Larry Jewell

3, 2, 1. We're talking with Dixie College head baseball coach Gordon Jolly. Coach, how's the injury situation as we hit midweek between a couple of big weekends for you? Nick DeLuca got a cortisone shot before last week in his elbow and that has improved. I played him in right field in the double header against BYUJV and he didn't have to make any real hard throws. We just want to rest that as long as possible and then hopefully he can get back into the shortstop groove where we need him. Travis Parker had some infection. He didn't even dress for the weekend series because he had infection. He had a boil and had some infection. Plus he's got a pulled hamstring, plus his right ankle is really swollen up. So he'll be there because he's a mentally tough kid and it's just a matter of him having some rest. Let's go back to that no hitter by Ryan McCoy. That must have been a pleasure for the coach to watch, wasn't it? It is. As I tell my team, there's two things that really bother me as a coach, and number one is when pitchers don't throw strikes. And number two is when batters take third strikes and don't swing the bat and they strike out. But Ryan McCloy has really come around. He's got a lot of talent and he's a pitcher that needs his rest between starts. And if he gets that, he's going to be real effective for us the whole year. Sean Andresen is still pitching very well for you. He's really a case of maturing from freshman to sophomore, isn't he? I think so. He got a lot of innings last year and this year he's getting the innings again. But. But he's learning to throw his curveball for a strike, and that makes all the difference in the world, plus a little bit of confidence, getting a lot of innings. So we expect those two, Sean and Ryan, to be our leaders this year, and hopefully we'll get a little bit of help from the other pitchers when we play four games in a weekend. And that's what we've got to have to be successful. As you talk to Major League Baseball managers or officials, they say, well, one of the keys to a good pitching staff is a good catcher. How's your catching staff been and does it make an effect on college baseball pitchers? I think so. I think it's just the consistency factor. They get used to throwing to the same people or the same two people, and if they do that, I think it's going to be a factor with them and they know what pitches they're going to call and they know exactly how they're going to set up how they frame the ball. And it's just a factor of getting used to what they're going to call and it definitely works out and it helps out for us because Travis Milne is back and he caught most about half of our games last year and he's getting at least three quarters of them this year. So the pitchers are getting used to him. For Travis, he's a multi generation catcher situation. It gets passed down from generation to generation in that family. Yeah, they're good athletes, they come from a good family. Gary, who's helping me coach, does a real good job and they're definitely a baseball family. And he not only is a good catcher, he's a good hitter and he and Adam, they're just good kids. They're fun to be around, they're hard workers and it's a pleasure to have the Milnes on my team. We've been talking with Dixie College head baseball coach Gordon Jolley on today's Rebel report on 1450 KSGI. 3, 2, 1. We're talking with Dixie College head baseball coach Gordon Jolly. And coach, you're beginning the Traveling Odyssey Now, 17 out of the next 19 games on the road, that must. Do you have your bags packed already? No, not really, but I'm trying to get extra sleep because I do the bus driving too. So that's one of the things I have to be cautious of is driving the bus. But yeah, this is definitely a maturing factor for us. And after we're through with this stretch on the road, you can look back and say that even if we've won or lost the games, that being on the road, seeing different umpires, being in different situations on the road, it matures us and definitely helps us as a ball club. You're talking about the maturing factor. Does it make the team feel closer to travel so much together? I think so. We're on the bus together, we eat together, we sleep in the same rooms together and we're just around each other and we play baseball together. So it does bring us together and I think that helps with our team. It must be a challenge academically for the kids. Yeah, it is. Finals start Monday, but we've got some teachers giving finals a little bit early and so our kids have to sometimes make special arrangements because they are on the road. And I think that's just the way it is with a lot of Extracurricular activities. No matter if it's athletics or not, you have to sometimes be in a special situation. Let's talk about this weekend's opponent, Utah Valley. Always a good ball club. Yeah, they have been and they're. We've already played them twice and we split down here, Utah Valley, Dixie and Snow. I think Will and I can't leave out CEU because they've got two excellent pitchers this year. But it should be a dog race and it should be fun. But I expect Utah Valley to be one of the top teams. They've got some excellent pitching, they have a lot of scholarships, they've got a lot of. They've got a nice facility and they've got a good coaching staff. So definitely they're going to be one of the top contenders in our helps to be under the umbrella of byu. A lot of kids would like to go there, I guess just to be seen by the Cougars. Well, yeah, in past Utah Valley has had five or six kids just since I've been here that have gone on to play at BYU and they've definitely been a big factor in BYU's baseball program. What will be the key this weekend? Four games. You got to get a little more pitching depth. That's exactly right. Right now Ryan McCloy and Sean Andresen are both 3 and 0, but my 3, 4 and 5 and even 6 pitcher, they're not throwing that well. And I think for us to be consistent and be a factor in our league, our bottom end pitching, which really isn't our bottom end pitching, it's just our, after our first two starters, they've got to come around and they've got to be a factor for, for us. Do you try to send a message for league play when you play these league opponents in non league games? No, not really. I try to do exactly the opposite. I try to, you know, if I can get away with it and not throw my best people that I'm going to play during the league, I do that. But you know, it's such this week that I don't have any other people. I will be pitching, you know, my top pitchers plus, you know, anybody else I can find too. But. But yeah, we like to win, but we don't put the emphasis or stress that we want to work on our pickoff plays. We want to work on special things that in normal situations maybe we might not do that quite as much just because it is a preseason game rather than a league game. We've been talking with Dixie College head baseball coach Gordon Jolly on today's rebel report on 1450 KSGI.