Michael Braswell 'can be something special' as South Carolina's freshman shortstop

Drew Meyer knew it early on Saturday watching South Carolina’s game against UNC Greensboro.

James Hicks just punched out a batter with the bases loaded to end the second inning, but the former shortstop was focused on what was going on in the background.

There, he saw shortstop Michael Braswell pirouetting and fist-pumping running back to the dugout celebrating the play. He knew then the Gamecocks might have something there.

“I said, ‘Aha.’ It stuck out to me right away,” he told GamecockCentral. “I’m like, ‘I like this.’ That’s the stuff you can control. It’s hard to teach.”

Meyer and the rest of South Carolina’s fan base were introduced to Braswell opening weekend and did not leave disappointed.

The firecracker of a shortstop finished the weekend with four hits, one home run, three walks while also driving in four runs. Tack on the game-winning at-bat Sunday and punching out the side during the 10th inning Sunday in a tie ballgame.

If the dizzying display of talent on the field wasn’t enough to sway South Carolina fans, Braswell also did it with flair, evidenced by the fist-pumping after Hicks’s strikeout and shooting an imaginary bow and arrow Friday night and a unique display of emotion after his strikeouts Sunday.

“Baseball’s a game. At the end of the day—take away all the cameras and the SEC and everything else—it’s a game. The point of the game, in my opinion, is to have fun playing it as well. You have to take it seriously,” Braswell said. “But at the end of the day if you’re not having fun with it, what’s the point?”

With his start on opening day, he becomes just the fourth true freshman to start for South Carolina there since 2000. The only others to do it are Meyer, Reese Havens and Joey Pankake.

He’s in a unique position a year removed from worrying about things like prom. But Braswell seems to be embracing the moment.

“Seeing he can run, he’s smooth in the field, he’s got a quick swing, showed he has a little bit of power,” Pankake said. “I think this guy can be something special if he sticks at it.”

Watching Braswell over the weekend, there’s fearlessness and air of confidence about him hard to find in freshmen.

It’s something his teammates also noticed from the minute he set foot on campus and it’s showing up early in the Gamecocks’ year.

“Personally I don’t think I’ve seen a freshman have so much confidence in himself than Michael does,” Andrew Eyster said. “It’s just rare. We all appreciate it as a team. We’re getting to see what he can really bring.”

Shortstop is one of the more high-profile positions on the field. To be able to shoulder that, even early in the season, as a freshman can be hard. Confidence and knowing the work he puts in daily becomes the natural fall back then.

And when a shortstop is that confident and easy to root for, as left fielder Matt Hogan said, it can galvanize an entire team. Not to mention the fact he can trot out to the mound and run a fastball up there in the low-90s for South Carolina’s pitching staff.

“It’s huge,” Pankake said. “People feed off that and you’re able to pick up other teammates. If someone is up there doing really well against the team, all it takes is one hard-hit ball. It’s like ‘All right, this guy is hittable.’ Other players are going to feed off that.”

Things are still very early in the season and one good weekend in non-conference play isn’t going to define a career. But Braswell showed enough through the first 27 innings to create a buzz at shortstop Meyer’s been waiting on for a while.

“I’ve been wanting an athletic, playmaker, game-changer type of shortstop at South Carolina,” he said. “We all do. We haven’t quite seen that in the past. We’ve had some solid players. But I’m talking about a game-changer that fans walk in the gate and want to see what he’s going to do today.”

The next chance Braswell gets to put on a show is Tuesday night against Winthrop (4 p.m., SEC Network Plus). Cade Austin (0-0, 32.40 ERA) gets the start opposite Winthrop’s Carter Sutton (0-0, 27.00 ERA).

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