Back To Base

Nobody on the Nixa High School baseball team was worried when it was announced that last season would be canceled due to the coronavirus, and when the players got the go-ahead to practice they did it just that to salvage a lost year.

“When it was happening, I was always holding out hope that we could have some kind of season,” said head coach Jason Daugherty. “But when it got canceled, a lot of our guys got out there as soon as we were given the clear to work out as a team.”

The workouts dragged into the summer and eventually led to club ball, where many of the players on the team played together to refine their skills for the spring, like junior Ryan Retone, who plays shortstop.

“Over the summer, I worked really hard with Evann Long, who was the shortstop two years ago,” Retone said. “I went to the batting cages and just hit for countless hours with Coach Daugherty and Coach Leonard, and they’ve helped me get stronger as a hitter and an infielder since freshman year.”

Others on the team took more professional ways to fill in the time lost because of the cancellations, as many of the pitchers on the team went to the prestigious Texas Baseball Ranch in Montgomery to work and improve on exactly what they needed for this year.

“Last summer, me and a couple of other teammates went down to the Ranch to learn how to throw harder and to be a more dominant pitcher,” junior pitcher Keith Piepmeier said. “I’ve been doing the stuff they told me to do to help my pitching get better.”

So far, that advice seems to be working to near perfection. In back-to-back starts, Piepmeier gave up just one hit in total, having thrown an eight strikeout no-hitter against Sedalia Smith-Cotton on April 2. He then came out less than a week later on April 8 and gave up one hit while also striking out eight against Parkview.

“This season, I’ve learned how to take one thing at a time, especially when I threw my no-hitter,” Piepmeier said. “I had to take each inning one at a time.”

Retone feels like the biggest thing he’s gained from the past two years is his leadership skills, which have helped him and his teammates grow closer on and off the field.

“Being a junior, I’ve been put into more of a leadership role,” Retone said. “This year I’ve felt more like I was pushed in that direction and the need for me to be that leader the team needs me to be has made me grow those skills more from when I was a freshman.”

Daugherty said he likes having that kind of leadership on his squad, especially from those who know what it’s like to play high school ball from past experience.

“The most important thing for us is getting our players to know the difference between spring and summer baseball because it’s totally different,” Daugherty said. “People who haven’t been in the program that long or haven’t done high school sports don’t really think about how much different the atmosphere is compared to a summer or club season.”

No matter how the season ends for the team, Daugherty and his squad will continue to look for ways to improve.

“I’ll never be satisfied with who we are as a team because there’s so much more room for us to improve on,” Daugherty said. “But I love being around the guys I have and making sure our team does have what it takes to get better every day.”