By Nate Sanchez
Sports Editor
With Friday’s win over Seattle, senior pitcher Jeff McKenzie earned his 12th win of the season, the most by any CSUB pitcher in a single season, and tied with Vanderbilt’s Tyler Beede for the Division I record. The 6-foot tall communications major has proven himself a vital part of a ‘Runner baseball team in serious playoff contention.
McKenzie’s road to ‘Runnerhood started at an early age on the Little League fields upon which he developed a love for the game similar to his father’s.
“I’ve been playing since I was 3 years old,” McKenzie said. “Any time of the year that I could play baseball, I was playing. My dad really got me into it.”
With McKenzie’s stats over the past two years, one would think he is a natural pitcher. Eighteen wins and 146 strikeouts over 204.2 innings pitched in the past two years is impressive for any Division I pitcher. However, throughout his career as a high school ballplayer at Oak Ridge High School and early into his junior college career at San Joaquin Delta College, he did not get much experience on the mound.
“I was mostly an outfielder,” McKenzie said. “My junior and senior year of high school, I was the starting right fielder for my varsity team. I only pitched probably two or three innings over those two years. I pitched every once in a while growing up, just whenever they needed me to pitch.”
Those two or three innings of experience as a pitcher came in handy during McKenzie’s days at SJDC.
“Over the summer before my sophomore year of college, I was our ace pitcher and pitched well,” McKenzie said. “I had over 80 innings and 80 strikeouts and that’s really where I developed as a pitcher.”
After helping SJDC win its first Community College Athletic Association Championship since 1959, McKenzie was honored with an MVP award that drew attention to the up and coming lefty.
“Jeff was a solid player and a solid person of great character,” SJDC Head Coach Reed Peters said. “He is an extremely hard worker. He’s the perfect student athlete.”
Out of junior college, McKenzie was recruited by Armstrong Atlantic State University in Savannah, Georgia, a Division II school and CSUB, a program enjoying its new growing strength in Division I. McKenzie chose to come to CSUB not only to play at the Division I level, but to show that he could in the faces of those who doubted him.
“Nobody thought he could play D1,” McKenzie said. “I was told growing up that I would never play D1 baseball. I had a chip on my shoulder and I wanted to show everyone that I could play at this level.” Standing 6 feet tall and weighing 170 pounds, some scouts and coaches told McKenzie he could not play due to his lack of a dominating figure, a common staple among power pitchers.
But McKenzie is not a power pitcher.
“I don’t blow people away with 95 mph fastballs. I throw mid-80s,” McKenzie said. “My thing is pinpoint accuracy. I can hit any spot at any time with any pitch.”
For McKenzie, “any pitch” includes a fastball, changeup, cutter, slider, knuckleball and his most effective pitch: the curveball.When he says “any spot,” he means it. McKenzie has only walked 24 batters so far, the least of any pitcher on the ‘Runner pitching staff with at least 60 innings pitched.
“The pitch that I’ve always relied on growing up and to this day has been my curveball,” McKenzie said. “When that’s on, I know it’s going to be a good day.”
McKenzie says that much of his success this season has come from Head Coach Bill Kernen’s philosophy stressing mental fortitude, a feature valued by all ballplayers, professional and college-level.
“His philosophy is heavy on visualization,” McKenzie said. “You can throw millions of bullpens by visualizing but you can only throw a couple hundred when you can actually throw them. I had good command before, but now I have even better command. Being able to know what pitches I want to throw beforehand and visualizing it before it happens then actually doing it after visualizing it has really contributed to my success this year.”
The ‘Runners will have to play next season without McKenzie, seeing as he is a senior. However, he does not have any worries for next year’s squad. “I think this program is an up and coming one,” McKenzie said.
“This year will be our best year of the program so far. With some good recruits, we can be a nationally contending team.”
McKenzie will be graduating this spring as a communications major with a concentration in digital media and a minor in history. McKenzie hopes his arsenal and Kernen’s pitching philosophy can take him to the next level, as he looks forward to the MLB First Year Player Draft.
