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College  | Story | 2/22/2015

Washington ready to shine

Patrick Ebert
Photo: Longwood



Friday at LakePoint: Funkhouser carries the cow bell | Saturday at LakePoint: Stewart, Vols on the right path


EMERSON, Ga. – Development is a common theme between Longwood first-year Head Coach Ryan Mau and his stud prospect, outfielder Kyri Washington. Recruiting and development, along with structure, are exactly what Mau has brought to the Lancers baseball team, a team that finished 22-33 a year ago.

Longwood University is also about development, a small liberal arts university nestled in Farmville, Va., a town of just over 8,000 people, which is twice as much as Longwood's enrollment.

Previously an independent NCAA Division I program, Longwood joined the Big South Conference starting with the 2013 season. They made the jump to Division I for the 2004-05 school year, and made the jump from Division III starting in 1980. The program has enjoyed 29 winning seasons in its 33-year history.

Mau is the fourth head coach of the program and spent the four previous seasons as the recruiting coordinator and pitching coach for the Naval Academy. Prior to that he spent four years as an assistant at VMI. Mau pitched for College of Charleston and spent two years in the Marlins organization as a professional player.

Given his experience Mau is quick to recognize the importance of instituting a system based on developing players from the bottom up.

“Before the Naval Academy I was also with Virginia Military Institute, so nine years of structured discipline, that background, is something I bring to this program, and it needed it,” Mau said prior to Longwood's third and final game at LakePoint on Sunday. “Attention to detail, accountability, some more structure and discipline. Self discipline that we're trying to instill in our players and develop citizen leaders. Obviously at the places I've been we've developed some pretty special men that go off an defend our country, so I try to bring some of those elements here.”

Included in those young men were seven all-Patriot League pitchers during Mau's time at Navy, as well as three top 100 finishes on Perfect Game's recruiting class rankings. Given his background in pitching, that is the foundation from which Mau intends to build this program.

“Recruiting is definitely a huge component,” Mau said. “That's how we're going to be able to elevate this program going forward. Currently it's about development of what we have. As a coaching staff we truly believe in developing the players. We're very hands on, high-energy coaches and we try to get the most out of our pieces.

“Developing a pitching is staff is where we're behind a little bit, trying to find those bullpen pieces out, but it's early on and guys are getting better and we've got to figure out what roles they can fulfill for us. Offensively I really like our club. We have some solid returning pieces, some proven hitters.”

One of those hitters is Washington, who stands out on the baseball field with a chiseled 6-foot-1, 215-pound frame. Washington was three-sport star in high school, as he also played basketball and football before deciding to focus on baseball.

“Something kind of clicked my sophomore year in high school,” Washington said about his decision. “That's when I really started to figure out (what I was going to focus on). I was a football guy before and I felt that wasn't going to work out long-term, so I decided to try baseball and I think it's paid off a little bit.”

Washington enjoyed initial success during his freshman year at Longwood. While he hit only .249, he clubbed 17 doubles and six home runs, proving to be a middle-of-the-order force early in his college career. The average jumped to .260 during his sophomore year, with similar power numbers; 18 doubles and seven home runs.

However, it's been during the last two summers that Washington has really put himself on the map as a prospect. He was named Perfect Game's 16th best prospect in the Valley League in 2013, and the 53rd best prospect on the Cape last summer. Currently he ranks as the 156th best overall prospect eligible for this year's draft.

Frankie Piliere graded Washington's power as third-best on the Cape last summer, just behind Boston College's Chris Shaw and Tennessee's Christin Stewart, and had this to say about him:

“A righthanded slugger with effortless – and the word “effortless” can’t be emphasized enough – raw power, Washington is an eye-opening player to watch during batting practice. He possesses 65 raw power on the 20-80 scale, as he can put the wall 30 feet over the fence anywhere in the park, including center and right center … Although getting this massive power to translate into game action hasn’t been easy, Washington does have a fairly sound, short swing path. If he can learn to discipline his approach, his offensive upside is enormous.”

Similar to the players that attend the Perfect Game Park South fields at LakePoint Sports during the summer months, Washington's time on the Cape was all part of the development process, giving himself the opportunity to gauge his own talents while playing with and against the best players in the nation.

“It was just great being on the Cape, being around ballplayers like that every day and see the top-notch (players) from around the country,” Washington said. “It definitely made me make some in-game adjustments. I kind of hit a low point during the summer, but then I started to figure it out and was able to compete and felt like I belonged there. I definitely feel like I improved a lot over the summer.”

Even though Mau is new to the program, he knew enough about Washington to realize the type of talent he possessed.

“When we took over here, obviously we knew Kyri was something special and we heard all the buzz about him,” Mau said. “The one thing that bothered us, that as a junior, they continually described him as being raw. Even coming out of the Cape, unbelievable strength, strength that I truly haven't seen; I haven't seen balls come off the bat like I have with him.

“I tip my hat to our hitting coach, Coach (Chad) Oxendine, who's done an outstanding job, and Kyri, his willingness to make changes. We broke him down mechanically, we've changed the swing, and more importantly he's bought into our mental approach. He's way more balanced at the plate right now, he's utilizing all parts of the field, which is something he hasn't done in the past. Opening weekend he had three opposite field home runs, also on off-speed pitches which he typically struggled with in the past, so Kyri Washington has done an outstanding job of being coachable, making adjustments and buying into our system.”

Washington added another home run on Friday, giving him four for the season. While Friday's dinger was pulled over the left field fence, if you blinked you probably would have missed it.

“Teams usually try to bust me in, bust me in, bust me in,” Washington said. “But the first weekend, surprisingly, pitched everything outside so I had three opposite field home runs because of that. I think that helped me with my swing path to the ball, to right-center, to be able to drive balls the other way.”

Washington and his Longwood teammates are in Emerson, Ga. this weekend at LakePoint due to the brutal winter weather hitting the Southeast and Mid-Atlantic states. That includes Farmville, Va.

“It's been a very difficult first couple of weeks to the season,” Mau said. “We battled some tough elements at Tennessee Tech last weekend, a very good offensive club. This week we got about eight inches of snow in Farmville, Virginia, so we had an opportunity to come down to Emerson and get on the turf field, (which) was a necessity.”

Mau got the opportunity to see the fields at Perfect Game Park South at LakePoint Sports last summer when he still assumed the recruiting coordinator role for Navy. His familiarity with the fields made the decision to travel south an easy one.

“It's an amazing place to come to,” Mau said. “Not only to evaluate, but for those travel teams to actually play on these surfaces in front of all of the scouts and recruiters is going to be a great experience for them. Once this complex was built it's just made things so much more convenient for us to come to one 'plex and be able to spin around (and watch another game). Weather really isn't much of an issue with the turf facility, it's outstanding.”

Although Washington didn't play much travel ball while in high school, largely due to him still playing football, word had spread of the new facility, even for those playing college.

“Beautiful fields. Wow. I wasn't expecting this. I was expecting some little complex. This is huge.”

With so many series cancelled, altered and/or moved this weekend it caused for teams, players, fans and scouts alike to find themselves in Emerson. With the number of other teams playing in the tournament gave scouts in particular a chance to evaluate players on a weekend many were fearful would be lost due to the weather. Washington embraces the additional opportunities to be seen, once again drawing from past experiences to know what to expect.

“It was great to play in front of scouts like that, to get comfortable, because I think sometimes guys get a little nervous trying to do too much in front of scouts,” Washington said of his time on the Cape in reference to playing this weekend at LakePoint. “It was great to be able to play in front of that many and get comfortable so it wouldn't effect me this season when scouts come to the games.

“I try to go with the flow. We practice every week like we're going to play, no matter how the weather is. We have a foot of snow outside, so we went indoors and did all of the stuff we would have done outside, took BP and all that, so we're prepared. Then on Wednesday coach was like “We're leaving tomorrow to go to Georgia.” That's fine, we're ready to play. It wasn't too unexpected, we figured we'd be playing somewhere and not just taking the whole week off.”

However, Longwood's season hasn't started the way Mau would have liked. Although they did win their season opener against Tennessee Tech, they lost their next four games, including their first two against Ohio here in Georgia.

“We're off to a slow start but I think we'll pick it up,” Wasington said prior to Longwood's game against Ohio on Sunday. “I've seen a lot of good things, but we're catching some bad breaks so hopefully within the next week we'll pick it up and turn it around and today get a W.”

Things appeared bright early on Sunday for the Lancers, as Longwood jumped on the Ohio Bearcats and lefthanded starter Evan Geist, who was up to 88 mph with his fastball, for three first-inning runs. Washington, serving as the No. 3 hitter, was hit by a pitch and came around to score on Connar Bastaich's two-run single.

After the Ohio Bearcats scored five runs in the bottom of the first, the Lancers simply responded by adding three more runs in the top of the second. However, Longwood was on the losing end again after Tyler Wells hit his second home run in the game, a solo shot in the bottom of the eighth, that broke a 6-6 tie and gave the Bobcats a series sweep and a 6-0 start to the 2015 season.

Although the results may not reflect it in the box score, the bigger picture is in mind for Mau and the Longwood Baseball program, once again pointing out the dedication to player development.

“I'm a short-term thinker,” Mau said. “We've got to take it one day at a time, we've got to find a way to get better each and every day. And that's our goal, be better today than we were yesterday, that's how I approach things.

“Ultimately we'd like to make our conference tournament and make a showing there. We've got a long way to go to get to that point. From a program perspective just get Longwood Lancer Baseball on the map, and we're going to do that with recruiting and developing of players and get this program to grow in the right way.”

Washington finished the series 4-for-11, which includes his big home run on Friday as well as a 3-for-4 performance on Saturday, leading to a .292/.370/.792 triple slash line to open the 2015 season. And when it was all said and done, his comments echoed those of his coach.

“I trying to take it one game at a time and just be ready for my opportunity to come to showcase my abilities.”
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