Hunter Jacobson |
The baseball field has always been home to Kevin Baker. For years, he had stepped in between the white lines and took part in the action on the mound and at the plate. But his freshman year at the University of Portland was different. He was in a new position: spectator.
As he sat and watched in the stands of Joe Etzel Field, he had only one thought: “I think I’ve got a shot to make the team.”
Baseball has been a part of Baker’s life since he was three years old and has been a part of his family for generations. The Pittsburgh Pirates drafted his grandfather Joe Baker in the 1940s. Baker decided to follow in the footsteps of his grandfather and made it his goal to play Division I baseball.
At the end of Baker’s high school career, his dream to play Division I baseball seemed out of reach. After four years of playing third base and pitcher, he found himself with no scholarship offers from any school.
“Part of it might have been my fault. I just didn’t know the process at all,” Baker said, “I just kinda thought schools would go after me.”
Baker was discouraged, but baseball was in his blood. So, despite the lack of scholarship offers, he decided to play summer baseball. But still, at the end of the summer, no baseball scholarships were on the table. That’s when he decided to come to the University of Portland.
The nursing program at the University of Portland was attractive to Baker. He became interested in the field in a high school kinesiology class. This interest led him to start looking at schools on the West Coast with well-known nursing programs.
Baker still didn’t give up on his baseball dream. After a conversation with his high school coach, his mind was made up and he was going to try out for the team.
The first order of business in the tryout process was a conversation with then-head coach Chris Sperry. It didn’t go well.
“Once I met the head coach he just kinda shut me down,” Baker said.
That conversation led Baker to the decision to focus on school for his freshman year. But transitioning to life without baseball was difficult.
“It was hard not to miss it,” Baker said. “It was the first year since I was three that I hadn’t played baseball.”
As the 2015 baseball season went on, rumors swirled of a coaching change for the Pilots and Baker was listening closely — his decision to play or not to play hanging in the balance.
“If there was a new coaching staff that came around that was gonna be my sign that I should try out,” Baker said.
Once new head coach Geoff Loomis was hired Kevin was all in. With coach Loomis came an opportunity for Baker to prove himself again. His interaction with the previous head coach left him discouraged, wondering why he wasn’t wanted on the team. But with the new staff on the way Baker had confidence that he would be given a shot and he wanted to make the most of it.
Once again Baker dedicated his summer to baseball. This particular summer was enormously successful for him because he saw his skills dramatically improve. He was able to boost his throwing speed.
The increase in speed set Baker apart from the competition. The 85 mile per hour fastball he once possessed is considered average, but a 90 mile per hour fastball made him an elite level pitcher.
The coaches noticed. Loomis’ ears perked up when he heard about a kid with a 90 mph fastball.
“All I had to do at that point was show them that I could do it,” Baker said.
After the first day of tryouts, Coach Loomis was sold on Baker just as Baker had been sold on him.
“We had about five or six guys try out that day,” Loomis said. “And Kevin was a guy who really stuck out to us. He’s a sophomore academically, but just a freshman athletically,” Loomis said. “So for a freshman guy who comes into a tryout and was throwing upper 80s, we were pretty impressed.”
The coaching staff was just as confused as they were impressed.
“We tried to figure out how it was that he was here for a year without playing,” Loomis said.
It was a perfect marriage between Baker and the new coaching staff and Baker joined as one of only two walk-ons who made the cut on the spring roster. He was officially a Division I baseball player.
“It was a dream come true,” Baker said. He described the feeling of achieving his lifelong goal with one word: “unreal.”
Baker recorded his first start in the Pilots’ second game at UC Davis on Feb. 20, 2016.
“I tried to tell myself the whole week that it was just another baseball game,” Baker said. “But the second I stepped out on that mound the nerves got the best of me.”
He had walked by the field during his freshman year as a student, but now he was in the action, starting a game in front of his home crowd for the first time. With his family in the stands, his nerves calmed and excitement took over.
His first home start didn’t go the way that he had planned, but Baker is still confident in his abilities. Baker already knows what he will be telling himself the next time he takes the mound.
“Make them hit it,” he said. “My stuff is good enough to make hitters get themselves out.”
Baker received similar advice from veteran teammate and pitcher, senior Jordan Wilcox.
“Basically my biggest thing to him was just don’t walk guys,” Wilcox said.
Wilcox, an experienced pitcher at the college level, has seen Baker grow and adjust to his new role.
“He’s starting to get the pace of the game, because it gets a lot faster as you get to this college level,” Wilcox said. “And he’s doing a better job of trusting his stuff and being more aggressive and having that philosophy that ‘I can beat these guys.’”
Reaching his goal of becoming a Division I baseball player has taken him on a long and difficult journey. In two years of college, Baker has made the journey from student to student athlete and now finds himself as a starter on an up-and-coming collegiate baseball program.
“I’ve gained confidence in myself,” Baker said. “I walk around campus with my head held so much higher than I did last year.”
For Baker, part of being successful is never being satisfied and always setting new goals. Baker has done just that. He now has his sights set on bigger and better things.
“My ultimate goal now is to play professional baseball,” he said, “Now that I know how good I can be once I hit my peak potential, it’s to play professional baseball.”
Coach Loomis sees pro baseball as a possibility for Baker as well.
“Velocity wise he could potentially be drafted in Major League Baseball,” Loomis said. “How he progresses in the next couple of years will really go to show that.”
Baker does have a plan B if baseball doesn’t work out. It’s what he originally came to the University of Portland for: nursing.
The University of Portland baseball team along with Baker is setting its sights higher this year than ever before.
“The ultimate goal is to win a College World Series,” Baker said. “As a college baseball team you shouldn’t be working towards anything less than winning that national championship.”
The advice he would give to someone chasing the same dream is: “You just have to give it a shot.”
Contact Sports Writer Hunter Jacobson at jacobsoh19@up.edu.
