Hawk’s Baseball wants to move from Chess to Checkers
Canyon Lake Baseball is rounding third as this season gets closer and closer to home base.
Senior Kyler Huff
The Hawks had a forgettable season in 2012, but forgetting last year could be a mistake for this CL team that finally has more than one senior playing.
Those hard knocks put on Canyon Lake are learning tools that might give this year’s team the drive needed to compete and win.
Starting with that 3-22 record, most of that roster was from a Freshman and Sophomore laden class that was playing district foes that were way out of their league.
Bandera was starting all Seniors but one player last season and that is just a sampling of what other teams had on their roster.
There is a band of Seniors that want nothing more than to end this season with some proverbial skins on the wall. That goal can be reached much like three years ago when Canyon Lake’s baseball team not only made the playoffs, but was the first team for Canyon Lake to win in their first round in postseason play.
There has been a report that Head Coach Trent Dunavant might have been smiling while prepping this team for the start of this season.
Get ready, because these next numbers will wipe that smile off your face and replace it with a frown.
Numbers 3 Wins last season .227 Team batting average 90 Runs scored 198 Runs given up on defense 28 Extra base hits 6.54 Compiled Earn Run Average 1.3 Runs allowed per inning
Other reasons that could be deduced from last year’s team besides experience.
Every time Coach Dunavant would walk to the mound to make a change at pitcher, the following could happen.
1. Take pitcher off the mound and move to Catcher.
2. The Catcher now goes to Third Base.
3. Third Baseman is moved to First Base.
4. Right Fielder is brought in to pitch.
5. First Baseman is moved to Center Field.
6. Center Fielder moves to Right Field.
You would be hard pressed to see Bobby Fischer who won the world title in Chess back in 1972, being able to make those type of moves on a chess board.
Because of all of those moves, Canyon Lake would stick with pitchers much longer than necessary simply because of not having the personnel to make replacements.
A Coach looks on his bench and wants to pinch hit for a player that has been owned by a pitcher to give his club a better chance to succeed in the later innings.
With just two players sitting in the dugout does not give a Coach a lot of options to bring the Rabbit out of a Hat for that important rally.
Add having to change six positions in making a pitching change, then that would account for those way too many errors suffered last season.
Hopefully you now have an idea of what goes on behind the scenes in a baseball game.
Baseball has so many variables for each (pitch, bat, catch, run, etc.) and then add the fact of trying to hit a small white ball with a skinny stick.
The only other sport that might be harder would be Horseback Archery.
What can all of this mean for this season?
Well we do know that three years ago, Canyon Lake had a team that was playing with Seniors for the first time. With those players in the lineup the Hawks crafted out a good season and those same players were playing through those painful years when all other combatants had maturity and experience in spades.
This formula will have some goals that will be reachable and items you can hang your hat on.
But baseball still will need to be played with an I.Q. that was in more of a learning mode last season instead of reacting in a positive motion in making plays and swinging bats.
There are five players that will need to perform at last year’s level or better.
Travis Walker who will be in his fourth year with the Varsity. Travis was nails in the batter’s box with a .435 average and a .518 on base percentage.
Eleven of his 30 hits were for extra bases and as talked about earlier, Walker was a pitcher, third, first, and any other position in the field needed at the time.
Michael Brady batted .350 with an on base percentage of .506. Brady took the catchers job and put every baserunner on notice that trying to steal was a capital offense and he would stand a good chance of gunning you down.
Logan Felch also contributed a notch below Brady with a .312 average as well as being Canyon Lake’s main player on the mound. Most all of his games were against the opponents Ace, hence his not spectacular looking record of 1-8 for last season.
Once again, that record was not indicative of how much of a competitor Felch battled on that mound.
Felch also can mash the ball as he finished with three home runs last season, leading the Hawks with 19 rbi’s.
Daniel Camarillo’s season was shortened last year but his return for his Senior campaign will add speed and a good centerfield player to this club.
Camarillo also batted .341 from the plate and would of easily scored more runs, but finished tied with Garrett Winters and Travis Walker with 14 each because of his reduced playing time.
Kyler Huff was another dual player coming in from left field when Coach Dunavant needed another pitcher.
Having Huff communicating with Camarillo will make that outfield formidable. Huff also finished 0-4 last season as the second in command in that pitching rotation. His 4.76 era was decent but when your team is giving up more than six runs a game then getting in that win column becomes a chore.
That is a good nucleus to build a contender with and adding all those other players that were in the furnace last season will hopefully help them return refined and ready to add strength and that improved I.Q. to a team that has not had much of anything positive these past couple of years.
Yes, we started with a lot of negatives but turning those into positives will be what might make this team into a decent opponent come District 27-3A schedule time.
Here is the Hawks Upcoming Schedule:
Varsity Games Junior Varsity 2/8 @ Seguin 5pm 2/8 Home Seguin 5pm 2/12 @ Burnet 5pm 2/12 Home Burnet 5pm 2/15 @ Llano 5pm 2/19 @ Marble Falls 5 & 7pm 2/18 Home Marble Falls 6pm 2/22 Home Wimberley 5:30pm 2/21-23 @ Lockhart Tournament 2/25 @ Lago Vista 6pm 2/25 Home Lago Vista 6pm
