I thought I'd chime in as mine experienced both success and a few surprises during the fall at the University of Georgia. He was recruited as an outfielder but to his surprise about a third way through the fall they wanted to look at him on the mound. Granted, he does throw really hard (in the 90's) but it was still a surprise. If that were not interesting enough then apprx. half way thru the fall they decided to slide him behind the plate. Now keep in mind, the whole time he's still doing all of his work with the outfielders in practice but now was double dipping in the fall also participating in the workouts for pitchers and catchers. I have to admit he was pretty exhausted at the end of every day but he was loving it.
As everyone is aware there was a lot of talk about all the freshman that were signed but I must give credit to those young freshman, they were not intimidated at all and came out in the fall during the pups vs. dawgs series, pups being the freshman and the dawgs being the rest of the team (returnees) and the pups simply destroyed the dawgs blowing them out in fact in several of their games. I was very pleased with what I saw talent wise and there is a lot of speed in that freshman group which will complement some of the power returning in the older fellas nicely.
In the end when the fall was complete Georgia also had sit down meetings w/ the players individually. However, Georgia does three evaluations on their players, they do a player self evaluation, their teammates do an evaluation on each other and then of course the coaches evaluation. In the end we were very excited as they informed him that he had made the 25-man travel squad as an outfielder and 3rd team catcher. They really love him behind the plate, they know he can play the outfield anytime, it'll be very interesting to see how the season unfolds. They have not promised him anything except that he'll have his opportunities to prove himself both in the outfield and behind the plate this season. It should be a very exciting year of baseball.
As an interesting side note to the above.....the GA coaches had no clue that my boy was a catcher all the way thru his freshman year in high school. In fact I don't know many that are aware of that, how interesting would it be that he goes back to his natural spot on the field even with all the success he's had in the outfield. The great thing is mine just wants to play, put him in the outfield he's ready, put him behind the plate he's ready, just put him in and he'll do what he has to do.
jbb and coach may good to hear your boys are doing well and I wish them all the best and best of luck to all the incoming freshman for a fun and exciting season ahead.