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'He's an absolute unit': Cole Messina continuing to be great all-around player for South Carolina

imageby:Jack Veltri05/08/24

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Mark Kingston, Previewing South Carolina-Georgia baseball series

With the way Cole Messina has been playing recently, it’s getting harder and harder to find ways to pitch to him.

Over the last two weeks, the junior catcher has been tearing the cover off the baseball. He’s had 15 hits in his last 25 at-bats. And he’s currently on a seven-game hitting streak, dating back to April 27.

There’s a lot of reasons behind what’s working so well for Messina right now. But in Mark Kingston’s opinion, he thinks his mechanics are about as good as they can be.

“I think he has really locked into where he needs to be and what his thought process needs to be, which leads to the right physical mechanics,” Kingston said. “He’s just in a really good spot right now and hopefully that carries on through the rest of the season.”

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During this brief hitting streak, Messina has been on a home run barrage, sending five balls over the fence with 15 RBI. It all really came together this past week when he earned SEC Player of the Week honors for his efforts.

He finished last week 9-for-14 with seven runs scored, two doubles, a triple, three home runs, two stolen bases and 10 RBI. On the year, he’s batting a team-best .314 with 15 homers and 50 RBI.

And it’s not just what he’s doing at the plate that’s drawing so much attention. It’s easy to forget he’s also one of the better defensive catchers in the SEC.

“Well, behind the plate defensively, he’s been regarded as one of the best in the country all year,” Kingston said. “And I think that’s warranted. He’s done a great job of when he gets chance to control the run game. He does a great job with pitch framing when there are borderline pitches.”

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Messina is playing just as good as he was last year. And he should be on track to be better with a few weeks left to go in the season. He owns a .990 fielding percentage with only four errors and six passed balls. He’s thrown out nine runners in 31 stolen base attempts, which is one better than how he finished last season.

“I mean, he’s an absolute unit behind there,” fellow catcher Dalton Reeves said. “He’s blocking everything, throwing guys out. He’s about as fundamentally sound of a catcher as you can have.”

For Reeves, who’s in the midst of his first season at South Carolina, has been nothing short of impressed with the job Messina has done.

“Even though he’s younger than me, he’s played at this level for two years now and this is his third year,” Reeves said. “I’ve been able to kind of tap into his experience as well as my own and develop my game behind him.”

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