(Photo: Nicholas Badders/WCSN)
Prepare to play, don’t wait to play.
That’s the mindset that Arizona State head coach Tracy Smith preaches to his team, making sure that every guy in uniform is ready to go when their number is called.
There have been plenty of contributors to the Sun Devils’ 9-0 start to the 2019 season, the most recent being junior outfielder Myles Denson.
In the opening game of a three-game series against the Michigan State Spartans, Denson made his second start of the season and registered two hits and an RBI, as Arizona State cruised to its ninth win in as many tries with an 8-0 victory
The two hits tonight gave the Las Vegas native eight hits in 14 at-bats thus far this season.
Despite not being a regular starter in the first handful of games thus far, Smith praised the three-time letter winner at Bishop Gorman High School for his approach to the game on and off the field.
“Before the on-field stuff, that guy’s a great teammate,” Smith said. “He comes, he works hard every day, he’s a team favorite in that locker room because he supports and has supported his teammates. I’ve said it [in press conferences] more than once, that guy could start at a lot of programs.”
Coming into his junior season, Denson had a .200 career average to his name in 80 plate appearances. Despite being the fourth outfielder, primarily entering the game for defensive purposes so far in 2019, Denson is rapidly starting to make a case for himself to be too valuable to take out of the lineup.
“It doesn’t matter if I’m pinch-hitting or I’m going to start, every at-bat is insanely important,” Denson said. “You got to take it for what it is.”
Apart from a 3-2 win last Saturday against UC Davis and a 4-3 victory on Tuesday night against Pepperdine, every game for Arizona State this season has followed the same blueprint: quality pitching on the mound and an onslaught of offensive production from throughout the lineup.
Friday night starter Alec Marsh lowered his ERA a full run to 0.83 while picking up his third win in three attempts to begin 2019 while not having his sharpest stuff according to both Marsh and Smith.
“I wouldn’t say it was his best performance, but it’s a pretty good thing when you’re saying it’s not his best performance and he shuts a team out through seven [innings],” Smith said.
“I gave us a chance to win, so that’s the biggest thing number one, but I thought I had a lot of good pitches going,” Marsh said. “I thought I was just too antsy in the beginning and I finally settled in in the second half.”
In addition to Denson’s contributions, his classmate Hunter Bishop had arguably his best game of the young campaign, going 2-4 with two home runs that measured a combined 885 feet according to the Sun Devil twitter account.
Bishop’s first blast, a three-run shot on a 3-0 pitch in the third inning that opened the scoring, seemingly woke up the team and was all his starter on the mound needed to secure the Devils’ ninth-straight victory.
“I was telling [Bishop], it was 3-0 green light and right before [Spartan starter Mason Erla] pitched the ball, I said ‘Game over,’” Marsh said. “When he hit the home run, that’s all I needed. Just good teamwork right there.”
With the team off to its best start since the 2010 season, a team that started 24-0 and was the last Sun Devil team to make it to the College World Series, Smith and company will look to continue the momentum and improve its record to 10-0 when they send sophomore Boyd Vander Kooi to the mound on Saturday night against the Spartans.
First pitch from Phoenix Municipal Stadium is scheduled for 6:30 p.m.
Bobby Kraus is a baseball beat writer for the Walter Cronkite Sports Network. You can follow him on Twitter @bobbykraus22
