Playing in a competitive field of seven teams in Region II, Nelson County/Midkota baseball got its non-region schedule started on Thursday with a dominant 13-3 victory over Midway/Minto.
But the Chargers have more they hope to achieve, and a lot of work still to do to get there. Here are three takeaways from their first game of 2024.
Catcher Zach Gibson returns from injury
Gibson made an obvious impact on the field Thursday, collecting three hits and throwing out a runner from behind the plate.
But this time last year, he wasn’t even playing. An ankle injury sat him out all of last season.
“I haven’t caught for a while. A couple years now,” Gibson said. “So it felt good to throw that guy out.”
Gibson slotted in at the No. 2 hole in the lineup. He set the table with a sharp double in the first inning, and contributed to the Chargers’ eight-run rally in the second inning. He got under a ball and popped it up in his third at-bat, but he stayed more level in his fourth at-bat and lined a single.
The Chargers were able to run freely on the base paths, in large part due to the M/M catcher’s lacking ability to throw runners out. But that wasn’t the case with Gibson catching. His presence behind the plate, plus his authority hitting the ball, made him one of the most immediately dynamic players on the field.
“I’ve coached him for many years, and he’s an all-state caliber player,” head coach Logan Lund said. “He’s got a thing with the hitting; can’t get so antsy, gotta stay in the middle. But yeah; phenomenal, phenomenal talent. We missed him last year with an ankle injury, and it’s nice to have him back, for sure. He’s gonna be a huge part of what we do this year.”
As a catcher, Gibson is largely in charge of the game, particularly when working with his pitchers. He’s still taking it easy coming back from the injury, and will likely share duties with a couple other catchers on the team, but it’s a spot he said he enjoys and is willing to take on for this squad.
“It’s just fun,” Gibson said of playing catcher. “You get to calm the guys down. You get to be the leader out there. It’s just a great feeling to be a leader.”
Preston Lee could be a difference maker on the mound
The pitcher Gibson got to work with for three of the five innings on Thursday was Lee, a crafty left-hander with big potential.
Lund was insistent that Lee wasn’t at his best in the opener, particularly regarding his location. He surrendered a couple hard hits in the third inning that led to a run, a rally that was kept in check by Gibson’s caught stealing. Lee still worked a dominant second inning, though. He allowed two runs in the first inning, but it was due much more to poor fielding than poor pitching.
Still, Lund clearly has trust in his southpaw. Lee already comfortably throws three pitches: a two-seam fastball, a changeup and a slider. But to Lund’s own admission, “he seems to add a pitch every year,” and he’ll occasionally try to mix in a splitter and a curveball.
“I trust him, and Zach behind the dish,” Lund said. “I let them two take care of it. And I’m just watching at that point.”
Lund expressed that he wants to see Lund refine his location going forward, especially in favorable counts when he has a chance to put away the hitter. Lee’s command was noticeably iffy in the third inning, when he was dancing around the strike zone and throwing hittable pitches even when the ball was in the zone.
But as a pitcher with a deceptive arm angle from the left side, and with multiple pitches he can mix in to unsuspecting hitters, there’s a lot of potential for what Lee can bring. A great starting pitcher can be a huge difference maker, especially at the high school level when a team can have its ace throw in a much higher percentage of its games.
“If he can show up with his A game, he’s tough to beat,” Lund said. “So I’m excited for what he has in store for us this year.”
The team has a lot to clean up to reach its ultimate goal
A 10-run mercy-rule victory might seem flawless at a glance, but Lund isn’t satisfied.
The Chargers weren’t quite as fundamentally sound as he would have liked, especially in the first inning. They committed two errors and hit a batter, allowing the Mustangs to score two runs without the ball leaving the infield.
The only perfectly clean inning from NC/M was the second.
“We played well, but we did a lot of things poorly, also,” Lund said. “So we gotta build off that.”
That goes back to Lee’s performance as well, which Lund felt could have been cleaner just going back to the basics. Lee rushed a throw on a comebacker, issued two free passes and threw two wild pitches in his three-inning outing.
“I don’t expect errors and poor pitching from our best guy,” Lund said. “But he was a little rusty the first time out. And he’ll make an adjustment from there.”
The Chargers are going to need to be as foundationally unimpaired as possible if they want to make a deep run. Lund’s attitude is the sign of a winning culture: one where he can criticize and pick apart the team’s errors even when they win by 10 runs. It’s that endeavor for perfection that could take this team far.
Gibson said he hopes to take this team to a region championship.
“It’s definitely high expectations,” Lund said. “These kids, they can take it as far as they want to go. I can make them from an average ballplayer to a good ballplayer, but they gotta do the rest. They can take it as far as they want, really. Obviously we’ve got a very competitive region, so just get better every day, and who knows where we end up?”
