Edwardsville pitcher Mark Smith commits to Missouri
Edwardsville High junior pitcher Mark Smith still hasn’t thrown a pitch on the varsity for the Tigers, but he has a baseball scholarship to the University of Missouri.
Smith made a verbal commitment Saturday and the hard-throwing 6-foot-4, 225-pound right-hander couldn’t be happier. He will be able to sign with the Tigers next November.
“It was just the coaching staff and being around all the players,” Smith said of his visits to the Columbia, Mo., campus and home of the Southeastern Conference team. “They make you feel like you’re already there. When I got on campus I just knew that was the place for me. I’d visited other places, but when I got to Mizzou I knew that waswhere I wanted to go.”
Smith will eventually join a long list of former Edwardsville players that found success at Missouri, including Dane Opel, Nathan Culp and Evan Frey. All three played in the minor leagues after playing for the Tigers, a path Smith would also like to follow.
“He’s a kid that throws hard and he’s a great athlete,” Edwardsville High baseball coach Tim Funkhouser said. “He’s got a real high ceiling. It will be fun continuing to watch him improve and get up there in speed.”
When I got on campus I just knew that was the place for me. I’d visited other places, but when I got to Mizzou I knew that was where I wanted to go.
Mark Smith
Smith, whose fastball routinely hits 89 to 91 mph on a radar gun, made a lot of progress this summer pitching for the St. Louis Pirates travel team and working with former Ole Miss closer and Pirates pitching coach Brett Huber.
“(Missouri) came and watched me over the summer a couple of times and I’ve already run down there a couple of times, too,” said Smith, also a standout basketball player at Edwardsville and the team’s second-leading scorer this season at 14.4 points per game. I always had love for basketball and baseball, I really never had a favorite sport.
“Whatever season it’s in, that’s my favorite sport.”
Smith said he also had a scholarship offer from Missouri State and had spoken with South Carolina, Cincinnati, Ole Miss and Illinois State, among others.
Missouri has one of the top collegiate pitching prospects in the country in former Collinsville High right-hander Tanner Houck. Houck, a sophomore for the Tigers, knows the Smith family well since Smith’s mother was his physical education teacher in Collinsville.
Smith has dealt with control issue in the past, but said things began to smooth out late this summer.
“The last three tournaments of the summer is when I started to figure it out,” he said.
Funkhouser believes Smith’s potential is nearly limitless.
“If he figures it out, you might be talking about a guy that gets drafted his senioor year of high school,” Funkhouser said.
Edwardsville’s senior baseball recruits include pitcher Trey Riley (Oklahoma State), outfielder Collin Clayton (John A. Logan junior college), outfielder Cole Cimarolli (Quincy) and pitcher Jake Garella (Mobile).
Norm Sanders: 618-239-2454, @NormSanders
This story was originally published December 6, 2015 at 8:35 PM with the headline "Edwardsville pitcher Mark Smith commits to Missouri."