Walk-ons in college athletics often have a tough time achieving the status of scholarship players. A lack of respect, fewer accommodations and even worse equipment usually make sure of that.
But with Mississippi State baseball, even the guys who haven’t yet made the roster are treated as if they have. That’s why a junior college transfer like Wyn Diggs or a freshman like Brooks Lewis have found trying out a worthwhile process.
“You never feel like you’re a walk-on here,” Diggs said. “You feel like you’re just one of the guys-just a regular player.”
After playing catcher for two years at Mississippi Delta Community College, Diggs received a letter from assistant coach Tommy Raffo encouraging him to walk on. Still, he gets no preferential treatment.
“I have no idea if I’ve made the team yet; it’s from day to day,” Diggs said.
Diggs and Lewis have both been coming to State baseball games from a young age, so actually playing on the grass and dirt of Dudy Noble is already a bit of a success story.
“It’s always been a part of my life,” Lewis said. “My uncles, my grandfather, my dad went to school up here. They didn’t play ball, but they were a big part of it. They never missed a game.”
Lewis also plays behind the plate, but at 5-foot-10, 175 pounds, he’s not really built like a catcher.
“I look like a middle infielder,” he said.
But the coaching staff has guaranteed to bulk him up if he makes the team. Even if he doesn’t, he’ll probably still refer to the process as a “first-class act,” a term he and Diggs used when discussing the tryouts.
“I’m glad that they said that,” head coach Ron Polk said. “They’re treated like everybody else: same number of cuts (swings), same locker size, same equipment, same care, same love, same discipline.”
Polk described MSU baseball’s treatment of walk-ons as the “best in the country.”
“It makes no difference to me if the kid’s on a significant scholarship or the kid’s on nothing,” he added.
What can make a difference, though, is the position one plays. Since second-team All-SEC catcher Craig Tatum left the Bulldogs to play professionally, it might be a good year for Diggs and Lewis to come aboard. After two cuts, the number of catchers is down to six.
Since Diggs has already played at the college level, making the MSU squad would be a more gradual step for him than it would for Lewis.
“The players from junior college to here, it’s not that much of a difference-just a few players that are a lot different,” Diggs said. “The rest are like the good junior college players.”
But at a higher level, actions are often performed at a higher quality, and that has given him several reasons to appreciate the aura that, for some, surrounds Mississippi State baseball.
“The time that really stands out to me is just the first time I got to hear Coach Polk, and I was sitting there, and he was actually addressing me as a member of the MSU baseball team,” Diggs said.
For Lewis, it’s an even bigger jump from playing high school ball at Heidelberg Academy to roaming around a Dudy Noble locker room, but he has an inspiration for rising to the occasion.
When he went to Omaha, Neb., this summer to see the College World Series, he watched fellow catcher Kurt Suzuki and learned that he walked on for Cal State Fullerton. Suzuki won the Johnny Bench Award, recognizing him as the year’s best catcher, while his team won the national championship.
“He was the real deal,” Lewis said. “I try to look up to guys like that.”
Since plenty of the hopefuls trying out have similar stories, backgrounds and skills, Polk has yet another tough decision ahead of him. What will assist him, though, is the player-coach evaluations-something fairly unique to State. Not many schools give the players a chance to determine who should play.
“I want them to see how the coaches evaluate them and also how their teammates evaluate them,” Polk said. “The fall is not only when you make the club, it’s when you make the starting lineup.”