Southeast Baseball

Earlier this week, Ohio Valley Commissioner Beth DeBauche wasn’t ready to make any significant adjustments as it related to the 2020 football season. However, she did state that the OVC Board of Presidents would be meeting on July 22 and 29 and may be doing just that.

This summer is nowhere near ready to fade off into memory either from a heat perspective or a baseball one.

Good Sports is a column featured weekly in the Southeast Missourian and on semoball.com. It is primarily designed to showcase people who have impacted the sporting life of Southeast Missouri, so that readers may get to know them more fully. Responses have been edited for clarity and brevity...

Southeast Missouri State baseball coach Andy Sawyers didn’t have any doubts that fifth-year senior Justin Dirden would be coveted by Major League Baseball teams this spring. It was simply a matter of whether or not the star outfielder would be selected in the abbreviated five-round MLB Draft this week or not.

The 2020 Southeast Missouri State baseball squad pounded out 21 home runs in its 17 games during this abbreviated spring season, and none were hit by freshman infielder Landon Hahn. However, don’t think for a moment that the Jackson High School graduate didn’t help the Redhawks be successful, as they won 8 of their last 11 games prior to the season ending due to the coronavirus pandemic.

There would be little debate that the 2020 baseball season for the Southeast Missouri State program will long be remembered, but that is because a global pandemic shut the season down 17 games into the season. However, there were positives to take from the shortened spring, most notably that the Redhawks fielded their first All-American player in four years...

You have to feel for Southeast Missouri State baseball coach Andy Sawyers a tad. He’s been guiding the Redhawks for four years as of this summer and half of his tenure has been a mess due to just poor luck.

For the time being, the NCAA rule book as it pertains to off-season diligence by Division I programs is a very, very fluid situation. What was allowed a few weeks ago (for example, virtual workouts), is no longer acceptable.

Even though there has been a moratorium placed on recruiting for all college coaches at this current time due to the COVID-19 situation, Southeast Missouri State baseball coach Andy Sawyers received some positive news Monday when the NCAA voted to allow spring athletes – in all sports - to extend their career by one season.

Wade Stauss saw the gathering storm coming for his team. The College World Series was cancelled. March Madness was called off. Still, when the waves finally hit in the middle of this month, washing out the rest of Southeast Missouri State’s baseball season, Stauss was put back on his heels...

Andy Sawyers is used to the satisfying sound of a bat making solid contact. The sight of a perfectly executed double play pleases him. An outfielder leaving his feet and successfully snaring a line drive brings a smile. Sawyers, in his fourth year as Southeast Missouri State baseball coach, will have to content himself with memories...

The only thing spreading more rapidly than the COVID-19 public health threat Thursday was the sporting events and leagues that were ceasing operations for the time being.

Martin, Tennessee was no place to find yourself over the weekend if you were a collegiate pitcher. The Southeast Missouri State baseball squad took two of its three Ohio Valley Conference games against the host Skyhawks and it scored a total of 51 runs in three games.

Southeast Missouri State senior pitcher Dylan Dodd was named as the Ohio Valley Conference Pitcher of the Week, as well as selected as one of Collegiate Baseball's National Players of the Week Monday.

There is nothing better for a struggling baseball squad than a series sweep to regain some of its positive mojo.

After storming back from a 12-2 deficit to win 16-15 in 10 innings Saturday against Northern Illinois at Capaha Field, the Southeast Missouri State baseball squad wasn’t able to rally in that regard Sunday, as the Huskies took the series finale 11-5.

Veteran Southeast Missouri State baseball coach Andy Sawyers preaches ad nauseum the need to compete on every pitch and in every at-bat and the Redhawks learned that lesson the hard way in Friday’s season-opener at Capaha Field against Northern Illinois.

For the second day in a row, it was Louisiana-Monroe jumping on Southeast Missouri State early in baseball action, adding multiple three or more run innings to seize control and down the Redhawks 13-4.

Southeast Missouri State was outhit 9-1 over the nine frames Friday as Louisiana-Monroe pitcher Ty Barnes (1-0) pitched masterfully giving up just one hit, striking out five, and only allowing one run in each team’s season opener.

Fourth-year Southeast Missouri State baseball coach Andy Sawyers will have to budget his time this afternoon because in filling out his lineup card for the Redhawks’ season-opener at UL Monroe (4 p.m.), he has more names to consider than he did throughout much of last season.

Southeast Missouri loves its baseball. Cardinal Nation is well represented in Cape Girardeau, as 520 fans gave evidence in Monday’s Cardinals Caravan event at Osage Center. Capaha Field is perhaps busier than it has ever been – hosting the Capahas, the Catfish, Legion and SEMO Conference ball – and of course, the university’s Southeast Missouri Redhawks...

Kerry Robinson bounded into a media room at Cape Girardeau’s Osage Center and went directly to a mother with two small boys in tow. Wearing a St. Louis jersey top with uniform number “0” and sporting a grey tam on his head, the now-team scout worked the room at Cardinals Caravan Monday – making sure every child there got what he or she came for – whether it be an autograph, a handshake or a brief conversation with men who may be future Redbird stars...

In the Tom Hanks film, “A League of Their Own” (1992), Tom Hanks, a washed-up major leaguer coaching a woman’s team during World War II, confronts a weeping ballplayer. “Are you crying?” Hanks asks. “There’s no crying in baseball!” Maybe not, Mr. Hanks, but in real life, there sure is cheating in the most leisurely of all professional sports...

The high temperature in Cape Girardeau today is expected to reach 40 degrees, which hardly makes one think baseball season is near. However, for the Southeast Missouri State baseball squad, the season is not just coming soon, it is here.

The recent construction of a $400,000 indoor baseball facility at Capaha Park will certainly impact the current Southeast Missouri State baseball players in a positive manner. However, it has already benefitted the Redhawks from a recruiting standpoint.

It’s Christmas time and the Southeast Missouri State baseball program recently received a gift that will keep on giving for years to come. After years of fundraising efforts and planning, the university recently unveiled a $400,000 indoor facility that is the envy of many programs across the country.

Fourth-year Southeast Missouri State baseball coach Andy Sawyers isn’t being overconfident as his team wraps up its fall portion of training. But he is confident in this: The Redhawks will hit for power better in 2020 than they did in 2019.

Every baseball player dreams of competing in October and for the Southeast Missouri State squad, that will happen twice this week.

Fourth-year Southeast Missouri State baseball coach Andy Sawyers is still four-plus months away from leading his Redhawks into a game that counts in the standings, but there was no hiding his excitement to get back on the field turf at Capaha Park Monday for the first of six weeks of practices, scrimmages, and a pair of exhibition games.