Blue Raiders End Competitive Fall Practice Period With Fall World Series

11/13/2020 1:00:00 PM | Baseball

By: Anthony Fiorella

Murfreesboro, Tenn.—The chance to play baseball is always a welcome sight given everything we've dealt with in this challenging year, and the Middle Tennessee baseball program made the most of that opportunity this fall. The Blue Raiders wrapped up the fall with a total of 18 scrimmages and ended it on a high note with a competitive Fall World Series this past weekend. Blue Raider infielder Brian Dillingham and pitcher Aaron Brown teamed up against JT Mabry and Zach Keenan to participate in a draft in which they split the remainder of the roster for the three-game Fall World Series over the weekend. Honorary captains Larry Maples and Rendrick Taylor got to name the teams: Maples' Syrup (Keenan and Mabry's team) and Taylor's Tanks (Dillingham and Brown's team).

"We played pretty well in the World Series," said Head Coach Jim Toman. "We finished up the fall well. We've learned a lot about our team. Despite Covid, we grinded it out and we've been doing our best to mask up and get after it. Give it up for Taylor's Tank's for winning the series 2-1."

The first game went to Taylor's Tanks by a score of 2-1. They were led by the strong performance from their starter Peyton Wigginton. A strong start by opposing starter Justin Medlin would become overshadowed by a ninth-inning walk-off by Taylor's Tanks' first baseman Jacob Williams, who singled to left field to push across the winning run to give his team a 1-0 series lead.

Williams continued his solid weekend in the second game, going 2-for-4 in the second game with a back-to-back home run in the fourth inning with teammate Josh Baker to help Taylor's Tanks secure the series win with a 6-2 win on Saturday. Team captain Aaron Brown's only blemish came in the fifth inning when Jake Hagenow hit a towering home run off the Lee Victory Wall of Champions.

Maples' Syrup bounced back on Sunday with a 4-3 win. They were led by second baseman JT Mabry, who finished the afternoon 2-for-4 with a pair of RBIs that came on a game-tying triple in the sixth inning. After taking the lead in the eighth inning, reliever Austin Cheeley came on in the ninth inning to earn the save.

Of all the bright spots that came from the past month on the diamond, perhaps the brightest was the success that Blue Raider pitchers had. During the Fall World Series, the starting rotation combined to allow just six runs in 27 innings of work, highlighted by two standout performances from Justin Medlin and Aaron Brown. In game one, Medlin struck out 12 hitters in five innings, allowing just two runners to reach base on the afternoon. The following day, Aaron Brown collected 10 strikeouts in five innings to earn the series-clinching win.

"Having older guys on the pitching staff helps feed energy into some of the younger guys," Brown said. "We have a good freshman class of pitcher and I think everyone else is growing and things have gotten a lot better this fall. Personally, I think this fall went well for me too. The fastball worked well, the changeup is there and I've fixed some things with my mechanics. My breaking pitches have gotten a lot sharper and just being able to stick to my routine has helped me a lot."

Though the pitching staff had some success, Middle Tennessee exhibited that it has perhaps more depth on this squad than we've seen in the past five to six seasons in Murfreesboro. With some players going down due to injury, many new faces got a chance to showcase what they could do. In the outfield, new faces Dayton "Chewy" Sanders and Bryce Symlar made a big push to become regulars in the lineup and in the infield newcomer Brett Coker had a productive fall at third base.

"These new guys are really good," veteran catcher Jake Hagenow said. "The competition was absurd. I think there's a lot of a spots up for grabs. We have so many options both offensively and defensively. I thought we all competed really well for some of those open jobs."

Hagenow and some of the other more seasoned players on the roster continued to produce and refine their game. With the addition of so much new talent, the Blue Raider coaching staff was able to shuffle veterans like Hagenow, DJ Wright, Mark Engel and JT Mabry defensively to maximize talent in the field along with having the option to have some of the more reliable bats from last season remain in the lineup as we approach 2021.

"We solidified four to five positions on the field," Toman said. "There are still a few spots we aren't quite sure about, but we have depth. We have guys that have multi-faceted tool sets. We have lots of speed; have some guys that hit for power and some guys that play really good defense."

Though pitching dominated much of the fall, there was plenty of offense to go around in the Fall World Series. JT Mabry had two hits and drove in a pair of runs on a game-tying triple in the top of the sixth inning on Sunday. On Saturday, Jacob Williams, Josh Baker, Brett Coker and Jake Hagenow all hit a home run. Cole Escher and Fausto Lopez both continued to set the table at the top of the lineup with each of the pair collecting a team-high five hits over the weekend.

"It's just like what [Coach Blake] Hunt has been telling us all fall: 'You should be more excited to play baseball right now than you ever have been because nothing is guaranteed.' Being able to get out here this fall and play the game we love was awesome and we definitely didn't take a single day for granted," says Hagenow.

Anthony Fiorella is a writer for goblueraiders.com. Follow him on Twitter @a_fiorella74 and also follow @MT _Baseball for more on the Blue Raiders.