Baseball's Freshmen Recruiting Rodeo

“The one thing I can say about Harvard is everyone returns the phone calls.”

That is the biggest difference Mike Zandler has noticed in his 20 months working as an assistant coach and the recruiting coordinator for the Harvard baseball team. Zandler has been coaching college baseball since 2002 and previously worked as an assistant coach at Davidson and as the head coach at the University of Illinois Springfield.

The combination of academics and steady improvement on the field under third-year head coach Bill Decker has made Zandler’s phone ring a lot more frequently with return calls from potential recruits, and has made the Crimson a legitimate contender in recruiting battles for elite high school baseball prospects all across the United States.

“I was looking for the best combination of academics and athletics,” freshman infielder Matt Rothenberg said. “I feel like Harvard’s the pinnacle of that. You can’t really find a better place academically and athletically. The location is great, and everything about it kind of sold me. When I was up here on my visit, that kind of sealed the deal.”

Rothenberg, a Boca Raton, Fla., native who was rated the No. 44 third baseman in the class of 2014 by Perfect Game, is part of Zandler’s first recruiting class, a group that features nine first-years who have already played a role in the team’s best start in recent memory. Harvard’s recruiting classes typically feature between seven and nine players, much smaller than the 12 to 14-player classes that perennial powers like LSU and Florida show off.

“We try to forecast a couple years in advance what we think our needs are going to be,” Zandler said. “I think one of the things we really place an emphasis on is making sure that we find the right person that’s a good fit for Harvard and the core values of our program, and a player that we believe projects to be an impact player for our baseball program.”

This year’s freshmen hail from eight states, ranging from Massachusetts to Hawaii. The group features four pitchers (three righties and a lefty) and five position players (two outfielders, a catcher, an infielder, and a superutility player in Rothenberg). While the group is certainly diverse, the individuals have bonded both as a class and with the other members of the team and have adjusted well to collegiate life and Division I athletics.

“The biggest transition [from high school] is definitely the time commitment,” senior infielder Jake McGuiggan said. “I think we’ve definitely had some positive experiences with them so far this season already. I think they’re going to further contribute as we move into Ivy League play and down the stretch.”

The freshmen have found roles all over the diamond thus far for the Crimson, with many stepping into new positions. John Fallon, a highly touted prospect out of Houston who was an Under Armour preseason All-American before his junior and senior seasons, was a shortstop in high school but has played second and third base at Harvard. Rothenberg played almost exclusively third base before coming to Cambridge.

“I feel like [third] is my position,” Rothernberg said. “But if playing second base or playing left field or playing whatever can get me into the lineup, I can work hard at that, and I’m all for it.”

Dylan Combs, a left-handed pitcher out of Kailua, Hawaii, who also starred in football in high school, has become a lefty specialist in the Crimson bullpen, appearing in eight games and recording 11 strikeouts in seven innings of work this season.Ian Miller, a righty from Brooklyn, has also made nine relief appearances for Harvard. The duo expects to see more action following sophomore Kevin Rex’s season-ending elbow injury.

Conor Quinn has seen the most game action of any Crimson freshman thus far. The outfielder from Amherst, Mass., is the team’s starting right fielder and has appeared in all but one of Harvard’s games, posting three doubles and five RBIs in 75 plate appearances.

“All freshmen go through growing pains once they get on the Division I level,” Zandler said. “They recognize that these are some pretty good lineups or pretty good pitchers we’re facing, but we have a number of guys who have filled in nicely.”

Fallon, Quinn, and Rothenberg comprised the bottom third of the Crimson’s batting order and combined for two hits in the second game of the team’s doubleheader against Penn on Monday.

The class of 2018 also features Austin Black, a left-handed hitting outfielder who hails from the same high school as senior center fielder Mike Martin; Brandon Wachs, a walk-on catcher from San Diego; Noah Zavolas, a right-handed pitcher from Acton, Mass., who has made five relief appearances this season; and Phoenix native Garrett Rupp, a 6’5” righty.

“We want players that are not only ridiculously strong in the classroom but have options in major Division I conferences,” Zandler said. “We want to be recruiting top 100 players out of their class each year, and I think we’re well on our way to doing that.”

Another unique characteristic of this year’s class is the return of the Massachusetts influence to Harvard baseball. Quinn and Zavolas are two of the six players from the Bay State on this year’s roster.

Sophomore catcher Josh Ellis had been the only Massachusetts native in the past two years’ recruiting classes. Recruiting local players was a hallmark of the late Joe Walsh, the Crimson’s coach from 1996 to 2012, who recruited seniors McGuiggan, captain Ethan Ferreira, and outfielder Jack Colton from the surrounding area.

“Being from the Boston area, I was fortunate enough that Coach Walsh always took a lot of pride in getting a couple local Massachusetts guys on the team every year,” McGuiggan said. “I was really fortunate that Coach Walsh sought me out from the South Shore and I was definitely on board with Harvard as soon as Coach Walsh jumped in the mix.”

With his first class on campus making an impact, Zandler is currently hot on the recruiting trail, working to compile two recruiting classes, the classes of 2019 and 2020, simultaneously. As the level of talent for the players who have committed to the team and the product on the field have both improved, the 2015 season and beyond look bright for Harvard baseball.

“We feel that this is a really good class, but our job as coaches is to basically one-up ourselves every year,” Zandler said.

At least he knows that everyone will be returning his phone calls.

—Staff writer Stephen J. Gleason can be reached at sgleason@college.harvard.edu.