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BYU Baseball: Hale and Wood earn All-WCC honors

By Shaun Gordon

BOSTON, MA - JUNE 24: Home plate and the batters box are seen before the interleague game between the Boston Red Sox and the Atlanta Braves at Fenway Park on June 23, 2012 in Boston, Massachusetts. (Photo by Winslow Townson/Getty Images)
BOSTON, MA - JUNE 24: Home plate and the batters box are seen before the interleague game between the Boston Red Sox and the Atlanta Braves at Fenway Park on June 23, 2012 in Boston, Massachusetts. (Photo by Winslow Townson/Getty Images) /
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Brock Hale and Jordan Wood earned All-WCC First Team honors for 2018, even as BYU Baseball finished conference play in a last-place tie.

Two bright spots have emerged from an otherwise forgettable BYU Baseball season.

On Tuesday, both Brock Hale and Jordan Wood earned First Team All-WCC honors. They’re the only two Cougars to receive any All-WCC honors at all after BYU’s last-place conference finish.

Hale earned the honor after leading the Cougars in nearly every offensive category. The junior outfielder was BYU’s best in batting average (.342), runs (39), hits (66), doubles (15), home runs (8), runs batted in (31), and stolen bases (7).

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On the other side, Wood was BYU’s most reliable pitcher. The junior went 5-4 with a 2.66 earned run average, and led the Cougars with 63 strikeouts in 94.2 innings.

While these two Cougars shined, to say that BYU Baseball’s season was disappointing would be an understatement. The Cougars topped the WCC preseason poll, but finished the season tied for last in the conference. BYU went 22-28 overall and 11-16 in conference play. Only Pacific had as bad of a record in the WCC. The Cougars and Tigers faced off in the final weekend, and BYU lost two out of three to drop them into that last-place tie.

Aside from Hale, the Cougars failed to score runs consistently. The “Bat Cats” from 2017 packed about as much punch as kittens in 2018.

That same lack of consistency doomed BYU’s pitching. Outside of Wood the pitching was erratic, and more than half of the Cougar staff finished with an ERA above 5.00.

Both Hale and Wood are juniors, and there’s a good chance they’ll both get looks in the upcoming draft.

If they don’t go pro, they’ll return as seniors in 2019, looking to help the Cougars rebound from a miserable 2018 campaign.

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