Florida Gators baseball senior snapshots

GAINESVILLE, Fla. — Another Florida Gators baseball season is nearing its end. This weekend the Gators will play their final three games at home against the No. 3 Kentucky Wildcats. Florida will honor six seniors this weekend who will play their final games at Condron Family Ballpark.

“It’s been a long journey with me. It’s going to be a very emotional day for me,” senior infielder Dale Thomas said on Saturday. “I love this sport. I love this program more than anything. For me to go out there, this is the place I’ve always wanted to play my entire life as a kid. I’ve always wanted to wear the Orange and Blue. For me to go out there means the world to me.”

It won’t only be the last game at Condron Ballpark for the seniors, but likely for the Gators this season. While Florida has games left, they have work to do to even make the NCAA Tournament. If they do they won’t host a regional. With that in mind, manager Kevin O’Sullivan took time to address the fans ahead of the home finale.

“I would expect it to be a great crowd. They were great today, too, honestly. I couldn’t have asked for anything more from our fans this entire year. Even when things have been, when we’ve struggled a little bit. Tomorrow the biggest challenge for this team tomorrow is going to be able to keep their emotions in check. We’re facing another good starter (for Kentucky). We just have to play the game and be clean like we were today.”

Florida Gators baseball seniors

Tyler Shelnut | Infield / Outfield

Across two seasons in Orange & Blue, Shelnut has 19 home runs while slashing .265/.365/.506 in 99 games including 96 starts. He has been a Swiss Army Knife for the Gators, playing in 60 games in the outfield, 27 at third base, and nine at first base over the previous two seasons. As a returning starter from last year’s 54-win, SEC Championship squad, Shelnut was named to the Gainesville Regional All-tournament Team and finished the year batting .277 with seven home runs. His production has taken a step forward this year, backed by a career-high 12 home runs, 13 doubles, 41 RBI and four steals in 46 games.

Blake Purnell | RHP

Purnell burst onto the scene as a redshirt freshman in 2022. He earned Freshman All-America
honors after pitching to a 2.86 ERA and four saves across a team-high 36 appearances spanning 50 1/3
innings. The relief ace made 17 appearances for last year’s SEC Championship team and has toed the
rubber 20 times this season for a grand total of 73 games pitched in a Gators uniform. Purnell is the
proud owner of a 5-3 record and 78 strikeouts in 91 career innings pitched at Florida, where he was
twice named to the SEC Academic Honor Roll and collected an SEC Freshman of the Week nod in
2022.

Ryan Slater | RHP

Holding status as one of Florida’s go-to bullpen weapons across each of the past three seasons, Slater has made 78 appearances including nine starts as a Gator. As the only UF pitcher to eclipse 20 career wins in the last three years, Slater has compiled nine saves, a .258 batting average against and 136 strikeouts in 159 1/3 frames from 2022-24. Slater’s best season came in 2023, when he helped the team to the College World Series by working to a 10-1 record in 27 games while earning three saves and 48 strikeouts across 59 2/3 innings. He has also fielded his position incredibly well, as evidenced by a 1.000 fielding percentage over 25 career chances. Slater graduated this spring with a degree in sports management.

Tanner Garrison | Catcher

Garrison joined the roster this past offseason as a transfer and wasted no time impressing with his elite defensive ability behind the plate. Grabbing hold of UF’s starting catcher job early in the season, Garrison posted a near-perfect .995 fielding percentage across 198 defensive chances. Most impressively, he threw out seven of 16 would-be base stealers for a 43.8% caught-stealing rate – the best mark in the SEC this year. At the plate, Garrison has reached base at a .348 clip while totaling one home run, three doubles, nine runs, and six RBI across 20 games including 19 starts.

Armando Albert | Infield

Transferring to the Gators this past offseason, Albert quickly made his presence known as one of the most polished defenders on the UF roster. The sure-handed infielder has committed just two errors in 23 games played this season while drawing eight starts in the Gator infield. Albert opened his Florida career with multi-hit performances in two of his first three games and drew a pair of starts in the team’s road series win at Miami. In 36 at-bats, Albert owns seven hits, six runs scored, and four RBI while earning 15 free bases on 10 walks and five hit-by-pitches for a stellar .431 on-base percentage.

Jaylen Guy | Outfield

Having transferred to Florida this past summer, Guy joined the Orange & Blue as a high-caliber defensive outfielder with a knack for making highlight reel plays. That held true with the Gators, as Guy has delivered a perfect 1.000 fielding percentage across 39 chances in the outfield during the 2024 campaign. Playing in 33 games highlighted by 18 starts, Guy has compiled a strong .355 on-base percentage as he has drawn nine walks while striking out just eight times in 62 plate appearances. The speedy outfielder has also stolen two bases while scoring six runs for the Orange & Blue, highlighted by a 2-for-3 night with one walk against No. 4 Texas A&M on March 15.

Dale Thomas | Infield

Transferring to Florida in the summer of 2022, Thomas quickly made an impact as role player and key
clubhouse leader, and his first-career homer helped take down Kentucky in the final game of the 2023
season and solidified the team’s SEC Regular-Season Championship. He appeared in four of Florida’s six
College World Series games in 2023, providing errorless defense at third base for the Orange & Blue.
Thomas has played in 62 games including 42 starts as a Gator, featuring 28 starts in 32 games this
season. All told, he has totaled three home runs, one triple, 10 doubles, 23 runs, 18 RBI and one stolen
base at Florida while fielding at a strong .967 clip across 91 defensive chances.

Thomas graduated from the University of Florida last summer with a master’s degree in entrepreneurship
and earned a certificate in nonprofit leadership from UF this past spring.

Sage Rodefeld | Student Manager

Sage has worked as a manager for the Florida Baseball program since the spring of 2021, rising to the roll of Head Student Manager due to his reliability and work ethic both on and off the field. Sage has spent countless hours assisting with equipment, field maintenance, practice, travel, game day duties and analytics – just to name a few. He graduated from UF this past spring with a degree in sport management and plans to continue his career in collegiate baseball with the end goal of entering the coaching profession. Thank you to Sage and all of our student managers for everything they do for the Orange & Blue behind the scenes.