ATLANTA — Friday marked the official beginning of the 2023 campaign for Georgia Tech baseball as they held their first full team practice.
"We're all fired up right now," infielder John Giesler said. "We've been practicing the last couple weeks, but get the uniform on today. Whole team together. It means a lot."
Despite many of these players returning from a successful season on The Flats in which the Yellow Jackets were ranked inside the Top 25 for much of the season, the players still get those preseason nerves as they finally get back out there for when it actually counts.
"Everyone, no matter how long they've been doing it, still gets the jitters before going out there," catcher Jack Rubenstein said. "We've been working really hard for a long time building up to the season and so I think there is certainly a lot of energy out here today"
This team lost plenty of talent from last year's team. Most notably, highly-touted catcher Kevin Parada went in the first round of the 2022 Major League Baseball First Year Player Draft. The Jackets know they'll have to handle their business in a different way this season.
"Last year we could go eight deep and all of them have a chance to hit a home run. A lot of those guys obviously are gone," head coach Danny Hall said. "We need to be a way better pitching team and play way better defense."
Georgia Tech opens up their season at home on Feb. 17 against Miami of Ohio at Russ Chandler Stadium.
