The Mark Kingston era is about to get underway at South Carolina.
The Gamecocks start fall practice Thursday with the team’s first intrasquad scrimmage scheduled for Friday at 4 p.m.
Kingston met with the media before the team’s first practice Thursday and discussed a variety of different subjects.
Young bucks
The Gamecocks’ 2017 recruiting class was ranked No. 5 in the country by Baseball America and includes a few high-profile commitments like Kyle Jacobsen and Noah Campbell, both of whom are rated in the top 100 prospects by PerfectGame.
There are also three other players rated in PerfectGame’s top 500 prospects: pitchers Carmen Mlodzinski and Logan Chapman and outfielder Ian Jenkins that could make an impact early.
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“There’s some big-name kids in this class,” Kingston said. “Campbell and Jacobsen of the position players have the most notoriety coming in, and it’s probably deserved based on what we’ve seen so far. Young pitchers, you have some really good guys. You have Chapman, you have Mlodzinski, really good guys. I don’t want to leave anybody out. (Corey) Stone’s going to be a good one. There’s a lot of good, young talent in the class no question.”
Kingston says there’s a lot of potential with this year’s team and said he’s been really pleased with players’ willingness to learn. Now, he and the rest of the staff are tasked with developing this class’s raw tools and figuring out which players can contribute right away.
“You never really know that until two, three, four years down the road, but there’s definitely some good, young talent in that class. What we need to figure out is which of these guys can help us right away. To me that’s the biggest factor.”
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Injury report
Heading into camp there are a few nagging injuries that will limit a few Gamecocks. Kingston didn’t reveal which Gamecocks will be limited but there will be some held out of fall scrimmages and others who will take a limited role to preserve their health.
“Every fall with every team in the country there’s guys who aren’t going to play as much as you want,” Kingston said. “There will be some guys that will be limited. There’s no reason to get a guy hurt in the fall unnecessarily.”
Graham Lawson was injured over the summer with arm soreness. He’ll likely be out the whole fall. The plan is for him to be ready for the start of the season in February.
A few other plays will be held out as well, although more will be known as scrimmages continue this fall. Kingston said he’s making sure his team is the healthiest it can be heading into the season.
“At the end of the day the spring is much more important than the fall in terms of that’s when guys need to be at their healthiest,” Kingston said. “There will be guys that will be limited, but we’ll just be smart in how we use those guys.”
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Arms in the stable
One of the biggest questions surrounding the Gamecocks is their pitching staff, which loses two weekend starters to the MLB Draft with Clarke Schmidt and Wil Crowe. Adam Hill is the presumed pitcher to take over the marquee Friday-night role, but after that competition is wide open.
Cody Morris and Colby Lee both started weekend games last season and will be factors in the competition with some of the younger guys like Chapman, Mlodzinski and a few other junior college pitchers.
“My hope is that these young guys are going to be able to pitch because they’re really talented,” Kingston said. “My hope is that the returning players that maybe had solid seasons last year will be able to have really good seasons this year. My hope is that a guy like Hill becomes a dominant SEC starter.”
It’s a huge question mark for South Carolina, who will have to try out some new pitchers in different situations over the course of fall practice.
“I’m not going to call our pitching a concern, I’m just going to say that’s our biggest challenge at this point,” Kingston said. “But sometimes challenges turn into a strength come springtime. I would say that’s our focus in terms of that’s where we better figure some things out.”
Other than pitching, the Gamecocks return five of their top six hitters from last season and return starters at every position in the field. Right now, Kingston said that could become the strong suit of this team.
“Position player standpoint, offensively and defensively we’re going to be pretty good,” Kingston said. “I feel confident in saying what we have coming back, what we’re going to be able to do to help these guys, I feel pretty confident in saying our offense and defense will be very, very good.”
