Jerzembeck, home runs help South Carolina to midweek blowout of Winthrop

The bleachers at Founders Park lay mostly empty on Tuesday afternoon. A smattering of fans littered the concourses and the garnet seats down either baseline, but early start time and increasingly cool temperatures as the night wore on left even the most dedicated tailgaters at home.

The seats directly behind home plate, though, were packed. An army of radar guns and backpacks were tucked between the plastic chairs, where double-digit major league scouts were on hand to see starter Eli Jerzembeck help No. 23 South Carolina (4-0) to a 19-3 win against Winthrop (3-1).

“You see the talent,” head coach Mark Kingston said postgame. “You see the elite fastball. You see the the command of all his off-speed pitches. He didn’t walk a batter. ... Some good things out of Eli tonight.”

It only takes a batter or two to see why those representing baseball’s best clubs were on hand for an otherwise nondescript midweek game between Southeastern Conference and Big South squads.

Jerzembeck, the No. 63 player in Perfect Game’s 2022 class rankings, fired a first pitch breaking ball low and in on Winthrop leadoff hitter CJ Conrad. He followed that with fastball clocked at 94 miles per hour in on Conrad’s hands.

Riding that mix of steady fastballs and slippery breaking-balls, Jerzembeck rolled through his first three innings of work as the offense piled up six runs behind him.

He retired three of his first four batters, the lone blemish a first-inning double to right field via Eagles right fielder Ricky Teel. Jerzembeck followed the first frame of his South Carolina career with similar stuff, working through a 1-2-3 inning — the final out coming on a low and away breaking-ball strikeout of Winthrop catcher Ty Hooks.

With temperatures dipping from 80 degrees at first pitch to the 60s by night’s end, Jerzembeck remained plenty hot. He retired the side in 1-2-3 fashion in the third inning on six pitches.

“I think I was just excited the whole time,” Jerzembeck said. “I was just really excited to be out there, I mean, the whole time.”

The freshman righty slowed some as his pitch count climbed into the fourth inning. Jerzembeck surrendered a pair of singles and a double over his first four batters of the fourth inning. A mound visit from pitching coach Justin Parker followed.

Kingston quipped postgame Jerzembeck, at times, sped himself up, forgetting to look at the wrist watch that signaled what pitch he was to throw before he stepped onto the rubber.

Jerzembeck responded to the brief meeting with vigor — forcing a ground out and recording his fourth strikeout of the afternoon to end the threat.

“His temperament is always a challenge, but that’s what makes him him,” Kingston said. “... We don’t ask our guys to be robots. We want their personalities to come out. We want them to be who they are. But then you have to keep that within a framework of what do we need in this moment as a pitcher in a big moment. And, again, he calmed down. He made big pitches and he got out of a jam.”

Where Jerzembeck coasted early before a brief hiccup, the South Carolina offense continued its historic start to the 2023 season with a hitting display that’d make the Murderer’s Row New York Yankees blush.

Evan Petry clocked two home runs, the 16th and 18th of the 19 long balls the Gamecocks have hit through four games this season. Braylen Wimmer, Cole Messina and Caleb Denny followed suit with homers of their own.

The start, albeit in three contests against UMass-Lowell and a Winthrop squad that won just 18 games a year ago, is a vast change from the 2022 campaign in which South Carolina consistently struggled to piece together enough offensively to compete as its pitching staff crumbled amid injuries.

“Preseason this year, I mean, I got it by truck. Like, I couldn’t find it,” said Petry, who finished 3-for-4 with four RBIs. “I worked with Monte (Lee), Coach (Mike) Current, (Scott) Wingo, Kingston, we all figured out what was wrong. It was just all mental. And mentally I became stronger.”

Leaving the bump after 62 pitches and four innings of work on Tuesday, Jerzembeck did plenty to inspire confidence those MLB scouts gathered at Founders Park will return for another glimpse.

Those scouts, more years than not, wouldn’t have had to travel to Columbia at all to see him pitch. After teams didn’t meet Jerzembeck’s signing bonus asks in the 2022 MLB Draft, he spurned professional ball to spend at least the next two seasons at South Carolina.

He now becomes a cog in what should be as deep a pitching staff as there is in college baseball, albeit on a pitch count around 60 right now, he said.

Will Sanders and Noah Hall are as good a 1-2 punch as exists in the SEC, while Jack Mahoney was borderline untouchable in his Sunday debut. That leaves Jerzembeck and last year’s initial No. 2 James Hicks, who underwent Tommy John surgery after his second start in 2022, to likely split the midweek contests this spring.

At this rate, those seats along the first and third base lines don’t feel like they’ll be empty much longer.