For the first time since June, baseball was in the air at Founders Park.

Mark Kingston addressed the media on Monday afternoon to preview fall baseball, which will officially start with scrimmages at 3:45 p.m. ET Thursday and 3:00 p.m. ET Friday. From another transfer class to incoming freshmen and returning stars, Kingston hit on several key points with his roster heading into the fall circuit.

As is the case every year, a few players will be out of action during fall baseball. Kingston confirmed that sophomore pitcher Eli Jerzemebck and incoming freshman Reese Marcum both “most likely will not pitch this season” after having their respective Tommy John surgeries in the spring.

In terms of players who are further along with Tommy John surgery but are not ready to pitch in the fall, pitchers Roman Kimball and Ricky Williams — both incoming transfers prior to the 2023 season — will not pitch in the fall. Returning closer Chris Veach, Georgia transfer Michael Polk and incoming freshman Jake McCoy will also not participate in fall baseball.

South Carolina is going into the season with two new coaches on staff. New pitching coach Matt Williams is replacing Justin Parker after he departed for Mississippi State, and Joey Holcomb joined the staff after the NCAA allowed a third paid assistant for college baseball.

“It’s been a very seamless transition,” Kingston said. “They were both brought here because they are proven talent developers at the very highest level, both of them. They’ve both had tremendous success. I liked Matt Willliams’ success not only in college and having some of the best staff in the country, but also his experience with the San Diego Padres. And Joey is known as one of the best hitting developers in the country. So him combining with Monte [Lee] I thought would be a really great combination.”

Up until Holcomb’s addition to the staff, program legend Scott Wingo was the program’s volunteer assistant and third base coach. Wingo is still involved with South Carolina baseball, but his role moving forward will be different.

“Scott’s title is Director of Program Development,” Kingston confirmed. “So we’re going to try to use him as much as he’s willing to do with alumni relations, community involvement and things of that nature.”

On the position player front, one of South Carolina’s key returners is Gavin Casas. The Vanderbilt transfer hit 19 home runs and drove in 56 runs last season and won Columbia Regional MVP with six crucial RBIs in the three postseason wins. He did it all from first base though, the same position he occupied at Vanderbilt. Kingston talked about his off-season development, and a potential position change in the works.

“He just wasn’t ready to leave, and I think that will be a great decision for him just like it was for last year’s three draft picks that all went higher than they had before,” Kingston said. “The interesting thing with Gavin is he used all summer to get in much, much better physical shape than he had been. He looks great right now. He’s swinging the bat great, his defense is much improved, and he’s in such good shape now that he’s actually taken some ground balls at third base. He looked pretty good over there, much better than I would have imagined.”

In a complete 180 from the state of the program at this time last year, South Carolina feels set on offense. The Gamecocks are bringing back most of their lineup, and have seven position player transfer portal additions. The pitching is the major question though after losing Will Sanders, Noah Hall, Jack Mahoney, James Hicks and Cade Austin to the MLB draft. Those five players accounted for 42 of 63 starts last year, and Jerzembeck made another three.

Eli Jones and Matthew Becker are the only two players still on the roster who started more than once last year. They are the unquestioned leaders on the mound, and two surefire members of the weekend rotation as things stand.

“This year I would say that those two guys, Jones and Becker, are the guys that are kind of stepping up for the work ethic and how guys are going about their business. For their personal growth I just want to see them take another step. They both took nice steps last year, but for us to be really good, we need them to take another step in their development and be dominant type guys.”

Jones started six games last year and finished with a 3.95 ERA, using control as his strong suit with just 17 walks against 63 strikeouts in 54 ⅔ innings. Becker joined the weekend rotation in the middle of the season after Sanders and Hall went down and started 11 games overall, flashing brilliance at times with 71 strikeouts but also struggling with command by walking 26 batters.

“For both of them really I think it’s consistency,” Kingston said. “When they’re both at the top of their game they’ve been dominant.”

On the topic of key losses, Braylen Wimmer is the most crucial one from the lineup. South Carolina’s senior shortstop returned to school last year after getting drafted, and the decision paid off as he hit .304 with 14 home runs and 43 RBIs in 2023 to up his draft stock. But Wimmer’s loss combined with Michael Braswell’s transfer portal exit to LSU leaves shortstop as the most glaring hole in the lineup.

Positions are always flexible in the fall and there is a long way until opening day, but two players have emerged as the lead contenders to fill Wimmer’s role. Will Tippett, who played second base and center field last season and was an everyday player by the postseason, and incoming freshman Lee Ellis.

“We have two guys that I think are plenty talented enough to do it, especially defensively in Tippett and Ellis,” Kingston said. “You’re looking at those two guys who will be fighting for innings at shortstop. I think they both need to continue to improve and get stronger and get more offensive, but defensively I feel really good that we’ll get the kind of defense we’ll need at shortstop.”

On the mound Ty Good is the headline name coming in from College of Charleston, one of three pitchers in the mix along with former Liberty pitcher Garrett Gainey — who is reunited with his old pitching coach Williams — and Tyler Dean from Virginia Tech.

"We love his competitivneess," Kingston said about Good. "He's got really good off-speed pitches; the fastball will be in that 89-91 range with a pretty good down angle. But the one thing we've heard time and time again is when the stakes get bigger, he gets better. So when he's playing in front of 10,000 people here at Founders, I can't wait to see him."

The SEC schedule dropped two weeks ago, but South Carolina’s three non-conference weekend series outside Clemson are still unannounced. Last year the Gamecocks faced UMass-Lowell, Penn and Bethune-Cookman around the Clemson series.

“They are in place,” Kingston said about the remaining series. “I don’t believe the contracts have been signed yet, so that’s usually the last piece of the puzzle for when you release it. Those will be released sooner rather than later.”

The Clemson series will consist of one game on each campus as always, but the location of the third game — historically either at the home of the Greenville Drive or Columbia Fireflies — is still “in process” to be determined.

Kingston also confirmed the team will only scrimmage during fall baseball and not play an exhibition against another program.

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