WEST POINT, Ala. – There will now be a pair of Warriors on the field at Troy University for this year’s Alabama Baseball Coaches Association All-Star Event. West Point’s Eli Folds received an invitation to the 21st annual event along with teammate Aubry Cleghorn who will be making his second appearance at the ALABCA event.
Folds put together an excellent start to his junior season on the mound, posting a 0.92 ERA with four saves, collecting 23 strikeouts and holding batters to a .205 batting average before the school year was cut short. Warriors Head Coach Drew Bryson is excited to have two of his standouts participating in this year’s event and has been very excited to see Folds develop into a real asset on the mound over the last couple of years.
“We are extremely excited for Eli and the opportunity he has to join Aubry at Troy in July and represent himself and the program at the ALABCA All-Star Event. As a sophomore, Eli was a great surprise for us on the mound. We knew he had a live arm and great stuff we just didn’t know exactly where he would fit into the pitching rotation,” Bryson said. “We threw him in the fire out of the gate and slotted him into the closer’s role. He’s a different breed of player on the mound that performs better in the pressure situations and really embraced that role and was big for us in being someone we could give the ball and to and go get us those last three to six outs of a ball game. He’s been off to a great start this summer and we expect him to continue to develop into a great player.”
Eli is happy to get a chance to play some more baseball this year and not only will he be with a teammate that’s been at the event before, he’ll get the chance to impress some new people on the mound.
“I’m excited to show off some of my skills to some other people outside of the community and to play for some scouts. I’m just excited to have the opportunity to play at Troy. I’ve been keeping up with travel ball recently, so I’ve been getting back into the groove of baseball and it feels really good,” Folds said. “I’m happy to get to go with Aubry because we’ve been teammates these last couple years and just got our season cut short, so it’ll be really funny to have someone down there that I’m teammates with.”
Folds was an effective weapon on the mound for West Point last spring but he’s still looking for new ways to develop his game even further this offseason.
“I’ve been trying to work on a changeup, I’ve got to add a changeup to my selection,” Folds said. “I need to be a three-pitch guy and I’ve been using two because I’ve been a closer and you don’t really need a ton of pitches. So, I’ve really just been trying to add a changeup and work the strike zone.”
This year’s event is scheduled for July 7-10 at Troy University.
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