Fair Grove Baseball Team Hits Off the Season

Fair Grove’s Baseball team kicked off their season over spring break in a jamboree at Parkview. They have been preparing for the upcoming season since January, and tryouts were in late March. 

Head Coach, Christian Overstreet, explained how the boys have been preparing for the season. “We have been going through an off-season program since the beginning of January.  All of our guys are in a weights and conditioning class the entire year so they are always focusing on training,” he stated.

Kyle Fritts (11) said, “As a team we’ve been preparing for baseball by doing off season workouts, working on hitting, agility and conditioning. Personally I have worked on my hitting a lot and trying to find all my power in my swing.”

Not much has changed for the team due to COVID-19 because baseball is an outdoor sport that is spread out. The team only has to wear masks when they are unable to social distance. COVID-19 did prevent the team from playing last season. “The lack of last year makes everything quite a bit more difficult. For example not seeing live pitching from other teams in over a year is hard to bounce back from, but this year we are working harder than ever to make up for it,” stated Tanner Lumley (12). 

On the other hand, missing a season also had benefits. “Our biggest strength is definitely that we have guys that want to prove something, because the last time they played with Fair Grove they were younger classmen not contributing at the varsity level, but now are going to make a big impact. I feel you could look at the lack of seniors as a weakness, but the juniors have really stepped in and filled those leadership roles,” explained Lumley. 

The team will be playing some new schools this year. Fritts stated, “We buffed up our schedule this year so we’re playing some tougher teams. It’ll be good for us going into the playoffs.”