12 of the most
talented baseball players
in West Tennessee
by John Armstrong
s one coach said to us recently, “If your uniform’s
not dirty, you haven’t really played.” Well, these
twelve players can get down and dirty with the
best of them.
Baseball sometimes gets the short end of the high
school sports coverage stick. Maybe it’s because of the
day games. Maybe it’s because we’re exhausted after
football and basketball. Maybe it’s because we don’t
realize how many outstanding baseball players we
actually have here in West Tennessee. We’ll introduce
you to twelve of the best in the next several pages.
Three will head west in the fall to suit up for the
University of Memphis. One will make his way to Austin
Peay to put on football pads. Some will no doubt be
drafted this summer by major league clubs, and some
have more years of high school remaining before
moving on. All are among the best players taking the
diamond in West Tennessee this spring.
So don’t misunderstand. We may call them our
“Dirty Dozen,” but they shine on the baseball field.
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JOSH LILES USJ
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hile some athletes in West Tennessee fly under the
radar in their respective sports, USJ’s Josh Liles is not
one who fits that category. And especially not when it
comes to receiving attention from major NCAA Division I college
programs.
“He’s getting at least one letter a week from big-time
programs,” says Bruin head coach Brad Dyer. Those programs
include numerous SEC schools as well as the University of
Miami, among others. “He’s got a good build for a kid his
age,” Dyer continues. “He’s really fast and has a plus arm.
And then he can just hit. His bat speed is really good.”
Heading into his junior season, Liles has turned plenty of
heads. He started for USJ as an eighth grader, batting leadoff
and hitting .376 with 27 SB. As a freshman Liles hit .508,
racking up an amazing 81 hits and scoring a state-record 76
runs. Last year, he hit .489 with 6 HR, 43 RBI, and 56 runs
scored en route to being named the TBCA Class A Most Valuable
Player, becoming the youngest player to receive the award.
“We could have five hits in a game, and he could have three
of them and score three runs,” commented Dyer. “He can carry
the team by himself sometimes. He just does things you can’t
teach.”
While Liles does possess amazing natural ability, it would
be a discredit to him not to mention his work ethic. “He’s
probably one of the best baseball players to ever come from this
area,” Dyer said. “His work ethic is unmatched by anybody to
go along with his ability.”
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layton Gant was not a typical freshman in 2005. Unless a typical
freshman goes 11-0 with a 1.40 ERA on the mound, hits .449 at
the plate, and smacks two home runs in the state finals.
That sound you heard was a collective “gulp” from USJ’s opponents for
the next three years.
Gant is a good hitter, but “at the next level he’ll be a better pitcher,”
according to USJ skipper Brad Dyer. “He has more upside [there].”
“If you think of a pitcher, that’s Clayton Gant,” he continued. “He has
the savvy and smarts to be a pitcher. He works on his mechanics all the
time. He wants to be an exceptional pitcher and he thinks that way. He
believes he’s supposed to be on that mound.”
Gant’s forte is his ability to throw all his pitches—fastball, changeup,
slider—for a strike. The fact that he only issued 13 walks in over 60
innings tells the tale of his control.
He’s also shown the ability to come through in the clutch, hitting two
solo shots in USJ’s win over Friendship Christian in last year’s class A state
finals, something that was admittedly surprising to Dyer. “It surprised me
on that big of a field. [But] he’s got some good hands. When he hits the
ball, the ball jumps. That just shows all the work he’s put into hitting.”
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ootball may still be in his future, but for now,
baseball is in the present. And that’s bad news for
teams facing the Hardin County Tigers this season.
Before heading off to Clarksville and Austin Peay
this fall, Adam Milligan will suit up for his senior
season on the diamond, and Tiger manager Ryan
Miller is plenty glad to have him back.
“What he brings to the team is hard to describe
because he brings so much,” said Miller. “More than
anything it’s his presence. When Adam’s healthy and
playing, he gives our team a sense of security. He’s
the rock and the foundation of our team.”
Though Milligan’s stats on the diamond last
year—he hit .372 with 7 homers and 29 RBIs—don’t
parallel those on the gridiron, he still makes a big
impact on the baseball field. It’s not uncommon for
opposing pitchers to attempt to pitch around him, and
when they do, Milligan can make them pay.
“You get a lot of teams that will pitch around him,
and he’s not a free swinger, so he’s going to [draw
some walks],” Miller said. “Then he can hurt you on
the bases because he runs well. He’ll steal second
base and get into scoring position.” Last season,
Milligan swiped 18 bags and scored 38 runs, making
the most of the times he got on base.
Thanks to his 3,065 all-purpose yards in football,
Milligan is much better known for what he does in
the fall as opposed to the spring, but that hasn’t kept
colleges from showing interest in him for baseball.
“I think as far as actual attention, he got a little
more in football,” Miller remarked. “But he’s drawn
interest [in baseball] from schools as big as Mississippi
State and Walters State, which is a great community
college in East Tennessee.”
Instead, they’ll just have to watch him this spring
and think about what could have been.
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JONATHAN WHITE MILAN
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n his first three years on the hill for the
Milan Bulldogs, Jonathan White has
mowed batters down like a John Deere
through a grass field. So when opponents
see the senior on the mound this year, they
should know what to expect.
Lots of trips right back to the dugout.
“Obviously, what he does on the mound
is valuable,” said Milan skipper Donny
Joyner. “Even as a freshman, he ended up
being the man we went to in the sub-state
game.” Even though the Bulldogs lost that
game to Marshall County, White was still
the go-to player in next year’s postseason.
Tossing the first and last game of the 2004
state tournament, White was untouchable,
throwing 13 shutout innings while allowing
only four hits and fanning 16 batters.
Midway through his junior season,
White became Milan’s all-time strikeout
leader. In the last two seasons, he’s
compiled a record of 25-4 while sitting
down opposing hitters on strikes 241 times
and has an ERA hovering around 1.00.
White doesn’t just excel on the mound,
either—he also hits in the middle of the
Bulldog order, from where he has driven in
over 100 runs in his sophomore and junior
seasons combined. The stats are nice,
but according to Joyner, it’s the intangible
things that allow him to be successful—like
working out with a broken foot.
“He’s been showing up out here in
a boot, and I have to tell him to get out
of the way because he’s out there taking
ground balls and jumping into the batting
cage,” Joyner said. “He’s running around
the bases with his boot on. He just enjoys
being out there.”
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JOSH DANIELS HALLS
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nown by baseball coaches across the area?
Check.
Known by everyone else? Not so much.
But don’t let his anonymity fool you. Though isolated
in the northwest corner of Tennessee, Josh Daniels
has drawn considerable attention from college and
professional scouts. The team’s shortstop and leadoff
hitter, he has signed to play with Walters State in
college though Halls coach Mike Blackwood wouldn’t
be surprised to see him get drafted this summer. “He’s
definitely the type of player that [scouts] are looking
for,” he commented.
The reason scouts look for players of Daniels’
ilk isn’t so much the numbers, though his are
certainly impressive. As a sophomore, he hit .488
and increased his average to .491 last season. In
addition, he hit 10 HR from the leadoff spot, scored
57 times and swiped 31 bases while being caught
only four times.
However, it’s the tools that catch the eyes of college
and professional scouts alike—his arm, range, and
most notably his speed. This past summer, Daniels
consistently ran the 60-yard dash in 6.6 seconds.
That is, according to Blackwood, the equivalent of a
4.4 in the 40-yard dash.
In other words, he’s flying. Both on the basepaths
and under the radar of most West Tennesseans.
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laying in a small town in Northwest Tennessee, Halls pitcher Chaseton Dudas doesn’t get a lot of
attention. Despite being named to the TSWA Class A All-State Team, Dudas—along with teammate
Josh Daniels—were non-existent on last year’s Jackson Sun All-West Tennessee squad.
Considering the facts that Halls advanced to Spring Fling and that Dudas’ numbers were among the
best in the area, it was an omission that caught Halls coach Mike Blackwood by surprise.
As a junior, Dudas threw 85 innings, second best in the state. In this day and age of young pitchers
throwing 150 or 160 pitches an outing, a high number of innings might raise some concern. But,
Blackwood says, Dudas’ efficiency enables him to complete games while keeping his pitch counts low.
“Most of the time, he’s going to complete a game [but] it’s not because he’s going to throw 150
pitches because I’m one of the strictest coaches on pitch counts. He’s very efficient. He makes the hitters
put the ball in play.” Blackwood also says it’s “not uncommon for him to have 9-10 pitch innings.”
Though he struck out 84 batters, Blackwood says that “he doesn’t blow a lot of people away. He
makes the batters swing because he’s around the plate consistently.”
Dudas is garnering attention from a number of junior colleges, including Jackson State.
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ounding out three University of Memphis signees from the
area, Dylan Cupples will see some familiar faces when he
arrives on campus—those of Gunter Delashmit and Mitch
Huelsing. The three West Tennessee seniors played together for
a travel ball team out of Memphis, which helped all three get
noticed and eventually signed by the Tigers.
While Huelsing and Delashmit will compete with others
for time in the field, Cupples will be looking for time on the
mound. And with his ability, he’s got a good opportunity to begin
contributing as soon as he steps onto the field.
Choctaw coach Preston Ozment describes Cupples as having
“incredible control”, and even that choice of words might not do
him justice. Last year as a junior, Cupples logged 68 innings,
striking out 86 and walking only eight batters. The TBCA doesn’t
keep leaders in the strikeout-to-walk ratio category, but if they did
you’d have to figure Cupples to be among the state leaders. And
that control, along with his upper-80’s fastball, is what impressed
Memphis so much.
“When you get into Conference USA, with teams like Rice and
Tulane that are national powers, you’re going to have to have
guys who can do those things,” Ozment correctly pointed out.
Speaking of doing things, expect Cupples to do plenty of
things this season. In addition to his strikeout-to-walk ratio,
he went 6-2 with a 1.70 ERA and three saves. At the plate,
he hit .417 with six homeruns and 47 RBI. But perhaps more
impressive, his on-base percentage was over .700 last year.
“He’s probably one of the hardest workers we’ve ever had,”
said Ozment. “He’s always in the [batting] cage or throwing or
working out.”
And for the Dyer County senior, the hard work is paying
dividends.
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hen Jonathon Keck steps onto the field for the Lexington Tigers,
there’s little question about where he is at any point in the
game. When you stand 6’7”, you tend to stick out a little bit on
the baseball diamond whether you want to or not.
Of course, once the game starts, Keck stands out because of his
performance, tallest player in uniform or not. “He’s got a chance to hit
the ball out of any park at any time,” says Tiger coach Jason Patterson.
One of his assets is the pressure he puts on opposing pitchers to get
him out. “You’ve got to bear down so much on him when he comes
to the plate,” Patterson continued. “He changes the whole complexion
of it because you want to challenge guys in front of him to keep them
from getting on base. It wears on a pitcher when you have a guy in the
middle of the lineup that hits like he does.”
After hitting .388 with 16 HR as a sophomore, Keck answered with a
.415 average, 12 HR, and 56 RBI as a junior. “He doesn’t get a lot of
pitches to hit,” Patterson said. “The fact that people pitch him tough and
can still put up the numbers that he does with as few pitches as he sees
to hit is really impressive.”
Though he can mash at the plate, Patterson believes Keck’s future
might actually be as a pitcher. “He’s a 6’7” lefthander, he didn’t pitch
much until his junior year, and he’s already hitting 88-89 on the [radar]
gun,” he says, “so he’s just developing. I can see him gaining five or six
miles per hour.”
As for his future, Keck has yet to sign though he’s being heavily
recruited by “several schools.” Patterson believes his power-hitting 1B
will make a decision soon. And whomever he decides upon will no
doubt be thrilled to have him and his 6’7” frame on campus in the fall.
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ust looking at Covington’s Gunter Delashmit, you might not
be impressed. In fact, you might not be able to pick him
out of the Charger baseball team photo. Standing 5’8”
and weighing in the neighborhood of 150 pounds, Delashmit
physically does not stand out from the crowd. Ability-wise,
though, is another story.
“I’ve had people ask me before which one he is,” said
Covington coach Geno Miller. “People have always known he
can play baseball, but is he big enough? Every level that he’s
been put on, he’s excelled.”
That includes the Junior Sunbelt Classic, a major tournament
held in Oklahoma each June, an event in which 130 future
major league players—and some guy named Troy Aikman—
have participated over the years. The Tennessee team won the
tournament, and Delashmit was named the tournament MVP.
Gunter has signed to play collegiately with the University
of Memphis following his senior season in 2006. The Tigers
were impressed by many things, particularly his defense at the
shortstop position.
“In my opinion, he’s the best [defensive] shortstop that I have
coached and have coached against,” Miller said. “Gunter has
very good instincts, especially playing shortstop. You really only
have to tell him one time on how to handle a certain situation.”
“He’s going to go [to Memphis] and do really well,” he
continued. “As long as someone keeps giving him chances,
he’s going to keep going. I think Gunter’s got something in him
that you just don’t teach.”
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ometimes, it’s hard to pass up a full-ride scholarship.
Even if it means turning down potential Division I
offers.
That’s excellent news for Union, who signed a legitimate
D-I prospect in Covington’s Tyler Mathis. “Tyler would have
had D-I offers had he waited,” said Charger coach Geno
Miller. “It’s just hard to turn down a full ride.”
So Mathis will take his impressive control to Jackson
in the fall, but before that he’ll be taking it to the mound
for his senior season in a Charger uniform. Good news for
Miller, bad news for opposing hitters. Last year, Tyler went
11-1 with 97 strikeouts and a microscopic 1.08 ERA.
“One of his best qualities is his maturity on the mound,”
said Miller. “Even in the course of a game if things aren’t
going his way, he handles it well and doesn’t get down.”
“He has a strong mental focus,” Miller continued. “Tyler
makes adjustments well. If he has an inning where he’s
doing something that’s not right, we can get over on the
side and talk about it. He’s very responsive to that.”
Though Mathis can throw hard, his control is what
makes him tick with the ability to throw all three of his
pitches for strikes in any count. As he heads into his senior
year and beyond, he’s got a chance to make a big splash
on the diamond.
“Tyler’s going to be an impact player,” Mathis
concluded. “He has an opportunity to go there and put up
some big numbers.”
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ose Oquendo popularized the “position”
with the Cardinals in the 1980’s. The utility
man. Mr. Do-It-All. The king of versatility
on the baseball field. Over his career, he played
every position on the diamond.
Munford senior Tyler Huelsing might do that
this year.
On any given day, you might find Huelsing
in the outfield, on the corners of the infield—and
even in catcher’s gear behind home plate. And
according to Cougar skipper Justus Cousar, he
can play all the positions equally well.
“His versatility,” says Cousar, “is a good thing
to have.”
So is his ability in the clutch. “If we’ve got
someone on base, he’s going to clean it up,”
Cousar continues. “He expects to do well. He’s
got that kind of confidence in himself.”
Last season Huelsing led the team with
a .458 batting average to go along with six
homers and 28 RBIs. While those numbers
aren’t jaw-dropping or eye-popping compared
to others in the area, his natural tools drew the
attention of many colleges including the one
with whom he eventually signed—the University
of Memphis. While Cousar isn’t sure where
Huelsing might play there, he knows one thing
for sure: “You know how the saying goes—if you
can hit, they’ll find a place for you to play.”
“He’s got a lot of potential to become a great
hitter in college,” he continued. “The sky’s the
limit for him.”
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e’s best known for throwing bombs downfield,
but opposing batters know him for throwing
pills to the plate. While he recently won the
Mr. Football award for class A, McKenzie’s Drew
Hayes is as dominating a presence 60 feet from
home plate as he is across the line of scrimmage.
Hard to believe? Ask the 90 batters he struck out in
fewer than 47 innings last season for confirmation.
“With football being the larger sport, it does get
[him] a lot of the headlines,” says second year
Rebel coach Jeremy Maddox. “If you’ve got a kid
like him who wins Mr. Football, that’s going to be
on the front page of most sports pages around here.
If he has a great outing on the baseball diamond,
it might be a little overshadowed because of the
success he’s had on the football field. But I think
he’s getting pretty good recognition [for baseball].”
If nothing else, he’s got to be recognized by his
opponents. In 2005, Hayes posted a microscopic
0.69 ERA while allowing only 19 hits in 46.3
innings pitched. Maddox isn’t against Drew’s
pulling double-duty, either, as a starter and a
closer—Hayes also accumulated six saves last
season.
“Any time you’ve got a kid throwing 90 MPH,”
Maddox said, “you try to get him on the hill as
much as possible.”
And, with McKenzie’s dropping down a
classification this season, Drew Hayes will get to
introduce himself to a whole new group of opposing
hitters. We’re guessing they won’t be happy to see
him.
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PHOTO: MATT SWINEA / MCKENZIEREBELS.COM
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