Revamped Scotties ready to swing away
A new season, a new section and a new series of challenges await Southmoreland baseball coach Brian Hyde and his team in 2007. Hyde appears to have his group ready to answer each and every challenge as the Scotties return all four members of their starting rotation and are prepared to take their cuts with a revamped approach at the plate.
“We really tried to change our entire hitting approach,” said Hyde. “We got away from the small ball approach because we really didn’t have a lot of team speed.
“We’re trying to focus on hitting the ball to right field and hitting behind the runners. We started going that way a lot in the second half of last season and we had our kids hitting around .425.”
Among the key returning players from last years team – which qualified for the WPIAL playoffs before losing to Valley in the opening round – are David Hyde, Al Levendoski, Jeremy Mains and Eric Frund.
Hyde will be the Scotties’ top starting pitcher as he is coming off a sophomore season that saw him finish with an impressive 5-1 record. Levendoski returns to play first base while Mains and Frund will hold down the shortstop and catcher positions, respectively.
Aside from overhauling the Scotties’ approach at the plate, Hyde also mentioned how they have put a strong emphasis on their play in the field.
“We’ve really made an effort to solidify ourselves defensively and to cover a lot more ground out there,” said Hyde. “We’ve really worked at it and the kids have really responded to it.”
Perhaps two of the most underrated players on the team are infielder Nathan Van Dyke and outfielder Sean Krott. Van Dyke returns as the Scotties utility infielder and is a player that Hyde will count on to make starts at just about every position around the diamond.
“Nathan is a really strong utility infielder for us,” said Hyde. “He fills in at each spot and has some of the best hands I’ve ever seen on a kid at this level.”
Krott is a player who Hyde described as a tall, athletic kid with a big arm and equally big heart.
“Sean is a kid that never really played until his freshman year,” said Hyde. “He made a strong commitment to it and I think he has a chance to be one of our better outfielders. He has a really strong arm and he always works hard for us.”
The Scotties will make the move to Section 4-AA, where they will join perennial powers Greensburg Central Catholic and Shady Side Academy. Despite the new section and new opponents, Hyde remains confident in his team’s ability to compete.
“We have a really strong junior class and I feel that our top seven kids can really perform for us and are really interchangeable for us,” said Hyde. “I see no reason why we can’t compete for a playoff spot if not the section title.”
Southmoreland will begin its season on April 2 at home against Riverview.