UK baseball alumni moving up in the ranks

While the majority of the Bluegrass spent the week fretting about who would and wouldn’t be present on next season’s basketball roster another hallowed sporting event took place: Major League Baseball’s Opening Day.

Lost in the questions of what point guard will lead the Cats and what high school All-American had committed or decommitted from UK were questions about the performance of the Yankees’ big-ticket additions and the Cubs’ century-old championship drought.

Local fans were even daring to ask if the Cincinnati Reds, yes those Reds, might follow their upstart rotation and youthful offense to contention for the first time in a decade.

By this point you might be wondering why a columnist charged with writing about UK sports is opining about a professional league with no immediate local connection.

But don’t fret: The UK connection is there; it’s just under the surface. Monday’s opening slate of Major League games saw former UK star Brandon Webb honored with the Opening Day start for the Arizona Diamondbacks. Webb, who led the majors with 22 wins last season and won the 2006 Cy Young Award, has become the poster boy for UK’s recent baseball success.

Webb joins World Champion Joe Blanton of the Phillies and Toronto Blue Jays left-handed pitcher Scott Downs as UK alumni currently in the majors. The Cats also boasted 15 alumni on minor league rosters at the end of the 2008 season.

Former Cats first baseman Ryan Strieby led the Florida State League with 29 home runs in 2008 and will open the 2009 season with the AA Erie SeaWolves. Outfielder John Shelby hit .295 for Winston-Salem to earn postseason Carolina League All-Star honors and a No. 10 ranking on Baseball America’s list of the Chicago White Sox best prospects.

Outfielder Colin Cowgill checked in at No. 9 on the Arizona Diamondbacks’ top prospects list after leading the Northwest League with 11 home runs despite just playing in just 20 games before being promoted to low-A South Bend. Cowgill’s UK teammate Sawyer Carroll finished ninth in batting in the Northwest League and also earned a promotion to Class A Fort Wayne for the Midwest League playoffs.

We all have heard the countless breakdowns of the so-called “drop-in talent” on the UK men’s basketball roster. The talent on the roster in recent years hasn’t been up to UK’s historic standards according to many fans and pundits.

The basketball Cats currently boast nine alumni on NBA rosters. Each of the three McDonald’s All-Americans from Tubby Smith’s top-ranked 2004 recruiting class has found his way onto a roster, but the majority of the UK alumni in the NBA are seasoned veterans by now.

All this information begs the question: Has baseball surpassed basketball as the professional sport with the heavier tint of UK blue?

A simple math lesson shows that the NBA still outnumbers MLB in UK alumni 6-3, but the UK alumni currently working their way through the minors might have something to say about that. Two former Cats are ranked on Baseball America’s top ten prospects list for their respective organizations, and four are ranked in their organization’s top 30.

The current talented UK baseball roster seems a good bet to keep UK’s recent string of strong professionals going, and the new basketball regime looks poised to replenish NBA rosters after acquiring a commitment from one McDonald’s All-American (DeMarcus Cousins) in the first two weeks on the job.

The growing number of UK alumni in all professional sports speaks about the progress of the athletic department as a whole, but during MLB’s opening week, you can’t help but feel like the UK team with the greatest professional impact plays not on the hardcourt, but on the diamond.

Jon Hale is a journalism senior. E-mail jhale@kykernel.com.