TCU baseball, Schlossnagle eager to watch prized recruit perform

Jim Schlossnagle can’t wait to see what Luken Baker can do for TCU baseball.

So he’s not going to wait.

The TCU coach scheduled a scrimmage for Sunday against Abilene Christian, giving him a chance to see Baker — a 6-foot-4, 265-pound freshman power pitcher and hitter that is the prize of the recruiting class — and almost 20 other new faces in live action.

Schlossnagle wants to learn all he can as early as he can about a team returning only four regulars and four pitchers from last season’s College World Series team.

But he knows what Baker can do. The high school phenom went 12-0 with a 1.02 ERA and batted .448 with eight home runs as a senior at Class 6A Conroe Oak Ridge. He was the 2014-15 Gatorade National Player of the Year, the first from Texas since Clayton Kershaw. He would have been one of the first players taken in the Major League Draft had he not been so firm in his commitment to TCU.

But now the Frogs have him for three years, at least. And Sunday, in a 1 p.m. scrimmage free and open to the public, they will get their first chance to see a hint of what they have on their hands.

“He’s a pretty special player,” Schlossnagle said. “So far, he’s got that combination of confidence and humility that all the great ones have. We’re certainly going to ask a lot of him.”

What, exactly?

“He’s going to pitch, probably as a starting pitcher, and he’ll be in the lineup every day, either as a DH, pitcher or first baseman,” Schlossnagle said.

That will make Baker a rarity. Few players hit and pitch after high school.

“It doesn’t happen often, but there’s certainly plenty of precedent — guys like Todd Helton and Mark Kotsay,” Schlossnagle said. “There’s some special guys out there, and I think he — at least after one week, or one month of working out — has a chance to be as special as any one of them.”

TCU, like everyone else, recruited Baker to pitch and hit, Schlossnagle said.

“If you would have polled 30 big-league teams, you might have had half that were going to draft him as a pitcher and half that were going to take him as a hitter,” Schlossnagle said. “Part of the reason he came to college is to try to figure out which one beyond college is going to be the best for him.”

Baker is ready to try the plate and mound.

“That’s the plan,” he said. “Obviously [I’ve] got to go out and earn a spot every day coming out here and doing what I need to do to earn that. But that’s the plan. That’s what I’m looking forward to.”

Teammates are already convinced.

“It’s not fair, that guy,” sophomore DH Connor Wanhanen said with a big smile. “I’ve gotten to see him on the mound a few times. He’s got great stuff. Watching him hit, his first at-bat here in an intrasquad, he hit an absolute screaming line drive over the second baseman’s head. So he’s not all power; he’s got some feel in the box, too.”

Baker said he was sold on TCU because of the coaching staff and the way it has developed major-league players. Schlossnagle said it started with frank discussions about the pros and cons of college and pro baseball.

“Talents like that don’t normally end up in college,” Schlossnagle said. “But as we went through the process, both the recruiting process and after that when we spent a lot of time trying to educate him on college baseball and the professional draft, he and his parents both understood the value of college, understood the value of college baseball, understood the value of a degree.”

Professional baseball bought Baker’s words. His name went uncalled until the 37th round by the Houston Astros. No one risked a high pick or offered guaranteed millions in an attempt to lure him.

“He was saying all the right things, as much as anybody ever has,” Schlossnagle said. “But it only takes one team. Yeah, we’re delighted to have him.”

This story was originally published October 2, 2015 at 7:51 AM with the headline "TCU baseball, Schlossnagle eager to watch prized recruit perform."