Hey Jamos, I know it's the middle of football season, but did you get to see any of the fall softball games? How did they look? What about the new freshmen? Appreciate any information/observation you have.
Hey Lee, good to hear from you.
Mrs. J and I have been attending the games and enjoying watching the ladies again. The team looks very different without Haley McCleney in center field but I think Murphy had another good recruiting year and the team will be very competitive again. The four new players are Elissa Brown, Gabby Callaway, Claire Jenkens, and Bailey Hemphill. I will add the roster to the bottom of this as it has all of their bios on it. The two most impressive of the four new ones are Bailey Hemphill and Claire Jenkins. Hemphill has a monster bat and catches. I think she has 5-6 homers so far in these games and 2 were grand slam. Murph bragged on her a lot before she got here and so far she is backing up all of his bragging. Claire Jenkins is the infielder we were looking for. She is tall and lanky with very good quickness and glove. She is from Pullman and whoever has been coaching her did an excellent job. She also has quick hands with her bat with good control of it. Elissa Brown is a small girl with lots of speed. She really handles her bat well and covers a lot of ground in the OF. Gabby Callaway may be the project of the three. She hasn't stood out as the other three has but she plays with a lot of energy in the OF but has average speed
I have been very pleased with the pitchers so far. Osorio is Osorio, very good. She seems to have healed from her injury last year. Littlejohn has also been impressive. She has had excellent control of her pitches, something that she really struggled with the last half of the season last year. Hopefully her boyfriend is gone. Maddi Moore is slowly working herself into an SEC pitcher. She has good velocity on her pitches but her location of the pitches still needs some work. I think she will give the team that extra support that the team needed so bad last year.
Murph has really been shuffling the players around in different positions on the infield. Defensively I think we will be a better team this year. Oh, I didn't mention Demi Turner. She has some type of a foot injury and I'm not sure how bad it is. She has not dressed out for any of the games and Murph hasn't offered anything as to what her problem is. We need her in the lineup in a big way, her bat is huge as well as her glove.
The teams that they have played are by no means SEC caliber but they have been competitive enough that permits the girls a chance to work on their game and they seem to be improving with each game. I think good pitching is the key as every year is and I think Maddi can add to what we lacked last year. The infield will be better but we have to find someone to replace McCleney in the outfield and I don't see anyone close to her level yet.
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