The Marshalltown High School baseball team has been trying to build back its proud tradition, but there has barely been enough pieces to begin assembling a foundation.
First-year head coach Colton Hanke likes the materials he has to work with, but numbers are once again sparse for the Bobcats’ boys of summer.
With a roster of just 20 players from grades 12-8, Marshalltown begins its new season tonight with a non-conference, varsity-only contest at South Tama.
“You just try and do what’s been done in the past and stay consistent and true to that as much as possible,” said Hanke, a 2015 MHS graduate and former all-conference pitcher. “It starts at the top and hopefully the older guys are taking the younger guys beneath their wing. I can’t express that enough where the guys have been doing what needs to be done so this thing continues to build and grow as we progress throughout the years.”
Hanke is the second former Bobcat who played for long-time head coach Steve Hanson to take the reins at his alma mater. Allen Mann was the interim head coach for the 2023 season as Hanke assumed the coach-in-waiting status while completing the school year and baseball season at Sherrard High School in Sherrard, Ill.
Since taking over the program he played in, Hanke has put an emphasis on doing things a certain way, and he’s had a core group of experienced ballplayers to help get that accomplished.
Seniors Caleb Kusserow and Dale Greene, and juniors Sam Greazel, Tayven Dutton and Zander Stupp have served as Hanke’s leaders since last season ended.
“Really we’re just trying to recreate from what it was with Coach Hanson and implementing that stuff again because a lot of it was done right and we’re trying to uphold that standard of doing it the right way and being consistent in what we do,” Hanke said. “I really appreciate what those guys have done. Even though three of them are juniors, they really blend together like a group of seniors.
“That group has really been helpful to make sure everything gets followed through and that helps with the younger kids buying back into it.”
Marshalltown’s last winning season was Hanson’s last at the helm in 2019, when the Bobcats went 23-18. Last year’s six-win total matched the best summer under the sun since then.
That small but savvy group of upperclassmen have been and will be pivotal in turning the program back around again.
“They’ve been very active in the offseason,” Hanke said. “They’ve been great role models for those younger guys. Even though we’re a smaller group with 20 guys total, it is a group that kind of clicks together because those older guys are holding the younger guys accountable and making sure they’re in the right spot and everything’s meshing together and I’m really looking forward to what Monday has to bring.”
The Bobcats bring back a pair of honorable mention all-Iowa Alliance Conference selections in Kusserow and Greazel. Kusserow has and will continue to serve as the team’s primary catcher, while Greazel is the team’s starting shortstop when he’s not pitching.
Stupp pitched 44 1/3 innings a year ago — roughly 30 percent of the team’s innings — and will be the Bobcats’ game-one starter. Dutton is a utility player who will spend his time defending all over the diamond, whether it be a corner infield position or somewhere in the outfield.
Greene hasn’t played baseball since eighth grade but is taking one last swing at the game in his senior summer. A starter on the Marshalltown boys’ tennis team, Greene will roam center field most of the time he’s in the lineup, and looked like an everyday player during the Bobcats’ intrasquad scrimmage last Friday night.
“He’s gotten a couple practices in since tennis so he’s just trying to find the groove of what it was,” Hanke said. “He’s taken four years off and it makes a difference, but in the grand scheme of things defensively he hasn’t lost a beat on it. He’s athletic and once he gets some reps in, he’ll come around.”
The next wave of players includes sophomores Yordanie Mella, Ernesto Fonseca and Jiancarlo Lopez. Mella is the team’s only left-handed bat and has the arm to contribute on the mound while also playing a corner outfield spot.
Freshmen JJ Schoenfelder, Gavin Freiberg, Tre Gilliland, Wyatt Peters, Jayden Miller, Luke Stalzer and Robert Santos will have the opportunity to play, as will eighth-graders Ashton Wright, Bennett Ricken, Garrett Thede, Oliver Young and Daylyn Davis.
Stalzer should get the call as the starting second baseman and Schoenfelder will take up at third base as well as a backup catcher role.
“Everybody has a chance to play,” Hanke said. “If you’re a younger guy … you have a chance with us being low in numbers. Pitching is probably going to be the biggest strain for us, but everybody has a really good chance of playing from top to bottom.”
Hanke acknowleged that while finding the right building blocks to start a foundation doesn’t deter the Bobcats from trying to have as much success now while they continue to look to the future.
“For this whole thing to get turned around, it takes one group to stick it out, be consistent, continue to do the right things and then things will start to roll in the future years for Marshalltown baseball,” he said. “The bummer is we’ve only got the two seniors but we definitely can’t take them for granted so it’s just working together and making sure everybody’s on the same page so we can get the most out of this season and see what we can do for the next year. I am more worried about the now part because what we do now is going to have a bigger impact on the future.”
Win, lose or rain, Hanke hopes this small group sets the tone for the future no matter the outcome.
“It’s more about mental toughness and just being willing to compete,” he said. “If you’re willing to compete top down, then that gives you a chance to win and then the wins will come from that. If the kids are willing to get after it the next day even if they go 0-for-4 with four strikeouts, if they’re willing to come back to the field, that’ll take care of the wins itself because that’s what’s going to build this program back.
“We need guys who are willing to get their hands dirty and have that mentality of ‘yeah, give me the ball. I want the ball again. Get me back out there so I can give us a chance.'”