When head baseball coach Chris Tamminen looks at this year’s Skyline roster he honestly doesn’t know what to expect.
“We’re young and we just don’t know yet,” he said. “It’s going to be quite interesting.”
The Spartans, who are coming off a 15-8 season where they finished atop the KingCo Crest and ended one win shy of the state tournament, graduated all but one of their starting fielders.
Even some of the familiar faces expected to be in the lineup will be absent. Skyline’s senior ace pitcher Adrian Sampson will miss the entire year after undergoing Tommy John surgery last July. Sampson, who is one of the top prospects in the area, won four games for the Spartans last season posting a 1.85 ERA with 63 strikeouts in 53 innings.
The next most experienced pitcher, senior Peyton Herrod, had a similar arm injury and will be limited to playing in the infield this year.
“Basically we lost the best pitcher in 4A KingCo and we lost our (second) starter,” Tamminen said.
The one regular starter who returns is senior outfielder Sean Penberthy (.227, 16 RBI).
Senior pitcher Connor Lawhead, senior pitcher and catcher Jim Carnes and Herrod, are the only other players who saw varsity time as juniors on last year’s squad.
Tamminen said he will need some newcomers to step up, including a core group of seniors in Aaron Caditz, Mikey Smith, Ryan Wiedeman and Jake Opitz. Senior Anthony DeMatteo also returns to the lineup after missing his entire junior season with an injury. Juniors Tyler Neudorfer, David Brown Nate Likta and Weston Blackburn, along with sophomores Connor Gilchrist, Jim Sinatro, Matt Lunde and Clayton Huber make up the rest of the varsity lineup.
“I think we’re going to be pretty good defensively,” Tamminen said. “Offensively, we’re just going to have to wait and see. It’s going to be kind of hit and miss because they’re just so many unanswered questions. There are just so many things I don’t know yet about this team.”
While he is unsure how his inexperienced squad will respond in a tough KingCo 4A, there is one thing Tamminen can count on.
“I can guarantee you we’re going to do what we always do as far as playing a hard seven (innings), respecting the game and working hard,” he said.
