopefully. We'll find out, but they'll come September. Are they planning on, is it all here at Old Dominion, or are there going to be any road trips? I think it's scheduled for my mom to come out on the Northeastern Series, which will be a great one. And then maybe against Louisiana, we'll find out. That's excellent, that's a lot, that's great.
We've had a lot of kids from out West there, and I know it varies how often they're able to come out and see them. It's a neat pipeline we have going with all the talent out there. Yeah, for sure. I mean, the best part is, you know, ESPN Plus, you put that on it. It might be 10 p. m. our time, but it's 7 p. m. their time for me. So for, for my parents. So it's, that's bad. That is such a blessing to have that ability for them at home to be able to watch. That's great. Exactly.
You know, they're already paying for it anyway, because it's bundled with Hulu and Disney plus. And all that. Might as well catch all ODU and Sunbelt stuff you can, but you're talking about your mom. And I was just reading the bio that your mom played softball and volleyball, the division one level. Yeah, she's a baller. I'll tell you that much. She was a catcher. So she understands game for sure. Yeah, nothing much to say there She's about five foot three of pure grit.
So just the perfect trainer for you coming up to get all that hustle in you Yeah, definitely might not know how to hit a baseball exactly but she knows how to hustle.
So it's been great Oh, that is awesome So just before we start recording you're talking about you're in one of the baseball houses with a couple of the guys you got other teammates right around you Is there anyone that like you connected with first when you got to campus, anyone that you've gotten super close with, aside from, and it could be the guys that you're actually living with now.
Yeah. I mean, there's a lot of guys who it's been a slower process for me to connect with guys, just cause I didn't want to, you know, junior transfer. I didn't want to put myself out there too far and rub anyone the wrong way. And I think I realized that I probably did more harm than good. I should've just been myself earlier and it would have turned out just the way it is now, but definitely my roommates. I mean, Dylan Brown and.
Dylan Brown is not who I expected him to be, but I love him because of that. Like he's such a good dude. Uh, John Holabat's obviously Kyle Finn. Great guys. I can't really say there's like anyone, like if anyone, I'll hang out with all these guys.
Like there's no one I'm like, there's no one above the rest, I think they're all just great dudes, which is so good to have because I've played on some teams where it's been, sometimes, you know, you get a little, you get some interesting characters on there. For sure. That's great to hear. That's one thing I've been telling everybody, you know, we talked about there's like 22 new players, as I said, but they brought in just a bunch of great guys, which is really good to see.
Yeah. Yeah. So I gotta know, cause Dylan Brown, love Dylan Brown, guy, I mean, nicest kid in the world, I think. What did you think he was going to be like? What was about him that you, what was the perception? Just you know, assuming going into a college house, I was like, all right, these guys are probably like frat boys. You know, you never know. Big D1, cool guys. I'm like, all right, Dylan Brown, he looked like a pretty good ball player last year. Who knows what he's going to be like.
And so obviously I don't assume the worst, but I assume, you know, I put in my two cents of what it could be and then hope for the best. And obviously me and him, we mean him nerd out all the time about weird things. So that's great. That's excellent. That is really cool to hear. I'm glad to just hear that chemistry. Cause it seems like this from coach Finn was recruiting strategy.
It was definitely bringing good guys and bringing guys from all different styles of background, whether it's Juco, division three, division other power conferences, but really all based in. Like teams and backgrounds that have won and continue that culture of winning while not being that weird guy that people don't like to hang out with. Exactly. Like it's been great.
Like seeing someone like Brandon Pond from Lynchburg who won a national championship and a guy like Gavin Abrams who played in the ACC for two years. Like, it's like, you just get a lot of people from different walks of life that you kind of can learn more from. So it's been great. Awesome. Steven, we'll finish up with one more question. Uh, so.
Allegedly this summer, we're going to get a new EA sports college football game, which I obviously be super excited about, but I'd be even more excited if they brought back the EA sports college baseball game for a couple of years. I know those may have been a little before your time, but. You know, if you were to, if they were to make an EA college sports baseball game, what would be your ratings on there? And how badly would you dominate your teammates in that game?
I don't think I've ever really ever played. I've never been much of a MLB the show or a college baseball kind of guy, but I would compete and I think my ratings would be, I mean, 99 speeds all I really need and then I'll find a way. That's fair enough. We can build on the rest there. Steven, thanks so much for joining us today and being one of the first guests here on the Hudson Homers podcast.
Hope to talk to you quite a bit throughout the season and definitely looking forward to you guys getting things kicked off here in a couple weeks. Sounds good. It'll be good to see you out there. Thanks for tuning in to the first episode of the Hudson Homers podcast. CB and I will be back next week to give you a preview. of Old Dominion starting rotation and their bullpen. We'll also have an interview with someone from the Monarch pitching staff.
We're also gonna take a look forward to Old Dominion's schedule this year, pointing out some key opponents, key road trips, and of course diving into a little bit of the history into some of the matchups. Hope that you, uh, join us for episode two next week. Go Monarchs! Okay.