By Chris Parker
Pleasant Hope baseball has a new head coach in Jared Gage this season. Gage inherits a program with seven starters returning from an eight-win team in 2022.
Those seven returning starters are: Landon Davis (senior), Chris Agee (senior), Levi Marshall (junior), Kyron Highfill (junior), Jake Hickman (junior), Duane Hickman (junior) and Trevor Tucker (sophomore).
“We have a handful of upperclassmen that have shown leadership traits in our pre-season practices, but our true leaders will emerge as we get started with our season,” Gage said. “Getting returners to buy into a new system has been an integral part of our pre-season growth.”
There are a host of candidates to fill innings on the mound for Pleasant Hope including some freshmen.
“Our rotation will be determined as we progress closer to opening day,” Gage said. “Many of our upperclassmen had varsity innings last year but we will have a better idea of what their specific roles will look like once we get rolling into March. There are going to be some incoming freshmen who will be competing for positions as well as innings on the mound for us.”
There are a lot of changes for the Pirates this year, so handling adversity will be key for the team to find success.
“How we handle adversity will be important this year,” Gage said. “This can be a difficult character trait to teach but can be a key aspect to success for us this spring. We are striving to focus on the process and remember that baseball is a game of failure. How we respond can dictate a lot for us.”
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Gage is wanting to instill an identity of fellowship in the Pleasant Hope baseball program.
“Our identity that we are striving for this year is fellowship,” Gage said. “Having unity within any sport can open up opportunities and this will be an important standard that our coaching staff will aim for.”
Pleasant Hope opens the season Mar. 18-25 at the Pleasant Hope Tournament. The Pirates will play Lebanon at Hammons Field in Springfield at 6 pm on Apr. 1.
“My expectation is for us to take the season one pitch at a time and get to where we are playing our best baseball in May,” Gage said. “However good this team is, I do not know yet, but our goal as a coaching staff is to have this team playing at our peak in May.”
