Right-handed pitcher Jordan Coons, who would have been a senior this year, decided after last season not to return to the Coastal Carolina program, coach Gary Gilmore confirmed Wednesday.
Coons led the Chanticleers with a 1.38 ERA in 2011 while going 5-3 in 45 2/3 innings after transferring to Coastal from Jefferson College (Mo.).
But he wanted the opportunity to play every day as a third baseman and told Gilmore he was going to pursue an opportunity elsewhere to make that happen.
“He wanted to be a position guy,” Gilmore said. “He had been a two-way guy in junior college, came here and we just thought he had a chance to be at least a senior draft pick pitching guy. At the end of the year, he said, ‘Coach, I just hate sitting over there for five days a week. ... I want to play somewhere every day. There’s some NAIA schools that I can go back home and play [at].’”
Coons pitched the championship game of the Big South tournament, holding Gardner-Webb to three hits over seven scoreless innings, and likely would have had a prominent role on the pitching staff in 2012.
“If that’s where his heart was, that’s what he ought to do,” Gilmore said of Coons’ decision. “Heck, he is a great kid. I thought if he had stayed, he would have ended up being a draft pick guy. He really came on at the end of last year.”
Infielders K.J. McAllister and Zach Lopes also did not return to the program. McAllister and Lopes had just 55 at-bats between them as freshmen last year.
The Chants are in the midst of fall practices right now. Check online Wednesday night or in Thursday's newspaper for Gilmore's thoughts on the roster as it looks now.
| Ryan Young, ryoung@thesunnews.com
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