Spring sports tryouts and practices start after school on Feb. 27, and one of those sports trying to make an impact this year is baseball. The varsity team returns four starters from last year’s conference winning team along with plenty of new young faces to the team.
Things are going to look a lot different for the varsity baseball team this year after losing 10 seniors from the 2016 squad. Varsity coach Rob Simpson is looking forward to the start of this season with lots of new faces.
“I think the look and completion of this year’s team is going to be exciting due to the mixture of ages of our players,” Simpson said.
With two of the returning starters being sophomores last year, there will be plenty of new young faces ready to go this year.
There are three college commits already on the team this year: Maxwell Spitzmiller (Northwest Missouri State University), Kaleb Herbert (Fontbonne University), and Joshua White (Northwest Missouri State University).
“I think that the three commits on the team are going to come into the season trying to prove something to the other schools around us,” Herbert said. “The main goals for this season are to win the conference championship again and hopefully have the younger arms coming up help us achieve that.”
Going into his third season on the varsity team, Spitzmiller is really looking forward to this season with the returning talent and new young kids that are going to be on the team.
“I’m looking forward to playing a lot of games and making more memories in a baseball uniform,” he said. “I’m also ready to keep getting better every day with a new group of guys.”
The first actual game for the Pirates is March 17 against Hazelwood West at Oakville High School in the Oakville Tournament.
